One of the main Algerian youth movements has just been dissolved. On October 13, the Algiers administrative court put an end to the existence of the Rassemblement Actions Jeunesse (RAJ).
This NGO had been at the forefront of the pro-democracy movement Hirak. This decision is a “shock” for human rights activists. Reactions of Said Salhi, vice-president of the Algerian League for the Defense of Human Rights.
Said Salhi does not hide his anger. Reached by telephone, the vice-president of the Algerian League for the Defense of Human Rights accuses the Algerian regime of continuing its repression against Hirak, the pro-democracy movement.
“It shocks me”, testifies Said Salhi.
It is a relentlessness on an association that symbolizes the achievements of the revolution of 1988. Said Salhi, vice-president of the Algerian League for the Defense of Human Rights
The human rights activist recalls that the association was born in the years following the first youth revolt in 1988 against the Algerian regime. The dissolution of the RAJ is a “relentlessness on an association which symbolizes the achievements of the revolution of 1988”, notes Said Sahli.
The Ministry of the Interior had requested the dissolution of the RAJ from the administrative court. The Algerian government accuses the youth movement “of acting in violation of the law on associations”. In a press release published at the end of September, the RAJ rejected these accusations “based essentially on the public activities of the association during the Hirak”.
Several members of RAJ, in particular its president Abdelouahab Fersaoui, aged 39, had already been the subject of legal proceedings. Up to nine of them had been imprisoned, including its former president, Hakim Addad.
Arrested in October 2019 during a demonstration in support of Hirak detainees, Abdelouahab Fersaoui was sentenced a few months later to one year in prison for “attacking the integrity of the national territory”. He served six months in prison between the end of 2019 and May 2020.
The RAJ, under the leadership of Abdelouahab Fersaoui, played an important role in the organization of the conference on June 15, 2019. This conference brought together a large number of political and civil society actors active in the Hirak to define it. the political roadmap. He explained it in an interview with the Algerian daily El Watan in May 2021: “Today, we need more than ever to capitalize on the two years of the popular movement, to meet, to exchange to be able to bring closer the visions of the actors and the forces of the Hirak remained faithful, to create junctions and synergies. We practically all have the same objective, but each one expresses it in his own way “.
The movement is hope for Algerian youth. Said Salhi, LADDH
The RAJ, reminds us of Said Salhi, of the LADDH, which was founded in 1993. The movement represents, according to the human rights activist, “a hope for Algerian youth”. This association “does a remarkable job” and offers an alternative to those who “seek a suicidal path by crossing the sea” he adds. But even more, the RAJ had a strong implication in the Hirak “as an actor of cohesion of the civil society”. He was an “outstretched hand”, a “negotiating space” between movements and power. And obviously, the power does not want any more of that: “We live a situation of regression”.
The RAJ is not the only target, according to Said Salhi. The SOS Bab El Oued association and several political movements such as the Socialist Workers’ Party and the Union for Change and Progress have been questioned or dissolved, or their leaders imprisoned.
For its part, the association said in a statement that it would not give up its fight and that its lawyers will appeal the decision: “Despite this unjust and aberrant decision, the RAJ will fight and defend the association so that it continues to exist on the ground.”
More than 200 people are currently imprisoned in Algeria for political reasons according to the National Committee for the release of detainees.
