As every Friday since the resumption of the protest movement, on February 22, the protesters launched slogans hostile to the power and the army, the pillar of the regime.
They do not disarm. The Hirak pro-democracy movement marches in Algeria were marked on Friday March 26 by dozens of arrests across the country, according to human rights organizations.
The Algerian League for the Defense of Human Rights (LADDH) reported “dozens of arrests in several wilayas [prefectures] in Algiers, Blida, Tiaret and Relizane”. Most of those arrested were released at the end of the day, she said.
“The LADDH, while expressing its full solidarity with the Hirak movement, denounces this repression and reiterates its call for an end to the repression and demonization of Hirak, and recalls respect for public freedoms and human rights”, said the vice-president of the League, Saïd Salhi.
In Algiers, the Iraqi activist Mohamed Tadjadit, a former detainee, and three students were arrested at the end of the weekly demonstration which brought together thousands of people in the center of the capital, announced the National Committee for the release of detainees. (CNLD), an association supporting prisoners of conscience.
“The activist and poet Mohamed Tajadit arrested at the end of the demonstration (…) in the rue Didouche Mourad in Algiers-center, and boarded a white Toyota, no news of him”, tweeted the independent journalist Khaled Drareni.
In addition, the security forces dispersed, using liquid gas spray, the demonstrators in Oran (north-west) as well as in the neighboring town of Mostaganem from the start of the parade, said a local journalist under on condition of anonymity.
Marches also took place in Tizi Ouzou, Bouira and Béjaïa, cities of Kabylie (northeast), as well as in Constantine and Annaba (east), according to images posted on social networks. Gatherings are in principle prohibited due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Like every Friday since the Hirak took over on February 22, the protesters – the number of which is difficult to assess in the absence of official figures – launched slogans hostile to the government and the army, the mainstay of the regime.
They castigated the decision of President Abdelmadjid Tebboune to hold early parliamentary elections on June 12 in an attempt to respond to the serious political and socio-economic crisis affecting the most populous country in the Maghreb.
Illustration of the daily difficulties of Algerians: an empty oil bottle held by a fishing rod, brandished by a Hirakist, echoing the shortage of table oil and the high price of sardines, two basic food products.
“No elections with the Band [in power],” chanted the procession through the streets of Algiers. “Algeria is the only country in the world to want to organize elections without a people,” lamented a protester, Aziz Boucheban. “The Barracks, through its civil facade, summons the official electorate, and the People respond with the real electorate in the street”, summed up this 33-year-old trader.
Use of a 3rd ballot since the end of 2019
Faced with the popular protest that persists, despite divisions, the regime appears determined to apply its “road map”, namely the use of a third ballot since the end of 2019, by remaining deaf to the aspirations of the Hirak and by alternating gestures of appeasement and repression. The presidential election of December 2019 and the constitutional referendum of November 2020 were sanctioned by record abstention rates.
Born in February 2019 from the massive rejection of a 5th term of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, helpless and reclusive, the Hirak calls for a radical change in the political “system” in place since the country’s independence in 1962, synonymous in his eyes with corruption , nepotism and authoritarianism.
“The Algerian people have decided that they want civilian, not military governance,” said Kamel, a 59-year-old civil servant. “We have been patient since 1962 and it is as if we have not experienced independence. Now is our independence God willing, “he added.
The unprecedented popular movement in Algeria is peaceful, plural – from secularists to Islamists – and without any real leadership or political structure to date. This earned him criticism for his lack of unity and political proposals.
With AFP
