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Algeria
Return to Authoritarianism, January 11, 1992
The coup, led by the minister of defense Major General Khaled
Nezzar, soon returned Algeria to an extremely tense state. Military
troops were put on alert throughout the country, tanks and armored
cars were deployed throughout Algiers, and military checkpoints
were set up. President Benjedid resigned on January 11, citing
"widespread election irregularities" and a risk of "grave civil
instability." The military then reappointed Sid Ahmed Ghozali
as prime minister. Ghozali was also named to head the new High
Security Council (Haut Conseil de Sécurité--HCS), a six-member
advisory body dominated by such senior military officials as Major
General Nezzar and Major General Larbi Belkheir. This new collective
executive body immediately assumed full political authority, suspending
all other political institutions, voiding the December 1991 election
results, and postponing future elections.
The HCS was soon replaced by the High Council of State (Haut
Conseil d'État--HCE), designed as a transitional government that
would have more political legitimacy than the HCS. In fact, the
HCE differed little from the HCS. The new HCE was a five-member
collective presidency dominated by military officials who had
almost unlimited political powers. Former independence leader
Mohamed Boudiaf was recalled from self-imposed exile in Morocco
to lead the new HCE and serve as head of state.
The coup initially went virtually unchallenged because even the
FIS leadership discouraged its followers from provoking clashes
with the military. Relative tranquility prevailed, and the military
withdrew its tanks and troops in the following days. Some Algerians
even expressed support for the coup, citing fears of an Islamist
government. Some 200,000 demonstrators marched in Algiers protesting
the Islamists, and the main workers' union, the General Union
of Algerian Workers (Union Générale des Travailleurs Algériens--UGTA),
in early January threatened to resist any Islamist government.
The period of relative calm, however, was as deceptive as it
was brief. Within a month, near civil war occurred as Islamists
struck back against the military crackdown. The new government
reimposed a state of emergency, banned the FIS in March, and dissolved
the communal and municipal assemblies, most of which had been
controlled by FIS members since the June 1990 elections. The government
also banned all political activity in and around mosques and arrested
Islamist activists on charges ranging from possession of firearms
to promoting terrorism and conspiracy against the state. Military
courts tried and sentenced the activists to lengthy imprisonment
or death, without right of appeal and/or full awareness of the
charges brought against them. Thousands of demonstrators were
taken to makeshift prison camps in the Sahara while hundreds of
others were detained for questioning and often tortured. Most
of the remaining top FIS leadership was arrested, and thousands
of rank-and-file party members were forced underground. Other
reversals of the democratization process quickly followed. The
press, which had slowly gained freedom, was quickly reined in,
the National People's Assembly was indefinitely suspended, and
the omnipresent and ubiquitous mukhabarat (state security
apparatus) resurfaced.
Despite the military's obvious targeting of the Islamists, the
latter's political suppression drew heavy criticism even from
FIS rivals. The FLN and the FFS soon proposed a tactical alliance
with the FIS to counter the military government in an effort to
preclude the complete abandonment of the democratic process.
The repressive military actions of the government against the
Islamists were reminiscent of the military force used by the French
colonial authorities against the nationalists during the War of
Independence. Thousands of troops were mobilized and assigned
to cities and all major urban centers. Curfews were imposed, removed,
and reimposed. Entire neighborhoods were sealed off because of
police sweeps and other searches for accused "terrorists." Islamists
retaliated by killing military personnel, government officials,
and police officers by the hundreds. Some 600 members of the security
forces, and hundreds more civilians and Islamist demonstrators,
were killed in the first twelve months following the coup. The
majority of Algerians, meanwhile, were caught in the middle, distrusting
the army as much as the Islamists.
The government, citing a need to "focus its full attention" on
Algeria's economic problems, warned that it would not tolerate
opposition. In reply, FIS leaders warned that the popular anger
aroused by the political suppression was beyond their control.
Hard-liners in FIS split from the more moderate pragmatists, criticizing
the FIS leadership for cooperating with the government. As a result,
radical factions replaced the relatively moderate FIS leadership,
now long imprisoned. Meanwhile, other independent and radical
armed Islamist groups arose, impatient not only with the government
but with the FIS itself. The new radicals, FIS officials acknowledged,
were beyond FIS control.
On June 29, 1992, head of state Mohamed Boudiaf was assassinated
during a public speech at the opening of a cultural center in
Annaba. The death of Boudiaf at the hands of a military officer
illustrated the extent to which Algeria's political crisis transcended
a simple contest for power between Islamists and military leaders
or between religious and secular forces.
Twenty months after the coup, the country was still being torn
apart by constant fighting between Islamists and the military.
Following Boudiaf's assassination, HCE member Ali Kafi was appointed
head of state. On July 8, only a week later, Prime Minister Ghozali
resigned, and Belaid Abdessalam was named to replace him. Both
Boudiaf and Ghozali had begun to move toward a rapprochement with
the Islamists, no doubt recognizing their desperate need for popular
support in the absence of any sort of constitutional legitimacy.
The months following Boudiaf's assassination and Ghozali's resignation
were marked by intensified efforts to suppress "terrorism." Emergency
tribunals, headed by unidentified judges who levied "exemplary"
sentences with no means of appeal, were established to try Islamist
"terrorists." An antiterrorism squad was headed in 1993 by General
Mohamed Lamari, a former government official under Ghozali who
was removed from office to facilitate talks with the opposition.
Islamist activity intensified as Islamists also targeted civilians--teachers,
doctors, professors, and other professionals--whose sympathies
might lie with the military.
Cooperation in 1993 among various opposition groups and the predominance
of professionals, including doctors and teachers, in such radical
groups as the Armed Islamic Movement, was considered by a well-informed
observer to imply a "considerable level of antiregime collaboration
among apparently respectable middle-class Algerians." Moreover,
it appeared that the radicalization of the opposition, far from
receding, has spread into traditionally more moderate sectors
of society.
Since independence the government has relied on veterans of the
revolutionary period as leaders, although they represent little
more than vague historical figures to most Algerians. The government
has also ignored numerous opportunities for dialogue with the
opposition, opting for rule by decree without any constitutional
mandate. Moreover, divisions within the government have greatly
hindered the development of an effective economic policy, undoubtedly
the key to Algeria's political turmoil in the mid-1990s.
Prime Minister Abdessalam was greatly hampered in his economic
efforts by his connection with Boumediene's failed heavy industrialization
program from 1965 to 1977. On August 23, 1993, Abdessalem was
dismissed and replaced by Redha Malek, formerly a distinguished
diplomat but also a traditional nationalist vehemently opposed
to the FIS and an advocate of a hard-line approach to combating
"terrorism."
The legacy of the past has played heavily into the current political
situation. For years the government had ruled without any accountability.
Until the mid-1980s, corruption and inefficiency were often masked
by high oil revenues that sustained an acceptable standard of
living for most Algerians. Unfortunately, this legacy has greatly
undermined the country's ability to rise to the current political
challenge by inhibiting the development of an effective economic
sector and by provoking widespread dissatisfaction among the majority
of Algerians.
Data as of December 1993
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