In remarks meant to lash out at Morocco’s supposed manipulation of the agenda of the African Union (AU), Algerian Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra appeared to unwittingly concede that Rabat’s effective continental diplomacy has been a major obstacle in the way of Algeria’s strategic goals on the continent.
Speaking during the 39th session of the Executive Council of the AU, which was held this week on October 14-15, the Algerian FM blamed Morocco for the outcome of the recent vote to grant Israel an observer status within the African Union.
He suggested that Algeria’s appeal against the decision following the AU vote was ignored because of a pro-Morocco “activist” win inside the AU.
Lamamra said, “It is regrettable that Nigeria’s and Algeria’s proposal to immediately restore the status quo ante was declined by an activist minority represented by Morocco and some of its close allies, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which had a particularly biased chairmanship of the session.”
DR Congo’s President Felix Tshisekedi is the current chairperson of the AU, and the Algerian FM’s main grievance during his speech seemed to be the claim that Morocco has been capitalizing on its close diplomatic relationship with Congo to impose its agenda on the AU.
Lamamra’s speech bore the usual markers of Algerian officials’ claims of a Morocco-led cabal bent on standing in the way of Algeria’s strategic goals. But while the Algerian media usually welcomes such allegations and even goes further than government officials in lashing out at Morocco, the Algerian FM’slatest remarks elicited a completely different response from a noted quarter of the Algerian media class.
In a particularly damning report about Lamamra’s AU speech, Algerian nationalist news outlet Algerie Part said the FM’s remarks amounted to a shameless acknowledgment of Algeria’s declining influence in African geopolitics.
A seasoned diplomat who is often associated with the heyday of Algerian diplomacy in Africa, especially on the question of Western Sahara and continental support for Polisario’s self-determination dreams, Lamamra was recently presented as the veteran and influential diplomat Algerian diplomacy needed to level the playing field and restore Algeria’s lost diplomatic prestige on both the global and African scenes.
With repeated reports that Morocco now has the upper hand on the Algeria-led pro-Polisario clique in AU discussions, many observers saw in Lamamra’s appointment as FM a signal of Algeria’s determination to make a comeback on the continental scene.
According to Algeria Part, however, Lamamra’s “concession of defeat” in his AU speech this week means the veteran diplomat is turning out to be yet another symbol of the “the decline of the diplomatic situation of our country, which is struggling to make itself heard not only in the world but especially in Africa.”
“But what has taken Lamamra to make such an admission of weakness before all the authorities of the African Union (AU)?” the Algerian newspaper fumed. It added that Algeria’s diplomatic setbacks have only increased in recent years and that Lamamra’s much-anticipated return as the chief of Algeria’s diplomacy seems to have only made things worse for Algeria.
“All he can do is make promises. And it is mostly the same promises that we have been hearing since last July on the supposed return of Algeria in the arena of the great nations of the world,” the article said.
It went on to cite recent tensions with France, “permanent war against Rabat,” recent news of ill-conceived strategic projections in Mali, among others, as some examples of Algeria’s increasingly out-of-sync and irrelevant diplomacy.
This is not the first time that the unapologetically nationalist Algerian website has taken issue with Morocco’s apparent series of diplomatic victories over Algeria.
After news emerged of the US’ recognition of Morocco’s sovereignty over Western Sahara in December 2020, Algerie Part lambasted President Abdelmajid Tebboune for failing to devise an effective strategy to contain Morocco’s diplomatic successes.
The Algerian regime has never been this “isolated” and “rejected,” it wrote, adding that the US’ unambiguous support for Morocco’s Western Sahara stance was the “coup de grace” for an increasingly moribund Algerian diplomacy.
Ironically, Algeria Part wrote in that December 2020 article that only Lamamra, “the most experienced and seasoned Algerian diplomat,” could save Algeria from further diplomatic debacles.
But as Morocco continues to sustain its diplomatic gains in Africa while positioning itself as “the gate to Africa” for foreign powers and investors, it is becoming increasingly evident that even Algeria’s most “seasoned” diplomat cannot reverse the decidedly pro-Morocco trend that some observers have described as an emerging – and Morocco-led – “new postcolonial order.”
