Doha – Algerians began casting ballots on Saturday in a presidential election widely expected to deliver a second 5-year term for the incumbent Abdelmadjid Tebboune.
Polling stations opened at 8:00 a.m. local time and are set to close at 7:00 p.m., AFP reported earlier today.
According to the report, preliminary results will potentially be coming as early as Saturday night according to Algeria’s electoral authority ANIE.
The 78-year-old Tebboune faces little serious competition from his two challengers – moderate Islamist Abdelaali Hassani and socialist candidate Youcef Aouchiche.
“The winner is known in advance,” Political commentator Mohamed Hennad wrote on Facebook, referring to Tebboune’s expected victory. In addition, he decried the “conditions in which the electoral campaign took place, which is nothing more than a farce.”
The incumbent’s main challenge will be boosting turnout, after he won in 2019 with 58% of the vote but amid a record low participation rate of under 40%.
That election followed mass protests, known as the Hirak, that toppled long-time president Abdelaziz Bouteflika. However, the protest movement was subsequently quashed through increased policing and jailing of activists.
The candidates
In addition to Tebboune, the two approved candidates to appear on the ballot are Abdelaali Hassani Cherif and Youcef Aouchiche.
Hassani Cherif, 57, is the president of the Movement of Society for Peace (MSP), a moderate Islamist party. He said the election is “an opportunity for reform, change and overcoming all the political, social and economic constraints Algeria has experienced,” as reported by Al Jazeera. Hassani previously served as a regional and national assembly member.
Aouchiche, 41, is the first national secretary of the Socialist Forces Front (FFS).
Active in student politics from a young age, Aouchiche said the FFS has an “ambitious” program aimed at “all fringes and social categories whose interests we will defend.” He currently sits in the upper house of Parliament.
However, over a dozen other potential candidates were disqualified or pressured to withdraw according to the Atlantic Council.
Anyone seen as a threat to Tebboune has been “sidelined” through arrests, travel bans or orchestrated political deals by “le pouvoir” – the shadowy clique of military and political elites that wield real power in Algeria.
Continued erosion of rights
The election is taking place in a context of “a steady erosion of human rights” under Tebboune’s rule, according to Amnesty International. In the run-up to the vote, authorities have dissolved opposition parties, shuttered independent media, and conducted “arbitrary arrests and prosecutions using trumped-up terrorism charges.”
“In recent years, Algeria has experienced a steady erosion of human rights through the authorities’ dissolution of political parties, civil society organisations and independent media outlets, alongside a spike in arbitrary arrests and prosecutions using trumped-up terrorism charges,” Amjad Yamin of Amnesty told The Guardian.
Sixty political activists, mostly from the Rally for Culture and Democracy party, were arrested in August alone. And just last week, Fethi Ghares, a key figure in the 2019 protests and leader of a banned opposition party, was detained along with his wife for “insulting the president.”
Legacy of broken power handovers
If Tebboune secures a second term as expected, it will mark a continuation of Algeria’s long history of failed transitions of power since gaining independence in 1962, writes Andrew Farrand of the Atlantic Council.
The country’s first president was ousted in a coup, his successor Boumediene died in office amid rumors of foul play.
Chadli Bendjedid’s rule ended with the military seizing power to prevent Islamists from winning elections, sparking a civil war. Mohamed Boudiaf, tapped by the army as a figurehead, was assassinated by his own bodyguard just months after taking office.
The military then hand-picked Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who won a stage-managed election in 1999. Bouteflika served four terms and planned to run for a fifth despite being severely ill and incapacitated, sparking the 2019 Hirak uprising.
Tebboune, a former housing minister and short-lived prime minister, then emerged as the military’s chosen candidate in the low-turnout 2019 election boycotted by the Hirak. In office, he has expanded presidential powers, jailed critics, and used energy windfall revenues from the Ukraine war fallout to boost military and social spending to compensate for his “limited electoral legitimacy,” according to Farrand.
But he has struggled to tackle inflation, missed economic targets, and failed to significantly advance Algeria’s foreign policy goals. His tenure has reinforced the country’s long-standing dichotomy: those willing to accept limited economic roles under heavy state influence stay quiet, while freethinkers are driven to leave or locked up.
With Tebboune’s certain victory, “Algerians aren’t likely to see their first normal handover of power in 2024—le pouvoir won’t let them,” Farrand writes. Every state institution has been turned into an arm of Tebboune’s campaign, leaving voters with little real choice despite their lingering desires for change.
Read also: Lacking Credibility, Tebboune Presents Deceptive Re-Election Narrative
