After successfully ousting long-time president Abdelaziz Bouteflika in 2019, Algeria’s pro-democracy Hirak movement quickly faded. Despite that, experts say it brought about a fresh political awareness that survives as the country prepares for presidential elections.
On February 22, 2019, thousands of Algerians took to the streets seeking sweeping change. Their protests were triggered by Bouteflika, in power since 1999, announcing he would stand for a fifth presidential term.
Less than two months later, the ailing president, who had rarely been seen in public since a stroke in 2013, was forced out by popular demand and a shift in the military’s allegiance.
In December of that year, Abdelmadjid Tebboune was declared president following a widely boycotted election during which protesters continued to chant their “Yetnahaw Gaa” slogan (“They should all go”).
A former prime minister under Bouteflika, who died in 2021, Tebboune oversaw a crackdown on the pro-democracy protests with ramped-up policing and the imprisonment of protesters.
Weakened, the pro-democracy movement then suffered a last blow with the onset of the Covid pandemic.
Five years after the protests began, Algerian authorities were still restricting the right to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, human rights watchdog Amnesty International said in February.
“It is a tragedy that five years after brave Algerians took to the streets in their masses to demand political change and reforms, the authorities have continued to wage a chilling campaign of repression,” the group said.
-‘Political struggle’-
The North African country is preparing for presidential elections on September 7 with Tebboune the frontrunner.
Endorsed by several political parties, the incumbent will face two rival candidates, after a handful of other hopefuls had their candidacies rejected.
Zoubida Assoul, a rejected candidate and lawyer who has defended several Hirak activists in court, said boycotting the election “would lead to nothing”.
“The only way to achieve change is through political struggle,” she told AFP.
“The people have fulfilled their duty by demonstrating to express their demand for change, but the political class and the media and academic elites have not assumed their responsibility of channelling the people’s demands into real political projects.”
She pointed out that no key opposition figure gave a speech or proposed an initiative during more than 100 weekly Hirak rallies.
The protesters wanted “a change of political system and the improvement of the performance of the media and justice,” Nacer Djabi, a sociologist, said.
But the movement “didn’t reach its goals on freedom and justice” despite being Algeria’s “first peaceful collective movement with clear demands”.
The government was quick to “bank on elections to get out of the crisis”, Djabi added, even as “history has shown that since the introduction of multiparty politics in 1990, elections do not solve problems”.
Djabi was referring to the 1991-92 general elections that sparked a decade-long civil war, when the Islamic Salvation Front won the first round while pledging to establish religious rule and the army intervened to halt the elections.
Also called the Black Decade, the war left some 200,000 people dead, according to official figures.
-‘Ideas don’t die’-
Despite fading, “the Hirak movement caused a violent shock within the regime, the aftereffects of which continue to this day”, said Abdellah Haboul, a lawyer.
Dozens of former officials, ministers, and business people have been sentenced to lengthy prison terms over corruption in recent years — including Bouteflika’s brother Said and former prime ministers Abdelmalek Sellal and Ahmed Ouyahia.
“Holding a high office in Algeria no longer confers total immunity,” said Haboul. “There is no longer any official who considers themself safe from prosecution even after leaving office.”
Djaber, the sociologist, said that even with more than 200 Hirak activists still in jail or facing prosecution, the movement “changed the mentality of citizens, who have become more daring”.
He said Algeria now has “a generation of women and men who have taken part in political life for the first time”.
“The elections will not change reality, with the results known in advance,” but the “Hirak movement continues to have an impact through raising awareness among young people”.
They could even return to protesting, said Djabi, because “the Hirak is an idea and ideas don’t die”.
“It can be reborn depending on political circumstances.”
