The recent popular movement in Algeria protesting President Abdelaziz’s Bouteflika’s bid for a fifth presidential term has been lauded by commentators for its civility and noticeable non-violence. Africa’s largest country largely remained passive during the events of the 2011 Arab Spring, marking the ongoing mass protest movement as an unprecedented development since the end of the country’s civil war, which raged between 1991 and 2002. In 2019 Algeria, however, scenes which may be difficult to come across even in the advanced democracies of the world have become an everyday reality. Citizens can comfortably drink a cup of coffee in Odan Square and in front of the Central Post Office whilst mass protests revolve around them demanding a change in the ruling regime. Indeed, artists can devote themselves to painting a landscape of the protests in the security of knowing that they are safe from any harassment. In any case, let us not talk too much more of how exceptional Algeria’s protests have been; instead, let us devote ourselves to the more pressing and grave question which faces Algeria’s current political scene: namely, what can the protest movement do to face the regime and its institutions in a more formal capacity? And from where does this work begin? Perhaps the most notable answer to the question deliberated by Algerians today – especially through the “Twitter and Facebook parties”, as Algerian sociologist Nasser Jabi describes them, is the importance of appointing official representatives for the movement, with the most circulated names including those of lawyer and rights’ advocate Mustafa Bouchachi, former Prime Minister Ahmed Benbitour (who served as head of government between 1999-2000), and Karim Tabbou – spokesman of the Democratic and Social Union party (Union Démocratique et Sociale – UDS). I will not proceed to examine the credentials of the above personalities or their worthiness to lead the movement. Instead, I pose a question: is reducing the movement into the persons of one, two or ten individuals the solution to fighting the regime? And perhaps more importantly, is the aim here to take a stand in front of the ruling authority in order impose a new balance of power which benefits Algerians, or to authorise this group to only speak on behalf of the movement? If the latter serves as the answer, then I remark that the recent popular movement has demonstrated a striking political consciousness in the Algerian population – a people who today understand politics more than ever before. The Algerian people are not ‘minors’ who require a group of individuals to be appointed at their head, in order to speak in their name and convey their ideas to the regime – for we are fully appraised of the slogans raised by Algerians in their protests, which carried a clear and stinging message to the ruling authorities. It is therefore clear in my opinion that the main issue lies not in who represents the movement, but the mechanisms by which it can be transformed from a “raw energy”- as the president of the New Generation party Soufiane Djilali puts it – to new transitional institutions, from which the country can then stabilise in a new era. To better understand this idea, we need only read the history of the Algerian revolution which was led by the National Liberation Front (FLN, the still-ruling party). Of course, there is no room for comparison between today’s FLN and its historical counterpart – that which once hosted educated cadres and a cultured elite in every meaning of those words. The historical FLN comprised a coalition which embraced various conscious political personalities across the competing ideological spectrum (liberals, communists, reformists, etc.) – all of society’s components were represented within it, for its aim was to liberate the land and the human. Therein lies the potential similarity with the current protest movement, which is similarly composed of various social sectors (students, teachers, workers and the unemployed, among others) which need representation. The solution therefore is a wide popular front which encompasses all these different components, allowing everyone from the furthest on the right of the spectrum to the furthest on the left a role in governance – regardless of their social or class status. This broad popular front would in turn be constituted from below by popular committees representing the various segments of society; indeed, the example of the students of the University of Algiers 2, who took the initiative of forming a “temporary independent committee” which will serve as the official students’ spokesman, is informative. Why shouldn’t we support such an idea? For we could form committees in all of Algeria’s universities and then assemble them in a unified national committee. We would therefore have succeeded in creating a framework for the students – further allowing the new national committee to become a factory for new ideas and cultured elites. After having guaranteed the representation of all students, we can repeat the application of the concept to the remaining sectors of Algerian society. Nonetheless, the reader may ask: what are the measures by which we can operate these popular committee in practice? I return here again to the example of the historical FLN, which brought together all the competing political currents in pursuit of a common goal (liberating the land and the human) and adopted a structure which allowed collective administration and prevented any internal leadership struggles – in other words, a decentralised management. The process of decentralisation entails transferring all authorities from the government level to lower-level elected institutions (local councils and municipalities for instance), protected from central government intervention. This would embody the opposite trajectory of post-independence Algeria, which has been based on the centralisation of power into the executive branch, and of course, the presidency. From this basis, and in order to avoid the danger of the movement falling into internal divisions, is it not incumbent upon us to leave behind the mindset of ‘great leaders’ and personalities that has destroyed our country’s youth, while entrenching in our society the values of supervision, custodianship and paternalism? Should we not rise to the level of modern populations who founded their states on institutions rather than individuals and verbose (often criminal) leaderships? Does not division lie at its source around the question of who is “worthy” or entitled to speak on behalf of the movement? Does confining the movement to the level of individuals and personalities not provide the Algerian regime with the opportunity to infiltrate it and dismantle it from within – not least by provoking ideological and identity-centred discussions? Indeed, does this approach offer a guarantee in the first place that the members of the movement will be properly represented? Should we not, therefore, learn from the recent example of others and pay greater heed to the importance of building sub-institutions out of this movement, which can truly lay the groundwork for the rule of the people and establishment of the authority of Algerian society, in all of its social diversity social, and which can in time be transformed into the true and full institutions of tomorrow’s Algeria?
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