By RFPosted on 01-03-2019Modified on 01-03-2019 at 01:28

Algerians are again called to protest today in several major cities in Algeria. Like last Friday, calls have multiplied on social networks. This movement led by young people has been joined in recent days by almost all opposition parties, who denounce as protesters the candidacy of Abdelaziz Bouteflika for a five-term leadership of the country.

Young Algerians who denounce a fifth term hope to gather even more people than last Friday. In all major cities across the country, the same slogans call for renewal at the head of the country. The protesters want the departure of Abdelaziz Bouteflika and the end of a system they consider corrupt, authoritarian and unable to revive the economy.

Since last week, almost all opposition parties have joined the movement. The students also mobilized this week, as journalists, including public media, to denounce the censorship and pressure they are subject to.

Chance of timing: while the challenge is growing in Algeria, the prospect of a fifth term of the President is increasingly criticized, we learn that Abdelaziz Bouteflika left Algiers for Geneva to be treated.

The regime has tried to get messages in recent days: the Prime Minister announced that the head of state would file his candidacy Sunday, deadline for doing so. The Chief of Staff has also denounced calls for demonstrations that push the Algerians to the unknown.

A movement without a leader

But according to the calls circulating on the social networks, these messages did not discourage the demonstrators. " I think he [the movement] is bound to last, especially since he is not violent, so he does not call for a violent reaction from the power," said political scientist Khadija Mohsen-Finan, teacher at Paris-I University and collaborator of Orient XXI newspaper. The demonstrations are everywhere. I have many questions and few answers: is the executive sure that the army is on its side, are they sure that the police are on their side ? The protesters are extremely numerous, calm and their demands are understood and the whole world adheres to their demands . "

For Fayçal Mettaoui, a journalist for the Algerian news site TSA, the success of the mobilization surprised authorities in Algiers, who had not expected such a magnitude for a movement without leader identified. " We have seen almost two million protesters across the country although there are no official figures. This has grown and is surprising, especially since there is no union or party or movement or organization that has overseen these events. The slogans are the same. I think it's a universal, if not global, movement. It is a movement noted in many countries, in France with the movement of yellow vests: we do not know who organizes, it is a movement where everyone can express themselves; we have seen other movements organize themselves in Sudan. "

■ What do Algerians living in France think?

It is time to change Algeria now, and I think it will be done, and it will be this year inch'Allah but by cons, it's not the right method; the youth must go, but it is not a young man who will govern a country. Yes, it must change but for someone mature anyway

At the café Le Soleil d'Oran, in the Barbès district of Paris, everyone seems to agree on one point: it takes change

01-03-2019 - By Alexis Bedu

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