A quick view from Algiers

Algiers is in the month of April 2014, punctuated by the electoral campaign and the 4th announced term of Abdelaziz Bouteflika.

International journalists will be invited to cover the end of the campaign and the election only for a few days, suggesting that there is no second round.

Meanwhile, the election campaign takes place in a tense climate, with the appearance of a citizen movement, “Barakat” (“That’s enough” in Arabic) which calls for the boycott of the presidential elections, like numbers of other political parties who withdrew from the race for the Presidency.

In the population, it is the indifference which predominates. The Algerians want regime change and know perfectly well that this will not happen through the ballot box, because the system is completely locked. This situation causes a feeling of fear which blends to hope, but the memory of the black decade is still very present and prevents any citizen movement of mass of appropriating a future.

In Algeria, two worlds coexist, the ‘system’ locked, centralized, militarized and Algerians who have only their frustrations and their hopes to survive.