On January 6, the Algerian military stormed the Tinguentourine natural gas facility in Amenas, where three dozen Al Qaeda-linked terrorists were holding hostages. It has been established that American, British, French, Japanese, Norwegian and Romanian workers were among those dead or missing while the Signed-in-Blood Battalion, an Al-Qaeda affiliate, wanted a prisoner exchange besides an end to the ongoing French war in Mali.
For us in Pakistan, a few details reported in the press were quite familiar as the hostage drama unfolded. While Pakistani ‘mujahideen’ have been spotted in Mali, Aafia Siddiqui (‘Daughter of Pakistan’) was among the prisoners the terrorists wanted to swap. Similarly, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, the leader of the Signed-in-Blood Battalion, who claimed responsibility for the hostage-taking, is a veteran of the ‘Afghan jihad’. Chickens, it seem, will keep coming home to roost.
The hostage drama has not only exposed Algeria’s uneasy stability, it has also brought to light the Satan-and-Father-Samaan relationship – as delineated by Kahlil Gibran – that exists between imperialism and the ‘war on terror’. Both feed on each other. The case of Algeria is particularly telling.
Once a proud symbol of progressive Arab nationalism, the Algerian anti-colonial struggle sparked the imagination of people across Africa and beyond. The National Liberation Front (FLN) heroically led an armed struggle that forced France to hold a referendum on independence. On July 1, 1962, six million voters answered ‘yes’ to independence, and a mere 16,534 said ‘no’.
To quell the resistance, two million French soldiers crossed the Mediterranean between 1955 and 1962 as the conflict led to the fall of six French prime ministers and the collapse of one republic. By 1962, the war in Algeria had already led to the loss of almost 25,000 French soldiers and 3,000 colons. However, the Algerians also paid a heavy price; in 1962 FLN estimated: “One million martyrs fell for the cause of Algerian independence”.
According to the programme adopted at the congress of the Conseil National de la Revolution Algerienne (CNRA), which met in Tripoli on May 27-June 7 1962, the “popular democratic revolution” was to be led “by the peasantry, the workers, and the revolutionary intellectuals”, at the expense of the “Algerian feudality and bourgeoisie, whose ideology would set the stage for neocolonialism”. With such Marxist aspirations, Algeria was to become a democracy founded on the socialisation of the means of production. The religious dimension of the country’s Muslim identity was emphasised too: “For us, Islam, stripped of all the excrescences and superstitions that have smothered or corrupted it, is to find expression in two essential factors in addition to religion as such: culture and identity”. But this was not to be.
Ahmed Ben Bella (1962-65), Houari Boumedienne (1965-78), and Chadli Bendjedid (1979-91) ruled Algeria with an iron fist. Like post-colonial elites elsewhere, Algerian oligarchy was corrupt and repressive. When confronted with the growing popularity of leftist ideas, the regime resorted to Islam for legitimacy. The 1976 constitution declared Islam as the state religion and Islamisation was set in place. A degree was promulgated in August 1976 that a day of rest be observed on Friday instead of Sunday.
In March 1976, gambling and the sale of alcoholic beverages to Muslims were banned. In 1979, Muslims were banned from raising hogs. In 1980, the Ministry of Religious Affairs was asked to concern itself with promoting an understanding of Islam. The number of mosques increased from 2,200 in 1966 to 5,829 in 1980. But Islamisation did not help stem either the growing economic crisis or mass unrest.
In 1980-81, for instance, only 280,000 jobs were created even if every year 200.000 new youth were entering the job market. The regime turned to the IMF for loans and went for a fashionable cure called privatisation. The aid given by the IMF was contingent on a programme of draconian but familiar adjustments: privatisation, devaluation and cuts in welfare. Consequently by 1989 debt-servicing had reached $6.5 billion, absorbing three-quarters of export receipts.
In the meantime, Islamisation from above only emboldened the fundamentalists from 1980 onwards. They clashed with Berber and Marxist groups on campuses throughout the country, intimidated female students who did not abide by ‘Muslim standards of dress propriety’.
By 1982, the situation had escalated dramatically. Fundamentalists began to distribute tracts for the abrogation of the socially liberal 1976 National Charter (and in 1984 the regime abrogated pro-women clauses in it).When a leftist student was murdered in November 1982, the government cracked down, arresting over 400 Islamist students. When 100,000 people marched on the University of Algiers mosque to protest the arrests, the government was astounded.
Two years later, a religious leader died in prison (he was never tried or convicted). His political funeral drew 400,000. In 1986 student protests spread to labour. A popular chant in those days was: “Chadli, that’s enough vice! Tell your son to return the money!”
Finally, FLN’s 6th congress in 1988 promised reforms including separation of state and party. In 1989, the government recognised 56 parties. Chadli was elected president in 1990 but the parliamentary majority was bagged by Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) the following year.
FIS was launched in early 1989, set up by Hachemi Sahnouni and Ali Belhadj following the bread riots. According to one commentator, “With its ready-built infrastructure of free mosques, independent religious schools and alternative social service agencies, most situated in the neigbourhood where opposition to the FLN leadership had already reached a critical mass, the FIS very quickly became the party of opposition for the vast majority of poor urban Algerians, whether they agreed with all of its Islamising agenda or not’.
However, the economic context was also a factor in the development of the FIS. While actively favouring the shift to that market economy, they only proposed remedies to its consequences: a religious ethic of solidarity, heartfelt mutual aid, the counterweight of a reassuring kinship.
But FIS’ electoral victory was not accepted by the FLN elite or their imperialist masters. Instead, the Islamists formed the Armed Islamic Group (GIA) and took up weapons. From 1992 to 1997, 100000 Algerians were killed. Like in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, schools were targeted. Apart from education women were also a target. In 1995, journalist Amal Boumedienne cited case after case of ‘unspeakable’ torture and abuse of women by GIA, including temporary forced marriage, to militants.
While the state ruthlessly butchered the Islamists, the GIA also isolated itself by brutalising its opponents. Thus, the bloody civil war began to subside by 1997. In 1999 and subsequently in 2004 and 2009, presidential elections were held, rigged, and Abdelaziz Bouteflika was elected comfortably each time. The Bouteflika regime has not solved any basic contradiction that gave birth to FIS/GIA. Understandably, the old issues are resurfacing. The hostage drama in Amenas is only a warning shot.
The writer is a freelance contributor. Email: mfsulehria@hotmail.com
Farooq Sulehria, "Hostage drama in Algeria," The news. 2013-01-30.Keywords: