Algeria: A Mandate of Sorts

More than 5,000,000 Algerians last week voted for their nation’s first Parliament. In the big coastal cities, a few of the 200,000 Europeans still remaining in Algeria lined up with turbaned Arabs. In the rugged Aurès Mountains, blond and blue-eyed Berbers gathered at the polling places. In the Sahara, “the veiled men in blue” of the Tuareg tribes and the secretive Mozabites cast their ballots beneath the feathery palms of remote oases.

Despite the show of democracy, the voters were apathetic, sickened by war and the clawing fights among their own leaders. By last week, the only slogan capable of rallying the Algerian people was the cry of Baraket (Enough). Ahmed Ben Bella, at least temporarily in control as head of Algeria’s Political Bureau, gave the voters no alternative to a single list of 196 candidates. The list had been purged of 59 names, including such Ben Bella opponents as ex-Premier Benyoussef Ben-khedda, Guerrilla Heroine Djamila Bou-hired, who had been tortured by French paratroops, and Mustapha Lacheraf, who spent five years in French jails as a fellow prisoner of Ben Bella. One unpurged candidate, Mohammed Boudiaf, refused to serve because “the lists haven’t been chosen in a democratic manner.”

Ancient Rivalries. Ben Bella, who left no doubt that he intends to be Premier of the new government, made a nationwide broadcast declaring that the tasks ahead “can be summed up in a few words: re-establishment of order in an Algeria disoriented by war, and the establishment of peace and prosperity throughout the country.” He is unlikely to achieve any of these objectives soon. Two of Algeria’s six wilayas (military districts) remain in a state of semirebellion. The country is deeply split by regionalism—the ancient rivalries among Berbers and Arabs, of townfolk and tribes. Kidnapings, rapes and murders occur at the rate of five or six a day, and photographs of missing persons appear in every newspaper. Jobs must be found for some 4,000,000 men and women; yet most factories are shut down, and the European technicians able to run them have fled the country. One hopeful sign of growing political maturity: Ben Bella, as well as his rivals for power, now freely admits that the reconstruction of Algeria cannot be accomplished without French help in the form of men, money and techniques.

Handy Pistol. In eliminating so many opponents from the candidates’ list, Ben Bella may have outsmarted himself. It leaves his foes comfortably outside his government and free of any responsibility for the harsh measures Ben Bella must take in the months ahead if he intends to restore order and revive the economy.

Yet last week all of Algeria’s wrangling leaders seemed chillingly aware of the nation’s disgust. Ex-Premier Benkhedda, despite his enmity toward Ben Bella, pointed the way to unity by going out and voting. And fiery army commander Colonel Houari Boumedienne kept himself and his Communist-equipped troops relatively out of sight. Only when the vote was in did Boumedienne announce a drive to crush antigovernment resistance in the region around Algiers.

About 80% of those eligible to vote went to the polls, and of those voting, nearly 5,300,000, or 99%, supported the single list. It was a mandate of sorts for Ben Bella, enough for him to begin to govern, but no guarantee that he could abandon his wary habit of sleeping with a pistol handy on his bed table.