Bouteflika failed to heed the people’s calls to withdraw his candidacy because he was undergoing medical examinations abroad. Consequently, calls were made for civil disobedience for five consecutive days starting 10 March, a call that was well received. Factory workers and civil servants boycotted their jobs. Moreover, private business owners closed their shops, applying additional pressure on the authorities. However, many political activists rejected this tactic, saying it would disrupt the protest movement and cause it to change course.

Algeria currently produces 98 per cent of its electricity using natural gas. Experts affirm that the solar energy available in the Sahara will shape the future development of Algeria’s energy sector. The Algerian authorities are also moving toward supporting projects to produce different types of renewable energy. This is because such projects contribute to local electricity supply as well as to generating wealth and creating job opportunities.

Massi sings most of her songs in Algerian Arabic as well as Amazigh, French and occasionally English. She has a significant audience in North Africa and France. Her lyrics deal with real issues, often taken from her own life experiences, which are imbued with sentiments of yearning and nostalgia.

While neither the presidency nor the Ministry of Defense provided any official explanation for the dismissals, local media outlets, observers and opposition figures have increasingly linked the wave of replacements to the 2019 presidential elections, the cocaine affair and Bouteflika’s attempts to counter the widespread corruption within several state institutions or the clash of clans within the strongly fragmented Algerian regime.

His statements were welcomed in Algeria, but they caused extensive debate in France, where Macron was criticized by the far-right Front National party competing with him in the presidential race. Soon after being elected, however, Macron announced a new position. “We admit but we do not apologize,” he said about France’s colonial history in Algeria, stressing that France should not be caught up in the past but rather must overcome it to move forward and establish French-Algerian relations based on common future interests.

Although combating irregular migration and human smuggling in the Sahel region was already imminent in 2010, its significance for the EU and its member states such as Germany has increased massively since 2015. It is therefore expected that Germany and Algeria will continue to cooperate closely in this domain as the war in Mali remains a significant security threat for Algeria. Meanwhile, human smuggling and migration continue to affect political discourses in Algeria and Europe.

Cholera is easily diagnosable and any delay is unforgivable. If this becomes an epidemic today, it is because of the delay in reporting and taking preventive measures.

Merzoug Touati was arrested in Béjaïa in January 2017 and subsequently accused of ‘incitement to non-armed gathering’, ‘foreign intelligence aimed at harming diplomatic ties’ and ‘incitement to gatherings and sit-ins in public spaces’. In May 2018, he was found guilty of ‘communicating with intelligence agents of a foreign power that could be harmful for the military or diplomatic situation of Algeria or its essential economic interests’,

The implication of government officials in drug trafficking is not surprising, Matthew Herbert, a research fellow with the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, told Fanack Chronicle. “This mirrors similar efforts by traffickers and businessmen to corrupt government officials at other points along cocaine trafficking routes, such as Guinea-Bissau or Mali,” he said. “What is surprising is that the Algerian officials were openly linked to the case. Usually such affairs are kept fairly quiet.”

Following Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia’s appointmentd in August 2017, Algerian authorities further escalated their crackdown on sub-Saharan nationals and have intensified their arrest and expulsion campaigns of migrant workers and refugees ever since. In March 2018, Minister of the Interior Noureddine Bedoui said that his government has repatriated 27,000 migrants since 2015 and intends to continue expelling those who reside in the country illegally.