Algeria and Morocco share identical problems that led Egyptians and Tunisians to overthrow their governments, says Murad Taib The roots of revolts throughout the Arab world are nearly the same. How people mobilise against their regimes, how they organise, how events develop, how the regimes react -- all are different and have led to different endgames. Government corruption, high unemployment rates, high food prices, absence of freedom are the problems that have led to revolts throughout the region. The outcome has been, to a large extent, happy in Tunisia and in Egypt, and still unclear in Libya and Yemen. Questions persist as to what will happen in Algeria and Morocco, the closest neighbours of Tunisia and Libya. It is today clear that longevity in power ends by harshly affecting the behaviour of rulers and their reaction to any form of dissent. Like all Arab rulers, those in Algeria and Morocco happen to be autocrats treating their peoples like serfs. Although Algeria showed the earliest symptoms of borrowing from the Tunisian experience, developments have still not moved to become a really popular uprising. Escalating prices, high unemployment rates, housing issues -- all closely linked to corruption -- have stimulated riots in Algeria. This is no different in neighbouring countries. And like in Tunisia and Egypt, poverty and oppression triggered a fairly well- educated young population to demand the ousting of President Abdel-Aziz Bouteflika and radical changes in the regime. Yet, for now, nobody can tell why anger has not escalated into real, violent clashes between the mobs and the security forces, including the army. Nor when such a development would take place, if ever. Observers believe a few factors make the situation in Algeria quite different from other Arab countries. Tunisia's western neighbour has experienced a decade-long bloody civil-war in which thousands of people, armed and civilians, were killed. Having its origins in the 1991 elections, the result was a strict, violent control of the society by the army. In the December 1991 general elections, the Islamic-leaned FIS party won 188 seats outright, and seemed to obtain an absolute majority in the second round. But the military quickly took over, dissolving the parliament and pushing president Chadli Bendjedid to resign. Street gatherings were banned and a state of emergency was declared. The FIS was disbanded and all 411 FIS-controlled local and regional authorities dissolved. The role played by the military since then has become so huge that Algerians are today convinced that it is the army generals who actually govern them. Memories of the bloody 1990s and exclusion from the US market made Algerians fear any eventual renewal of violence. Even if this violence is to liberate them from this suppressive and corrupt regime. "We have a good situation because we have no debts," recently declared Nasser Mehal, Algeria's minister of communication. "We have a adequate foreign exchange reserves that allowed the government to face many problems." $150 billion to be exact. But that's one reason why Algerians could be angry. They wonder why poverty is growing when the country is so rich. "Our country has been run by the same forces since independence in 1962", Said Saadi, head of the main opposition party, the RCD. "The names change, but the tight political police control is just like the KGB. They decide elections and manipulate justice". And, as elsewhere, this regime is also appealing to the Western countries' Islamophobia to stick to power. With an army leadership deeply sunk in corruption, any eventual reaction to a possible popular revolt will turn to a real bloodbath, fear many. Army generals will not give up their advantages and status easily. Their support and faithfulness to president Bouteflika and his regime are so strong that any form of dissent will be harshly oppressed. In Morocco, unemployment among the young is the highest in North Africa. About half the population is under 25. Long-oppressed Islamists constitute a political force of unknown popularity and influence. But Moroccans' resentment towards the kingdom's extremely corrupt business empire might trigger of a revolt. WikiLeaks suggested "the influence and commercial interest of the King and some of his advisers in virtually every real estate project". On the ground, protests are escalating every week but claims seem different from what we witnessed in Tunisia and Egypt and what we might see in Algeria. The nationwide protests, coordinated by young Moroccans, are mainly calling for King Mohammed VI to make credible reforms that will pave the way to a constitutional monarchy similar to those of the UK and Spain. After the 20 February demonstrations, the King announced the creation of "an economic and social commission", a step judged "insufficient" by activists and the civil society of the kingdom. Protesters said the commission did not "represent" them and asked for "radical measures against corruption, the release of political prisoners, and greater freedom of the press". "We have dozens of these commissions", said human rights activist Abdel-Moneim Refai. "Yet, the authorities routinely persecute journalists and activists." Earlier this month, Khadija Riyadi, head of the Moroccan Association of Human Rights was beaten up at a protest outside the Libyan embassy. Lahssen Haddad, a management professor at Rabat University, told the Financial Times that "a lot of Moroccans are saying they want to reform the regime rather than get rid of it. In that sense, there is some sort of Moroccan exception. But I think that the winds of revolution are blowing; they are very hot and Morocco will not be immune." "As in other countries of the region, Morocco is asking itself whether its economic or political foundations are not among the worst," reported L'Economiste daily business newspaper in a front-page editorial. "There is a need for the social contract to be renewed."
