Government takes initiative

Dubai: Unlike the nationwide uprisings which toppled leaders in Egypt and Tunisia, Algeria's protests were localised and did not turn into a national political movement.

Unrest echoed the plight of a distressed population faced with unemployment, a housing crisis and soaring food prices.

Weekly protests went on for a few months in big cities and on some occasions turned violent. The government however successfully put down the waves of violence, self-immolations and industrial action through a large-scale, assertive but largely peaceful deployment of the police force in urban centres.

There were at least a dozen cases of self-immolation and four self-immolators died. After a surge in such cases, the government decided to adopt draconian measures. They jailed those who survived immolation attempts, Algerian press reported.

On the reform front, the government, led by President Abdul Aziz Bouteflika, however, has embarked on a series of initiatives to win over the public. In February, Bouteflika lifted the state of emergency that had been in force since 1992.

On April 15, Bouteflika announced on nation television that a commission featuring experts in constitutional law will revise the country's constitution.

In early May, the government revised the year's national budget, allocating 25 per cent of the total to pay for public sector workers' salaries and subsidies on flour, milk, cooking oil and sugar.

In July, Bouteflika was presented with findings from a cross-party consultation process on democratisation. Following this, the regime pledged to develop an online forum to promote public debate that along with civil society and a series of regional and local conferences for development should form a full-scale reform roadmap.

In September, the president announced sweeping media reforms to allow private radio and television stations to exist for the first time since independence in 1962.

The reform agenda has not yet played out and a weak or delayed process could easily spark further public protests against Bouteflika.