Algerian presidential election | Abdelmadjid Tebboune re-elected with nearly 95% of the vote

(Algiers) Outgoing Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune has been re-elected for a second term with a record score of nearly 95% of the vote, following a poll marked by persistent disaffection among the electorate, according to preliminary results published Sunday.

The president of the electoral authority (Anie), Mohamed Charfi, announced a victory for Mr. Tebboune with “94.65% of the votes” and “5.32 million votes” out of “5.63 million votes” for the three candidates, without giving the number of invalid ballots or providing new figures on participation, estimated the day before at “an average rate of 48%.”

The turnout at the polls was the real issue in Saturday’s vote, with Tebboune wanting to be “a normal president, not a badly elected president” like five years ago, Hasni Abidi, an analyst and director of the Cermam study centre in Geneva, told AFP.

In December 2019, Mr. Tebboune, 78, won the presidential election with 58% of the vote, but a turnout of only 39.83% (60% abstention). At the time, the election took place in the tense context of the Hirak, the massive pro-democracy movement that had just ousted his predecessor Abdelaziz Bouteflika from power.

Faced with the outgoing head of state, only two candidates were in the running: the leader of the moderate Islamist party MSP, Abdelaali Hassani, 57 years old, who won 3.17% of the vote, and Youcef Aouchiche, 41 years old, at the head of the Front of Socialist Forces (FFS, the oldest opposition party) who obtained 2.16%.

“Irregularities”

In an unprecedented move, the campaign teams of the three candidates, including Mr. Tebboune’s, denounced in a joint statement, shortly before midnight, “irregularities and contradictions in the results announced by the Anie”, saying they wanted to “inform public opinion of the vagueness and contradictions in the participation figures”.

Shortly before, Ahmed Sadouk, Mr Hassani’s campaign director, had described these figures as a “masquerade”, questioning the calculation by the Anie of an average between the rates of each region while the participation rate is calculated by dividing the number of voters by the number of registered voters (24.5 million in total).

The three candidates also mentioned “an error in the announcement of the percentages for each candidate” and “data contradictory with the vote counting reports” submitted to the Anie by the local electoral commissions.

Mr. Tebboune was the big favorite in the election, benefiting from the support of four major parties, notably the National Liberation Front (FLN, former single party).

Fahima Hamlaoui, a 41-year-old French-Algerian, said she was “happy” with Mr Tebboune’s re-election, “whether people like it or not”. “I like him, I don’t know much about him, but I have a good feeling,” she told AFP outside a candidate’s office.

The three candidates said they wanted to continue the recovery of the economy (which has been growing at a rate of 4% for two years) and make it less dependent on hydrocarbons (95% of foreign currency revenues).

“A failure”

Aided by the natural gas windfall, of which Algeria is the leading African exporter, Mr. Tebboune promised to revalue pensions and salaries, 450,000 new jobs, housing and to make Algeria “the second economy in Africa.”

For Mr. Abidi, Mr. Tebboune’s record score is “not a surprise given the profile of his competitors and the resources deployed” for his campaign.

But “he has won only 319,000 votes since 2019 and has only turned out a little over 5 million voters out of 24 million registered, or less than a quarter. A failure that requires a profound overhaul of his policy,” he told AFP on Sunday.

“It is a victory that looks like a warning,” notably due to the failure to win over the young electorate, who represent more than half of the 45 million Algerians and a third of the electorate, according to Mr. Abidi.

Without a review of “his method of governance and without changes in his team”, the “deficit of democracy” in his record could constitute a handicap in his new mandate, added the analyst.

While Mr Tebboune did not mention this issue, his rivals had promised more political and media rights and freedoms during their campaign.

According to the National Committee for the Liberation of Prisoners (CNLD, Algerian), dozens of people linked to the Hirak or to the defense of freedoms are still imprisoned or prosecuted.

Before the vote, the NGO Amnesty International accused the government of continuing to “stifle civic space by maintaining a severe repression of human rights”, with “arbitrary arrests” and “zero tolerance of dissenting voices”.