The 76-year-old Chengriha is said to harbour extreme enmity towards Morocco in a military establishment that has contributed to rising tensions in the Sahara since strongman Ahmed Gaïd Salah's death (AC Vol 61 No 4 Territorial armies)...
As cross-border tensions have ratcheted up Chengriha has left civilian government to Tebboune while he concentrates on clearing the military ranks and wider 'pouvoir' (powers-that-be) of potential rivals from formerly dominant factions led by Gaïd Salah and Abdelaziz Bouteflika (AC Vol 63 No 2 Living in limboland)...
First clearing the ranks of the 'le pouvoir' (powers-that-be) of potential rivals from former dominant factions led by the late Ahmed Gaïd Salah and the Bouteflika regime to secure his ascendancy (AC Vol 63 No 1 Living in limboland)...
The officer who signed off on his removal Lieutenant-General Ahmed Gaïd Salah himself died in December 2019 but his successor from the gerontocracy 76-year-old Major-General Saïd Chengriha has been accumulating power (AC Vol 61 No 2 Desperately seeking legitimacy)...
Vol 62 No 16 |
- ALGERIA
- MOROCCO
A power vacuum remains following the death in December 2019 of army Chief of Staff Lieutenant-General Ahmed Gaïd Salah (AC Vol 61 No 2 Desperately seeking legitimacy)...
His successor Major-General Saïd Chengriha is powerful but not to the extent of Gaïd Salah or the most feared security strongman of all the now retired Mohammed 'Tewfik' Medienne...
Two days later the officer who had driven Gaïd Salah's plans to make the Algerian military an Egypt-style industrial power Major-General Rachid Chouaki was detained by the military tribunal in Blida (AC Vol 60 No 22 Two visions lock horns)...
Despite the incentive to toe the line of a Tebboune-Chengriha axis that this might suggest relatively open jockeying for position – and plotting – continues involving officers who felt marginalised by Gaïd Salah and Chengriha...
And when the army Chief of Staff who threatened to dominate Tebboune Lieutenant-General Ahmed Gaïd Salah then died suddenly it seemed that Algeria's sclerotic political system could finally be rejuvenated (AC Vol 61 No 2 Desperately seeking legitimacy)...
Graft driveIn recent weeks the government has taken concerted action taken against the business-minded children and relations of the former elite including the family of late military strongman Lt Gen Ahmed Gaïd Salah...
The president's alliance with Saïd Chengriha – whom he confirmed as army chief of staff after Gaïd Salah's death – offers a potentially unprecedented opportunity for Tebboune to build his power base...
Politics continued during the lockdown including corruption trials in civilian and military courts of oligarchs and other members of the ancien régime including key allies of late military strongman Lt Gen Ahmed Gaïd Salah as well as such fallen luminaries of Bouteflika's rule as ex-premiers Ahmed Ouyahia and Abdelmalek Sellal and business moguls close to Saïd Bouteflika led by Ali Haddad...
Le pouvoir ('the powers that be') has reorganised to fill the vacuum after Bouteflika and Gaïd Salah (AC Vol 60 No 17 Waiting on the general)...
Many senior officers are in prison where ex-Direction centrale de la sécurité de l'Armée head Athmane Benmiloud has been charged with plotting against senior officers during the Gaïd Salah leadership; he complained of 'psychiatric problems' – a defence thrown out by a military judge...
In the new constellation of power in Algiers several sources say that the late military strongman Lieutenant General Ahmed Gaïd Salah's successor Major General Saïd Chengriha has control of key security portfolios including the Sahara rather than new civilian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune...
The sudden death on 23 December of military strongman Lieutenant-General Ahmed Gaïd Salah may prove more significant for Algeria's future than the election on 12 December of a civilian president former Prime Minister Abdelmadjid Tebboune...
Urged on by El Hirak the protest movement that has dominated Algerian public life since February 2019 Tebboune could yet live up to his claim to be a reforming leader now that he is free of Gaïd Salah's micro-managing tendencies...
Whether Gaïd Salah's coronary was fact or fiction is unconfirmed; but the fact there are doubts about the corpulent career-soldier's demise speaks volumes for the shadowy world of Algerian politics...
Generals splitDivisions at the top were already apparent during the election campaign when a number of generals broke ranks to back an outsider candidate Azzedine Mihoubi while Gaïd Salah and his most senior aides Land Army Commander Maj...
Some ministers retained in government were identified with Gaïd Salah such as Belkacem Zeghmati at Justice...
Tebboune's links with army chief of staff Lieutenant-General Ahmed Gaïd Salah garnered El Hirak derision but he has a residual 'Mr Clean' reputation gained during his brief spell as PM in 2017...
He will have to prove that what in 2017 seemed like a bold anti-corruption campaign targeting the Bouteflika clan wasn't just evidence of Gaïd Salah driving elite in-fighting to a new level which eventually drove Abdelaziz Bouteflika from office (AC Vol 58 No 17 The state stays captured)...