Amine Ryad
The world as a whole, not just the West, must learn from the Russia-Ukraine war. And, especially for us Africans in this context of regional tensions and heightened economic insecurities. Energy and food crises, to name only the most socially impacting ones, await African populations at every moment. Should we add to this the devastating effects of a military conflict in the north of the continent?
President Putin, in search of power ad vitam aeternam, has found all the ingredients in his war once morest Ukraine. It has consolidated its internal authority, legitimizing in passing massive repression and undivided power. And, externally, it infuses an ideology of psychological warfare once morest the West to deceive Third World public opinion. To set oneself up as a world champion in the ideological struggle once morest the West, qualified by the Russian leaders as “oppressor and degenerate” is politically very profitable populism.
We must not rush into this ideological trap because it suits dictators and not democrats. The parallel with the Algerian neighbour, which has remained aligned with Russia since Soviet times, is obviously a plausible scenario. That of making the Moroccan Sahara “the Ukraine” of Algeria by sending army tanks one fine morning at dawn to this side of the border. It will be the result of a logic of war that the generals have been trying to impose on Morocco since the new hawks came to power with President Tebboune, chosen by the army, installed at the head of the country.
An option that no doubt runs through the minds of Algerian generals. They will thus be able to restore a new legitimacy to the moribund regime and hide from the eyes of the Algerian people the failure of a calamitous socio-economic management. A scenario that would suit these new hawks well. They have just celebrated the sixtieth anniversary of the independence of this country martyred by 60 years of controlled cutting of the country by the army. And how to celebrate it? By displaying pathetically and with great pomp in the streets of Algiers a military parade in the Soviet style of yesteryear. The official press and media for their part poured out anti-colonial discourse targeting France and by extension neighboring Morocco. The opportunity was too good for a regime in the absence of a constructive political project.
Several enlightened Algerian intellectuals rose up in the international press once morest this masquerade. Social networks have also raised popular voices once morest all this mess that only serves the interests of enriching the military nomenclature and its servants. Several videos of Algerians have circulated on the net to denounce the waste of the country’s immense resources for the purchase of arms and equipment from foreign countries which are rubbing their hands with this financial windfall. Where is the independence? Enough to return to their graves the million and a half martyrs of the independence struggle.
The people would have liked their country to present, 60 years following its independence, the face of a prosperous and economically autonomous country as well as a peaceful society at the political and social level. None of that, maybe we should wait for the 120do anniversary and the arrival of another generation of leaders.
In the meantime, these noises of boots resounding by the Algerian generals must worry the international community. A new war front in the Maghreb would be a new planetary catastrophe. Africa and the rest of the world will not recover.
A logic of war which manifests itself on several fronts through increasingly explicit acts of hostility. First, a unilateral rupture of diplomatic relations decided by the Algerian regime, provocations doomed to failure at the borders by the Polisario interposed, fakes of so-called Moroccan acts of war once morest Algerian nationals staged in the media.
Added to this is the refusal to participate in the negotiation round tables proposed by the United Nations special envoy, coupled with a fierce stubbornness to entrust the handling of the Moroccan Sahara issue to the African Union to circumvent the UN. An option that the majority of African heads of state refuse to avoid for the continental organization an additional subject of cleavage and which the AU has no means of resolving as it has other fish to fry.
A diplomacy of manifest hostility which is becoming radicalized with, for example, the refusal to authorize exchange meetings between academics, the ban on the entry of Moroccan journalists to cover the Mediterranean games, etc. The symphony of mistrust is growing. Would it be to prepare Algerian public opinion for unilateral military action once morest Morocco? A scenario in any case to be taken seriously given the impasse of the regime to offer other happier prospects to the brotherly Algerian people 60 years following its glorious struggle for independence and dignity. The international community is taken to witness.
