Algeria, January 10th of 1992.

On the tenth of January of 1992, the Haut Comité d’Etat, or HCE, was discussed for the first time in a five-man room in an Algerian military base; the mounting crisis since 1986 has finally exploded with the electoral victory of FIS on the first round of elections in 1991. Algerian President Chadli Benjedid, associated with the FLN and a heavily-criticized figure in Algeria due to his incompetence to managing the nation during the crisis period, has commented that he is likely to aid FIS in their upcoming electoral victory, to the displeasure of the Armed Forces and to many military and political leaders of the Algerian political landscape.

The FIS electoral victory was thus extremely unpopular among the cadres of the military due to their populist, Islamist policies and their threatening behavior to the current establishment which would, naturally, shake it to its very core; of course, the Armed Forces also have a dozen of other concerns, including the rise of further radical elements within Algeria which would lead it to look similar to the Taliban-controlled areas of Afghanistan. The key leaders of the Armed Forces in this trying times include Liamine Zéroual, Mohamed Lamari and Mohamed Mediène, who are all reputable politicians and members of the Armed Forces.

A SHORT BACKGROUND OF THE ALGERIAN PROTESTS

Algerian society pre-1988 was a hotbed of different thoughts, including, of course, Islamism and more radical left-wing groups; which heavily influenced the outcome of the conflict and also the causes preceding it. Algeria, as an authoritarian nation which is riddled with corruption and governmental practices which are shady at best, buckled under a petro-state economy during a crisis and whose submersion into societal unrest dragged it into a conflict fueled by religious fervor, government dissatisfaction and a government whose main interests laid within the principles of authoritarianism, up until Benjedid’s attempts to reform the government post-1988 protests.

The ‘88 protests were fueled by the national discontent of the population with the government’s handling of the oil crisis and the economy, encouraged by Islamist groups that were running rampant under Benjedid’s rule, and stopped by a massacre by the army which served only to fuel further discontent, and now, it seems, that the army’s political power will grow from the barrel of a gun.

ONE MAN, ONE VOTE, ONE TIME

With the electoral victory of FIS, in January 11th of 1992 the Armed Forces of Algeria, stormed the Presidential Palace of incumbent President Benjedid; what happened next was the live resignation of the President, who also declared that the current elections of the government were canceled as “unfair, undemocratic and as a major threat to the democratic apparatus of the Algerian government”.

Mohamed Boudiaf, an exiled independence fighter and one of the founders of the NLF, had been exiled in Morocco and listened on the radio about news of Algeria, including the immediate formation of the Haut Comité d’Etat, or HCE; it was a day after that the Armed Forces sent him a letter, inviting Boudiaf to compose the chairmanship of the HCE and thus, attain the role of President of Algeria.

The reception to President Boudiaf has been lukewarm at best on the 13th of January, as the populace seemed to only interpret the news as the military attempting to legitimize itself against FIS and other Islamists groups; the seeming apathy of the populace was a bad sign to the future of the junta, but there was still two problems to take care of - the arrest of FIS leadership, and the stabilization of the regime.

Even today, on the 14th of January of 1992, a mere three days after the coup d’etat, Islamists groups are already reuniting and bracing themselves to engage in warfare against the ruling party, which has claimed it is “determined to fight against dangerous groups that threaten to undermine Algerian democracy and the democratic framework that has been built since the war of independence”. Already, there were loyalists fermenting the seeds for the rise of three different groups, the Islamic Armed Movement (MIA), the Movement for an Islamic State (MEI), and the Islamic Front for Armed Jihad (FIDA).