Algerian leaders Wage and welfare cuts and dismantling of state sector
=FLN Congress AFTER three days of debate. 5,000 delegates at the Special Congress of Liberation Front (FLN) Algeria's only party December 26 overwhelmingly approved a new charter for the country. This was by no means an irrelevant exercise in textual hairsplitting, but a fundamental rewriting of the source of the country's policies and laws."
Before the Congress even brought down the curtain, the press agency Algerian Press Service (APS) issued a lengthy statement dispelling any doubt on the credentials of the delegates - the vast majority personally handpicked by Benjedid Chadli, Secretary-General of the party -and giving weight and legitimacy to the new Charter which will pave the way for changes in the political hierarchy and the economic options: text, a precise and which will modify Algeria, Its people, its party and its state.
No one would doubt that the text was clear: but what was also clear were the manceuvres of the bureaucracy to steamroller through fundamental changes. Until the Congress, it was generally surmised that the final version of the Charter would embody the synthesis of a countrywide "exemplary debate". For the first time revealed that the text was in its final shape long before the debate started: "The draft presented to Congress was prepared by the political leaderhsip at the beginning of 1985 and debated by 4 million citizens. " In reality the general line of the new policies has already begun to be implemented for the last few years. The exercise was an unmistakeable sham to legitimise
swing towards Thatcherism the National - - on "supreme president substantial "a clear to rubberstamp gress Charter. rich document So in fact the Algerian the state labels masses." These (General Union democratic APS (National Union of Algerian Women). is than more state bureaucracy. the reorientation
President Chodit's new pragmatism appeals to Washington the lurch to the right by President Chadli who orchestrated in minute detail the scope and extent of the debate, culminating in a special Con- the new "exemplary democratic debate" in the future of "revolution" quietly hostile bypassed the vast majority of the Algerian masses and simply involved the FLN and its front organisations "democratic" labels the organisations of the "organisations place, the UGTA the are of Algerian workers), the UNJA (National Union of Algerian Youth) and the UNFAA "enemies of Even within these closed circles, it would be naive to presume that the discussions were without problems. It that they certain reflected the profound impasse of the The inevitable Congress clashes were led by old guard FLN militants who opposed tooth and nail towards new Socialist Viewpoint No. 10 February 1985 p23
By JACK GOLDBERG economic choices. They posed as unrelenting defenders of the old political order born out of the Revolution in the '60s and by former president Boumedienne. Their opposition was symbolised with a single slogan: "No to Economic Liberalisation"
Anticipating a rearguard action by
factions, president Chadli kicked off the debate inside the FLN as early as mid-August. First this allowed him to proclaim that a really
debate was taking strengthening the legitimacy of any decision taken by Congress. Secondly, his unshakeable control of the Party's apparatus and the state's mass media gave him the added advantage to expose all dissenters as
Othe Revolution" and manipulate public opinion to his advantage. Further it allowed him to gauge the number of his opponents and prepare more adequately for the
(timing, choice of delegates, etc.). So far from being a forum where he arqued with and convinced his opponents of the correct-
EFLN Congress ness of the new orientation, president Chadli used the pre-Congress discussion as a sounding-off exercise to disorientate his opponents and pave the way for his own resounding victory at Congress.
Nevertheless the crisis of the bureaucracy was open and visible. The clashes, sometimes vitriolic, found expression in the public press. The ministerished in liMousiahid Messaoudi Zitount, published in (FLN daily paper) two articles calling for a liberalisation of the economy, making a case for free market forces, advocating a salary freeze and openly welcoming private capital from imperialist countries.
Around the same period, Algerie Actualité, a national weekly. nounced the welfare state and condemned the FLN as a "closed apparatus which stifled any free expression and perpetuated a monolithism that negates individual value. promotes intellectual paucity and cliquism. * Revolution Africaine (official organ of the FLN) reacted Immediately. denouncing the "theses of
bourgeois reaction, a project sponreminded all counter terrutionaries sored
of the might of its armed wing, the
Popular National Army.
ft became quickly obvious that
within the state bureaucracy two
tendencies were shaping up: one
favouring a rapid privatisation of the
economy, a bigger share for the na-
tional bourgeoisie and a rapproche-
ment with imperialism. The other ci-
inging to the "socialist ideals" in-
herited from former President
Boumedienne.
The crisis of the bureaucracy
became more acute at a time when
the state of the economy was worsen-
ing. The standard of living of workers
was steadily being eroded by infla
tion and a sudden rise of basic com-
modity prices.
Most Importantly,
legislation, the "statut général du
travail" (General Labour statutes),
introduced by Boumedienne in 1978
started being widely implemented in
all state institutions. Its general aim
was to restructure jobs in state-owned
enterprises and rationalise their. com
parable values. In real terms, it was
set to cut wages by around 25% as
well as increasing national insurance
contributions. Workers only
resisted the implementation of the
new labour legislation but demanded
large wage increases which the state
bureaucracy cannot even start to
As well as labour unrest, a wave of
civil disorder is engulfing the coun
try. Muslim fundamentalists started
Warmed rebellion repressed in
blood by the army. Armed clashes
just outside Algiers ended with twen
ty deaths. The main ringleader Bouali
is still on the run, despite a vast
police operation - which indicates
the existence of sympathies among
Former President Ben Bella (left) and Boumedienne in 1963 the local population as well as connivance with sections of the ruling
During the same period.
demonstrations demanding the freeing of all political prisoners reached a peak when the whole Kabyle population struck on November 10th after the trial and emprisonment of the popular political sInger Ait Margallet. The Government has shown a staunch determination not to concede an inch.
Opponents, whether human rights
Kabyle cultural crushed. While in the past opponents were systematically rounded up and Imprisoned without trial for several years until released as a "gesture of good will", the government appears
Ton its human rights record and has devised new
Sits opponents. Twenty-three Algerian League of Human Rights were tried for conspiracy against the state, distribution of leaflets and 1legal assembly. Despite the collapse of the prosecution case, based on flimsy evidence, they were still con
sentences ranging between 6 months and 3 years.
Almost simultaneousiy. of former president Ben Bella - the first Algerian president, deposed in a coup by Boumedienne - received up to 20 years in gaol for plotting armed revolt. These show trials remained a taxing test for a state bureaucracy already isolated and whose power
base is increasingly shrinking.
What is at stake for the government Is how to adapt to the necessities of the economic crisis without the risk of opening a more violent crisis that the
state has no immediate means to con-
Ta section of the
bureaucracy, the only way to salvage
situation is to liberalise the - a position in itself con-
tradictory to the maintenance of a
one party system for the most or
thodox wing - wholeheartedly sup he dry devani Carde Social
Parti d'Avant Garde
(PAGS) - what is most important is Socialist Viewpoint No. 10 February 1985p24
I to maintain the "gain of the Revolution, the inheritance of Boumedienne" embodied in the vast state sector and the one-party system. Only then could they avoid or, at worst, postpone any confrontation with the
Fears that a spiralling down of oil prices will accelerate the crisis of the
have thrown bureaucracy into permanent turmoil in isolation from masses. Faced with increased working class and youth militancy, they cannot fall back any more on the op tion of the FLN front organisations -state trade unions, youth section and women's section - which for many years operated as transmission belts under the control of the FLN.
These organisations remain empty hulks devoid of any significance since the Stalinists who used to run them have been pushed aside by President Chadii: what is left is on the one hand workers and youth yet organised in independent structure - steadily affected by the capable of expressing their anger in an open conflict with the state: and on the other hand a beleaguered state
bickering about what
It is In this context that the new Charter is seen as a way out. Pesident Chadli's line has strongly emerged as the new orientation. On the one hand it maintains the status quo on the political terrain, while on the other it
has started - without conceding the
demands for an immediate liberalisa-
tion of the economy - to tilt slowly
away from the "socialist ideals"
devised and theorised by former
president Boumedienne.
While still proclaiming his commit-
ment to the past and to Algeria's fun-
damental options such as "socialism",
state control and one-party system.
President Chadi! has now paved the
way for a new economic system, one
in which sloganising about socialism
will sound increasingly hollow and
unconvincing: the breakdown of state
Industries and collective farms; an in-
creased share of the economy open to
private capital; the linking of wages
to pare state. A mighty jump from and an end to the
state capitalism to neo-Keynesianism. welfare state.
peppered with concepts such as "self
reliance directly poached from the
vocabulary of Thatcherism.
"pragmatic" Persident Chadli, the
sheet of Congress will re-
clothes: there is less material in them
than they like to see. The economic
reorientation will necessitate sooner
or later a reshuffling of the different
And it is more than certain that this
will open a more naked crisis where
the weight of the Algerian working
class and youth would this time be of
Polish workers form
A NEW current has been formed within the