Algerians despair despite country’s wealth

sami aboudi — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 13:12:51 +0000

Two Algerians were detained by Egyptian authorities recently while trying to obtain a work visa from the Israeli embassy in Cairo, a local newspaper has reported, despite the fact that Algeria and Israel are still officially at war.

A survey, published by an Algerian newspaper, showed that up to half of Algeria's young men are tempted by the idea of fleeing to Europe as illegal migrants to escape misery at home.

Why do so many people from a country – renowned by many in the Arab world for sacrificing up to one million people in a war to end 130 years of French rule - want to escape to Europe?

Algeria is a rich nation but its people are poor. It is the world's fourth largest gas exporter and the tenth of oil. Foreign currency reserves have soared to $138 billion at the end of Nov. 2008 from $41 billion at the end of 2004.

Yet, the UNDP's human development index, which measures quality of life, puts Algeria in 104th place, behind countries such as Cape Verde and Belize.

High unemployment, estimated at 70 percent among people under 30 - though official statistics give far lower figures - is driving many Algerians to desperate measures.

Earlier this year, police in the town of Chlef fought angry youths who had burned shops and buildings in the latest in a series of protests against lack of housing and jobs and what critics call an unresponsive political elite.

Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has led his North African Arab country out of a brutal civil war by combining military force with an amnesty for militants, but getting Algerians out of poverty appears to be proving more difficult.

He looks well placed to stay in office after his allies pushed through a law that allows him to seek a third term in office when his second term ends next year.

High oil prices over the past few years have helped the country of 33 million launch a $140 billion five-year national economic development plan and repay a large part of its foreign debt.

The Algerian government has promised a $100-150 billion national development drive from next year. But many Algerians ponder how to cope until such a plan takes off.

"We are desperate," said Mohamed Tegar, a 32-year-old resident of Chelf. "We are six men living in a very small flat and all of us are unemployed. We don't understand the local authorities' reaction."

Why is Kirkuk such an obstacle for Iraq?

sami aboudi — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 15:27:31 +0000

Iraq's leaders have overcome many hurdles in their struggle to rebuild their country after the ouster of Saddam Hussein in 2003. But agreeing on the fate of the "ethnic tinderbox" of oil-producing Kirkuk is a particularly testing one.

Why has Kirkuk proven to be such an obstacle? For many, settling its fate seems to be an easy task.

The dispute largely revolves around Kurdish demands to incorporate the city into their autonomous northern Iraq region. Arabs and Turkmens want the city to remain under the control of the Iraqi government as it has always been.

For an outsider the dispute might seem to be an administrative question of who will manage the city but Kirkuk's fate has taken on national and regional dimensions since U.S.-led forces toppled Saddam. It has fuelled the ethnic conflict between Arabs
and Kurds and drawn in regional powers, especially neighbouring Turkey.

Kurds look at the city inhabited by Arabs, Kurds and Turkmens as their historic capital, while Arabs and Turkmen argue it equally belongs to them.

While Sunnis and Shi'ite Arabs are locked in a power struggle across the country, they are united in rejecting ceding the city to the Kurdish autonomous region.

But Kirkuk is more than a piece of real estate inheritance. The city sits on a sea of "black gold" -- Iraq's biggest oil field, which has become more lucrative with crude prices above $100 a barrel.

From a regional perspective, Ankara opposes Kurdish control of Kirkuk not only out of concern for the rights of fellow Turkmens in Iraq but also because it will bolster its own Kurdish minority's demands for autonomy.

Watching an independent Kurdistan gradually taking shape across its border, Ankara fears that Kirkuk's oil could strengthen the autonomous region in the face of a weak central government in Baghdad, and realise Kurdish aspirations for a region-wide Kurdish state, possibly encompassing southern Turkey and parts of Iran and Syria.

After years of trying and failing, Iraqi leaders are trying to reassure friends and foes that they are close to a deal on the future of Kirkuk. But even if parliament adopts a compromise hammered out behind closed doors, it is difficult to see how it will be implemented.

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Algerians despair despite country’s wealth

Why is Kirkuk such an obstacle for Iraq?