A Blog by the Editor of The Middle East Journal

Putting Middle Eastern Events in Cultural and Historical Context

Friday, February 13, 2009

Bouteflika Makes it Official

Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has officially announced that he is running for a third term. Since all the major opposition candidates had already announced they were sitting out a race they considered had a foregone conclusion, this is hardly a surprise, though as I noted in an earlier posting, there are still some questions about Bouteflika's health.

At this point the other announced candidates are from fringe parties or independent nonentities; no major political figures are challenging Bouteflika in the April vote, which will therefore likely be even more one-sided than the 2004 elections, when he at least had a serious challenger in the person of former Prime Minister Ali Benflis, but still won by 85%.

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