The Path of Recognition

By Ferhat Mehenni

This truth must be recalled, even though not all political actors and observers want to acknowledge it:

Algeria is a colonial creation, viable and sustainable only by the dictatorship inscribed in its DNA.
No democracy is viable without the peoples of which it is composed and, who must exist distinctly from each other. Any denial of existence of these peoples (Kabyle, Mzab, Chawi, Chenwi, Hartan, Oran, Constantine and Tuareg …) will lead inevitably to failure. I mean no offense to all those who, on social networks, strive to state “we are neither Kabyles, Chaouis nor Touaregs … today, we are all Algerians“!
But the recognition of these peoples will have to be the basis of any eventual reconstruction – including independence for each of them, especially for those of them who wish it. There can no longer be national unity on the basis of the denial of the peoples that make up this country. The path of recognition, ultimately, is that of wisdom. Otherwise, nothing but a military-police dictatorship will be rebuilt on the ruins of the one that has just fallen. A bloodbath incited by the army, as in October 1988 with General Nezzar, would restore a semblance of order, but would not truly solve any political problem. The chaos would lead to a “libyanisation” of Algeria. This would be a lesser evil for all as opposed to the restoration of a new military regime that inevitably will always lead to new Toufik, new Bouteflika and new fluctuations like those of today and the Civil War in the 90s.