ALGERIA: Abdelaziz Bouteflika joins fellow Algerians to vote in Presidential elections

Record ID: 573908

  • Title: ALGERIA: Abdelaziz Bouteflika joins fellow Algerians to vote in Presidential elections
  • Date: 10th April 2009
  • Summary: VARIOUS OF PEOPLE GETTING THEIR PAPERS
  • Embargoed: 25th April 2009 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Algeria
  • Country: Algeria
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA1KJU0FF45CAHGS9IM8V7ZX451
  • Story Text: Algerians begin voting in an election the country's President Abdelaziz Bouteflika is expected to win convincingly.
    Algerians began voting on Thursday (April 9) in an election President Abdelaziz Bouteflika needs to win convincingly to show he can re-connect with disillusioned voters and snuff out a lingering Islamist insurgency.
    Bouteflika, a 72-year-old veteran of Algeria's war for independence from France, is expected to win by a big margin but if voters stay away from the polls that could boost opponents -- including Islamists -- who say the vote is a charade.
    Algerian lawmakers, most of them loyal to Bouteflika, cleared the way for him to stand for re-election last year by abolishing constitutional term limits. Critics said that would allow him to serve as president-for-life.
    The five other candidates in the race present no real challenge, and several opposition figures not taking part have urged their supporters either to put blank voting slips in the ballot box or stay at home.
    About an hour after voting started in the capital, a teeming city of white-washed French colonial buildings, only a trickle of voters were making their way to central polling stations, though election officials said they expected more later.
    "It is my right to vote," said one voter after leaving the polling station.
    "I voted for my country for the good of my country," said another.
    Bouteflika himself was accompanied by his nephew Ahmed when he cast his ballot in front of a crowd of media.
    Supporters say Bouteflika deserves credit for steering Algeria, an oil and gas producer across the Mediterranean from the European Union, back to stability after a civil conflict in the 1990s that killed an estimated 150,000 people.
    But a rump of rebels affiliated to al Qaeda mount occasional attacks -- a low-level insurgency that security analysts say finds sympathy among some of Algeria's millions of unemployed young people who feel their government has let them down.
    Bouteflika has promised to spend 150 billion USD on development projects and create 3 million jobs, his remedy for an economy in which energy accounts for about 96 percent of exports but where other sectors have been choked by red tape and under-investment.
    Polling stations are scheduled to close at 8 p.m. (1900 GMT), but no results will be released until Friday when the Interior Ministry will announce the winner.
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