GOVERNMENT COALITION PARTIES RETURN IN LEGISLATIVE

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 ALGIERS 000680 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/18/2017 TAGS: PGOV KDEM AG SUBJECT: GOVERNMENT COALITION PARTIES RETURN IN LEGISLATIVE ELECTION THAT GARNERED LITTLE INTEREST REF: A. ALGIERS 282 ¶B. ALGIERS 292 ¶C. ALGIERS 618 Classified By: Ambassador Robert S. Ford, for reasons 1.4 (b, d) ¶1. (C) SUMMARY: Algerians went to the polls in low numbers under heavy security Thursday to elect representatives to Algeria's largely powerless 389-seat parliament for five-year terms. The parties of the current government coalition claimed the day, led by President Bouteflika's FLN, the secular RND under former Prime Minister Ouyahia, and the Islamist MSP. The coalition's claim on power, however, diminished by 35 seats. Louisa Hanoune's socialist Workers' Party will become Algeria's largest opposition party. Voter participation averaged about 36 percent, a noticeable drop from the reported 46 percent participation in 2002. Turnout in key cities including Algiers, Bejaia, and the Berber stronghold of Tizi Ouzou were among the lowest in the country. With the exception of two small bombings in the eastern city Constantine on the eve of the election, there was no reported violence. Interior Minister Zerhouni reported that there had been isolated cases of election irregularities, but he insisted that they had not affected the results. The next and final step in the election process is the Constitutional Council's ratification of the results, and disgruntled candidates can appeal to that council before it announces the final results. Political observers anticipate the current government cabinet to resign and for President Bouteflika to announce a new cabinet shortly afterwards. We do not yet know how big, or how important, the cabinet changes would be. Our first impression of the election is that the low turnout suggests the political process itself needs greater credibility, a point that system aparatchik and Interior Minister Zerhouni implicitly acknowledged at his May 18 press conference. We suggest some press guidance at the end of this cable. End Summary. TURNOUT LOW ¶2. (U) As noted reftels, perhaps the biggest question in the elections was whether or not Algerians would care enough to vote in the election. Total voter turnout as reported by the Ministry of Interior on May 18 was 6.66 million -- which translates to 35.51 percent of registered voters. (The corresponding figure for the 2002 legislative elections was 46 percent, the Interior Minister acknowledged at his May 18 press conference.) Interior Minister Zerhouni appeared a handful of times in the course of election day on national television, which played patriotic music and interviewed voters who said voting was their patriotic duty, announcing updates on voter turnout. The highest turnout occurred in predominately desert provinces with sparse populations, where the social stigma of not voting is greater. (Two experienced journalists told us May 17 evening that in rural areas government administrators will sometimes cause problems for people whose voting cards are not stamped.) The prize for the highest turnout in percentage terms went to Tindouf, where 66.03 percent of voters appeared at the polls. Turnout in the most populated cities, like Algiers, was poor. Final turnout in the largest city, Algiers, was a disappointing 18.4 percent. The one exception was Oran, the second most populous city, where turnout at 31.40 percent approached the national average. Meanwhile, Berber strongholds Tizi Ouzo and Bejaia, where there are relatively more sympathizers for Berber leader Hocine Ait Ahmed's boycott call, turned out only 16.14 and 17.77 percent of voters, respectively. Zerhouni himself noted that many Algerians were at the beach and did not vote; one embassy officer confirmed that all beaches around Algiers were unusually populated. Nonetheless, Zerhouni on May 18 said the 36 percent turnout compared fairly with legislative elections in Italy and in the U.S. Algerian political parties, he admonished, needed to demonstrate greater relevance to Algerian voters. A neighborhood butcher told Poloff May 17 that he wasn't going to vote because the election would change nothing. He wanted lower taxes and better services and the elected deputies would do nothing to secure such things. ALGIERS 00000680 002 OF 004 ¶3. (U) Zerhouni on May 18 noted that there had been 962,000 invalidated ballots, and he acknowledged that the voters themselves had invalidated them. He commented that this suggested that voters were unhappy with their political choices but at the same time recognized the importance of voting as a patriotic act. ¶4. (U) There were no reports of election-related violence, although two bombs exploded May 16 in Constantine, killing one police officer and injuring two Algerians, according to media reports. Extraordinary measures were taken to ensure that violence and bombings did not mar these elections. Police would not allow anyone to stop or park a car in front of a polling place. We observed a series of passenger buses lined up as a barrier against car bombings in front of the access points to two polling places in downtown Algiers. Uniformed and plain clothes police and security personnel were out in force at all polling places. ¶5. (C) Our staff observed young Algerians in lower income areas of the capital mocking people who voted, telling them they were wasting their time and that nothing would change as a result of elections. Based on input from the FLN, National Rally for Democracy (RND),Movement for a Society at Peace (MSP),Rally for Culture and Democracy (RCD),and the Workers' Party (WP),nine embassy personnel observed voting at what the parties identified as key polling places for their get-out-the-vote efforts. Areas thought to be fertile for the MSP and WP registered very low turnouts, based on our observations. The turnout in MSP, RCD, and WP strongholds was the most disappointing. The morning of election day, MSP and WP both told us that turnout was lower than expected. Contrary to expectations of the parties, we also found that turnout was strongest in the morning and tapered off as the day progressed, except for some last-minute voting in less affluent areas right before polls closed. (Polls were originally scheduled to open from 0800 to 1700 local, but Zerhouni extended the balloting time to 2000.) ¶6. (C) We commonly heard Algerians near polling places express their dissatisfaction with the Algerian election process, noting that their votes would not matter and voicing that they would have preferred to vote in the French presidential election. Algerians who voted generally said they did so out of patriotic duty or because it was important to vote to help build democracy. Voters casting ballots for the latter reason also predominantly said they were seriously considering voiding the ballot by tearing or marking on it. In this way, they claimed they could support democracy and protest their perception that voting changed nothing in Algeria. In their separate tours, Ambassador and Pol/Ec chief each got to enter polling stations (in working-class Bab el-Oued and upper-class Hydra, respectively). Neatly lined out on tables for voters were paper ballots for each of the 24 parties running in Algiers. Each party's list of candidates appeared on the ballot paper in Arabic. The French-language initials of the party appeared at the top of the page, along with a photo of the candidate in the party's top slot. Voters then went behind a curtain to discard the undesired ballots and place the desired ballot in a white, sealable envelope, which was then deposited in a ballot box that was clearly labeled as to the location of its polling place. Voters signed the registry next to their name, and their voting card was stamped (and national identity card reviewed) to guard against repeated voting. In most of the polling stations, there were a couple political party observers. While the observation is by no means statistical, PolEc Chief observed one voter ask for a pen with the clear intent of invalidating the FLN party list before putting it in an envelope. This is our best indication that voters carried out their threat to invalidate their ballot. In general, we observed older, conservatively dressed Algerians voting with greatest frequency. In particular, we observed a very large percentage of middle-aged to elderly veiled women at the polls. In the course of our observations throughout the day, we saw only a small handful of people under forty cast ballots. (Comment: It was especially striking that in the densely populated Bab el-Oued district, a former stronghold of Islamists, there were crowds of people in the markets and on the streets but the polling centers were empty of voters. Young men preferred to hang around with friends ALGIERS 00000680 003 OF 004 outside rather than vote. End Comment.) GOVERNMENT COALITION TAKES LION'S SHARE OF VOTE ¶7. (U) At an 1100 press conference May 18, Zerhouni announced that the FLN won the most seats, 136 (down from 199 last elections in 2002). RND and MSP, the other two members of the presidential coalition, made gains and won a total of 61 and 52 seats respectively. (In the last elections, MSP won 38 seats and RND 47.) The next biggest party was the Workers' Party, which finished with 26 seats, up from its current 21. In the new parliament, it will be the largest opposition party, followed by the Berber-dominated RCD (19 seats),which was not represented in the previous parliament. The remaining parties obtained seats in the single digits. Zerhouni in his May 18 press conference pointed to the 32 parliamentary seats won by 13 small parties and commented that this proliferation of small parties was a problem. Perhaps, he observed, the political party law should be changed. Thirty-three independent candidates also won election in the southern desert provinces. Overall, the coalition's majority in the 389-seat parliament has significantly diminished with a collective total of 249 seats, down from 284. HOW CLEAN AND HOW FAIR ? ¶8. (U) Political parties on election day expressed only minor complaints about balloting irregularities, filing complaints directed at 15 polling places out of approximately 40,000. Political party contacts told us the disputes were minor and would not affect the overall results, a point that Minister Zerhouni also made that evening. Election observation commission president Bouchair reportedly told the media May 17 evening that there were no serious problems that would affect the results nationally. We will seek more details from political party candidates in the next several days, but our initial impression is that the voting process itself was fine. We are not sure of the vote tallying process, an area where there have been many complaints in the past. Removing conservative Islamist Abdallah Djaballah as party leader of Islah, a decision that Algerian lawyers agree was not grounded in law and contradicts two court rulings in his favor, unfairly disadvantaged Islamist candidates (refs A and B). Unprecedented scrutiny of signatures on petitions for independent candidates, which led to the disqualification of all independent candidates in the most populous provinces, also strikes us as denying free and fair ballot access (ref C). In these fundamental respects, we find these elections to have had significant problems. WHAT IS NEXT: RATIFY RESULTS, CABINET CHANGE ¶9. (C) The Constitutional Council has the constitutional responsibility of ratifying election results. Zerhouni on May 18 said candidates may appeal election results to the council before that announcement. A variety of Algerian political journalists told us the evening of May 18 that they anticipate a cabinet shake-up in the coming days. Canadian Ambassador Peck told Ambassador late May 18 that the Algerian Foreign Ministry informed him that day that Algerian Foreign Minister Bedjaoui would not make a long-planned trip to Canada the week of May 27, due to the elections. Some Algerian newspapers expect a significant cabinet change, while others discount the likelihood. The editor of the second leading Arabic daily told Ambassador May 18 evening that public confidence in the political process is already low, and a small cabinet change would further sink that waning confidence. COMMENT ¶10. (C) Unquestionably, many -- if not most -- of the ALGIERS 00000680 004 OF 004 political parties running in this election conducted dull campaigns that earned no public interest. The government's marginalization of independent candidates and Islamists loyal to Abdallah Djaballah, many of whom have been the standard-bearers of anti-corruption and economic reform, also likely contributed to the record-low turnout. (That said, we do not want to overemphasize the political strength of Islamists; we only found a single Islamist MSP poll watcher on May 18 in the former Islamist fiefdom of Bab el-Oued, far fewer than the FLN, RND or even communist PT deployed. Truly Algeria in 2007 is not the same as it was in 1991.) In particular, we were struck by the remarks of several young unemployed Algerians who mocked voters at the polls. They told us that it was wrong for Algerians to elect do-nothing parliamentarians who earned 3,000 euros per month when unemployment and economic hardship were so pronounced. As the new parliament (and new cabinet) start out, bringing hope and economic opportunity to these youths, who represent one-third of the electorate, is vital to establishing a credible Algerian democracy and ultimately sustainable stability. ¶11. (C) As for the impact on our programs and policies, the rise of the Workers' Party as the largest opposition party, with its strong anti-American rhetoric, as well as the return to power of more conservative elements of the FLN (ref C), suggest that the new parliament will be less friendly to the U.S. than the old (not to say that the old was particularly friendly). Our strongest levers for change as we move forward will likely be the reform-minded RND as well as the Islamist MSP, whose general support of economic reform and advocacy of lifting the Emergency Law banning political demonstrations in Algiers augur for broader opening of Algeria's political space. ¶12. (SBU) Suggested points for press if needed: -- We respect the choices made by the Algerian people on May ¶18. -- The government blocked some political figures from running, but Algerians did have a broad set of choices. -- There are reports of election tampering but no political party has yet raised major complaints. -- We note the low turnout of voters. -- The Algerian government and Algerian political parties will need to find ways to make the election process more credible and relevant to the Algerian public. FORD