Algeria: Violent street incidents jolt Jijel after attempted self-immolation

A desperate street vendor set himself on fire on Sunday in protest at the demolition of his shop, sparking off violent clashes between security forces and angry youths in the city of Jijel, about 360 kilometres east of the capital Algiers.

• The hapless young shopkeeper was rushed to hospital suffering from severe burns, said local news outlets, while scores of disgruntled protesters went on the rampage by hurling stones and bricks at public buildings in the city-center where extra units of security forces were deployed.
• The street clashes spread to several areas in Jijel and severely disrupted road traffic, forcing the National Front for Social Justice Party to cancel a scheduled election campaign rally in the city and numerous shops and businesses to remain closed for fear of looting.

• 2011 Algerian self-immolations:
• In 2011, as the widely reported protests sparked off by Mohamed Bouazizi’s self-immolation in neighbouring Tunisia began to have a clear impact on the Tunisian government, a wave of self-immolations swept Algeria.

• These individual acts of protest mostly took place in front of government buildings following an unsuccessful approach to the authorities to vent grievances. Four self-immolators have died of their burns so far.

• It began on 12 January, when 26 year-old Mohamed Aouichia set himself on fire in Bordj Menaiel in the compound of the daira or local administrative district building.

• He had been sharing a room of 30 square metres with seven other people, including his sister, since 2003; he had repeatedly approached local authorities to get on the social housing list and been rebuffed. He has so far survived.

• On 13 January, Mohsen Bouterfif, a 37-year-old father of two, set himself on fire. He had gone with about twenty other youths to protest in front of the town hall of Boukhadra in Tebessa demanding jobs and houses, after the mayor refused to receive them.

• According to one testimony, the mayor shouted to them: “If you have courage, do like Bouazizi did, set yourself on fire!” His death was reported on 16 January, and hundreds of youths protested against his death causing the Wali or provincial Governor to sack the local mayor.

• However, hospital staff the following day claimed he was still alive, though in critical condition. News media described the suicide as “echoing the self-immolation that triggered the protests that toppled the leader of neighbouring Tunisia.” He finally died on 24 January at a hospital in Annaba in far eastern Algeria.

• These suicides were followed by dozens more attempted or successful self-immolations across the country, so far without triggering nation-wide demonstrations, most of them after the Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali fled his country on 14 January.