“Algeria’s revamped Constitution, the American Way”

The new draft constitution, submitted of late to the examining and appreciation of the President of the Republic, Abdellaziz Bouteflika, provides for significant changes in terms of advanced democratic principles, the anchoring of the rule of law and the safeguarding of values related to freedom of expression and human rights protection, according to well informed sources close to the file.

The same sources told Echorouk that the newly revamped constitution contained salutary provisions which enshrine the rule of law in all circumstances, the protection and safeguarding of human rights, freedom of speech and expression, the independence of the judiciary and the promotion of the political, cultural and economic rights of all the Algerian citizens.

The new constitution was minutely devised by a panel of eminent jurists and lawmakers who took into account the sweeping changes unfolding on the world scene as well as the telling tragic events which wracked the country in the past decade in order to spare Algeria further upheavals and turmoil in the future through the consolidation of genuine democratic state institutions at all levels.

Similarly to the US constitution, the introduced constitutional amendments provide for the election of a president of the Republic for a four-year mandate, renewable only once as well as for the creation of the post of a vice-President, an unprecedented novelty in the country’s political system since Algeria’s hard-won independence in 1962.