Ali Benflis: « The era of politician dubbed as miracle maker is over »

Algerian former premier Ali Benflis Sunday said he would stand in the country’s presidential elections, after a 10-year absence from politics after he lost the 2004 poll to President Abdelaziz Bouteflika.

Algerian former premier Ali Benflis Sunday said he would stand in the country’s presidential elections, after a 10-year absence from politics after he lost the 2004 poll to President Abdelaziz Bouteflika.

“With honour, determination, confidence and a lot of humility, I took the decision to be a candidate for the presidency of the republic,” Benflis, 71, told the press and his supporters in attendance.

Incumbent President Bouteflika on Friday set the date for the next presidential polls on April 17^th 2014, but has still not said whether he himself will be seeking a fourth consecutive term after more than 14 years in power.

“I am motivated by national duty and it is in this spirit that I hope to propose and lead a project for Algeria with all Algerian men and women,” Ali Benflis affirmed.

Benflis was the second prime minister during Bouteflika’s first mandate as president, and then ran against him in the 2004 polls.

He has a reputation as a human rights defender and is popular with intellectuals, but in 2004 he only won 6.4 percent of the vote cast, while Bouteflika was largely reelected with 85 percent of the ballot.

During his speech, which lasted one and a half hours, Ali Benflis, who also served as justice minister in the past, said his priorities now would be boosting the judiciary, creating jobs, and improving education and health services.

He also said it was essential to “head towards a productive national economy,” saying he had a program with “innovative solutions”.

Benflis also said he would follow up with the policy of civil concord and national reconciliation initiated by the current president to end the country’s terrorism-related strife, which lasted more than 10 years and killed thousands of people, according to official figures.

Algerian electoral law requires each candidate for the presidential race to collect at least 60,000 signatures from supporters across no fewer than 25 provinces of the country.

The 2014 election is legally due on April 17th; given that the current presidential term expires on April 16, 2014, and Article 132 of the Organic Law stipulates that the presidential polls should be held 30 days prior to the end of the presidential term.

A national commission in charge of preparing the presidential election is to be set up imminently, which will be headed by the Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal. The relevant commission will be made up of representatives from ministries of interior, justice, finance and media.

However, the opposition has been urging the government to set up an independent electoral commission in order to ensure a fair and free presidential election, a claim rejected by the government.