Bachir Mecheri: “Abassi Madani accepted Pt Bendjedid’s offer to bow out of run-off election”

The Lawyer of the now dissolved “FIS” Party, Mecheri Bachir, has categorically denied the remarks made by the former Minister of National Defense, retired Army General Khaled Nezzar, about the crisis-fraught events that unfolded in the early nineties in Algeria.

Lawyer Bachir Mecheri even accused the latter of being a “liar or of having lost his reason”, as he put it, while bringing his own version of these worrisome events in a statement made to”Echorouk”.

According to Mecheri’s testimony, the late President Chadli Bendjedid had charged Abdelkader Hadjar, the current ambassador of Algeria in Tunisia, to get in touch with “FIS” Party leader Abassi Madani, without the knowledge of his second  man in command, namely Ali Belhadj, who were both of them imprisoned at that time at the military prison of Blida, for the purpose that his party wouldn’t engage in the second round of the 1991 parliamentary elections, arguing that such a participation would be “suicidal” for the country, and be content with the results of the first round of the polls, given the threats of “fitna” or discord hanging over the country and that the presidential election would follow suit when calm is restored.

And to substantiate his version of events, Lawyer Bachir Mecheri said that the two Hadjar brothers can testify to this contact with Abassi Madani as it happened a day or two before the resignation of President Chadli Bendjedid.

According to Mr Mecheri, this secret meeting which lasted over half an hour, known only by the President, the two Hadjar brothers and himself, was held in the courtyard of the Blida military prison and not in the parlor of fear of being heard by someone else and thus avoiding possible leaks.

After such a meeting, the lawyer revealed that the “FIS” Party leader Abassi Madani was aware of the high stakes and he thereby contacted on the same day Abdelkader Hachani, a senior member of the “FIS” National Executive Board, urging him to hold a press conference in which he was to announce officially the withdrawal of the FIS Party from the second round of the 1991 legislative elections.

But this contingency didn’t finally materialize because Abdelkader Hachani and his deputy withdrew from the headquarters of the “FIS” National Bureau on the pretext of discomfort and moved to the Annassers district near Kouba in upper Algiers to hold another “parallel” meeting to decide, with other persons to keep on with the electoral process and to ignore Abassi Madani’s instructions.

According to Lawyer Mecheri’s revelations, Abdelkader Hachani was to take then the post of head of government, Ait Ahmed that of Parliament Speaker and Sid Ahmed Ghozali was to be designated President of the Republic.