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                                                                                WORLD, Page 30

NORTH AFRICA

A Prelude to Civil War?


To turn back the fundamentalist tide, Algeria's army derails
legislative elections and sets up a tense standoff

By JILL SMOLOWE -- Reported by William Dowell/Cairo and Lara
Marlowe/Algiers


    On the day Algeria should have been holding the
concluding round of parliamentary elections, proving that it
could move peacefully from one-party socialist rule to a
pluralist state, the country's military was putting the
finishing touches on a bloodless coup d'etat. Last Thursday,
just five days after the army forced the resignation of
President Chadli Bendjedid, provoking the dissolution of
parliament and cancellation of the elections that had promised
to hand Muslim fundamentalists a legislative majority, Mohammed
Boudiaf was sworn in as head of a military-backed, five-member
Council of State. Boudiaf has splendid credentials -- he is
nonpartisan and a hero of Algeria's war for independence from
France -- but real power within the ruling council is likely to
fall to the country's Defense Minister, Major General Khaled
Nezzar.

    And there's the rub. With no clear constitutional standing
and with allegiance from few outside the military's high
command, the council is trying to impose its authority on a
restless nation that could erupt any day in civil strife. Short
of martial law, it is unlikely the council will be able to
provide the glue for an electorate fractured along political,
religious and ethnic lines. The Islamic Salvation Front (F.I.S.)
shows no inclination to cooperate with the authorities who stole
the party's electoral victory. Last week the fundamentalists
and leaders of the two other main political parties set aside
their differences to try to design a strategy for restoring an
elected parliament.

    At the heart of the drama is the question of what is
better for Algeria's democratic aspirations: a military
intervention that claims to safeguard democratic ideals by
robbing fundamentalists of electoral victory, or the full play
of the electoral process, which risks empowering radical
fundamentalists who might prove antagonistic to the
give-and-take of democracy. After the F.I.S. swept the first
round of voting on Dec. 26, the military was hardly alone in its
fears that the fundamentalists might wield their legislative
clout to impose an Islamic republic. Nearby African and Arab
states breathed a sigh of relief after the military intrusion,
which the Tunisian daily As-Sabah characterized as "a
last-minute change of direction by a train heading toward the
abyss."

    For a Western world grown accustomed to drawing facile
distinctions between villains and heroes as it witnessed one
political convolution after another, Algeria's crisis posed a
jarring dilemma: Which takes precedence -- democratic principles
or geopolitical self-interest? The U.S. initially appeared to
support the annulment of the election by contending that the
generals, whose intervention had the support of a handful of
civilian leaders, acted constitutionally when they appointed a
council to fill the vacant presidency. In fact, the 1989
Algerian constitution makes no such provision. A day later,
officials declared that Washington would not stake out a
position in the constitutional debate. France, which ruled
Algeria until 1962 and still maintains close cultural ties, also
zigged and zagged until President Francois Mitterrand concluded
that Algeria "must at the earliest possible opportunity go back
to a democratic process."

    Meanwhile Algeria's military men gambled on nostalgia. By
bringing Boudiaf aboard, they hoped to create an aura of
historical legitimacy. But Boudiaf, 72, is hardly a household
name now. He has been absent from Algeria for the past 28 years,
since he fled to Morocco after refusing to serve as the puppet
President of an army-controlled government. With nearly 75% of
Algeria's 26 million people under age 30, it is questionable
whether young voters will grasp the symbolism.

    In his first address to the nation, Boudiaf struck a
menacing note. "We will permit no individuals or group to claim
a monopoly on Islam and use it to threaten the country," he
said. Those are certain to be heard as fighting words by the
F.I.S. As yet, the party's acting leader, Abdelkader Hachani,
has steered clear of incendiary rhetoric that might catapult
Islamists into the street and give the authorities a pretext to
ban the party. Last week, when riot police surrounded the mosque
where Hachani was conducting Friday prayers, a traditional forum
for political messages, he counseled, "Whatever happens, do not
react."

    Still, Hachani has declared that the 231 parliamentarians
elected in December -- 188 of them fundamentalists -- constitute
the country's sole legitimate governing body. He has threatened
to take the government to court for violating the constitution,
and to convoke an opposition parliament.

    The least likely scenario is that Algeria's three main
parties will sit idle and permit the Council of State to serve
out the two remaining years of Bendjedid's aborted five-year
term. There is also no guarantee that the army rank and file,
more than half of whom are draftees, will support the military
leadership. French Arabist Francois Burgat predicts that the
army maneuver will be viewed as an attempt by a select group of
officers to hold on to their privileges while Algeria sinks
further into economic decay. "I would not be surprised to see
factions of the army break away and begin fighting the officers
who are now in power," he warns. Whatever the outcome, it is
plain that the military has not imposed a solution -- it has
merely postponed the day of reckoning with Algeria's Islamic
forces.