Algeria tightens security grip on freedom of expression

Adopted in December 2020, the Algerian constitution formally guarantees freedom of the written, audiovisual and electronic press. However, since Hirak stopped working, a series of repressive laws were passed in 2021, 2023, and most recently in late April 2024, de facto eroding any form of freedom of expression in the country.

They limit the right to freedom of expression of journalists and the media, as well as Algeria’s opponents, and contain several worrying provisions. In 2024, Algeria seems to have taken a bold – and worrying – turn by passing laws that could make dystopia’s greatest writers fade away.

In a dizzying downward spiral, Algeria has just set in stone its provisions in the Official Gazette that could still make the most die-hard human rights defenders shudder. These texts, published in the latest edition, introduce changes to the Criminal Code that redefine treason and terrorism to cover almost any form of protest.

Imagine a regime where criticizing the economy or revealing questionable procurement could earn you the label of traitor to the nation. And with good reason, Article 63 bis, for example, provides for life imprisonment for anyone who “discloses to foreign agents classified information or documents” about security, defense or the national economy. But the artistic vagueness with which the concepts of “security” and “national economy” are defined opens the door to arbitrariness.

Moreover, the Algerian legislator, in a fit of heightened protectionism, seems to be confusing political opposition with acts of terrorism. Article 87 bis, redefined from 2021, turns political criticism into a quasi-terrorist act, assimilating any form of protest with a threat to state security. An effective way, certainly, to push the debate under the carpet by emphasizing the protection of the nation.

In this grand legislative orchestration, each new law seems like an additional hammer blow to the coffin of freedom of expression. The goal seems clear: stifle dissent, stifle a free press, and turn whistleblowers into enemies of the state. In the information age, where transparency is often seen as a pillar of democracy, these initiatives seem not only counterproductive, but also dangerously regressive.

In short, with these new laws, Algeria could turn into a theater where criticism becomes risky and truth a luxury. Human rights defenders, journalists and dedicated citizens are thus faced with a tragic dilemma: to remain silent or risk imprisonment. A choice that, in any self-respecting regime, should never exist.

These texts, in their calculated ambiguity, seem straight out of the dictator’s apprentice toolbox. They could not only turn journalists into prisoners, but also from whistleblowers into heretics who would be suppressed. Who would have thought that in 2024, sharing information could become an act of high treason? Each section of the bill appears designed to further stifle free expression, blindly conflating national security with simple criticism of the government.

Under the guise of fighting terrorism and protecting the economy, the capos regime of Algeria adopts a series of laws that identify any protest with a criminal offense. In the blink of an eye, activism and investigative journalism could find themselves stigmatized as quasi-terrorist enterprises.

In this great theater of the absurd, where criticism becomes betrayal, we witness not the protection, but the suffocation of civil society by Kafkaesque laws that might bring a smile to our faces if they were not so tragically real. East of Eden, the regime of two senile men from Algeria, in a fit of unprecedented foresight, is proposing laws to regulate freedom of expression. It is an initiative that even George Orwell would have considered too daring to feature in his works.

These new laws, a veritable masterpiece of restriction, could turn the Algerian media landscape into a charming garden where only state-sanctioned flowers could bloom. Under the guise of protecting the nation, the government seems determined to impose a strict media diet on its citizens, limiting informational calories harmful to their political digestion. Censorship in Algeria is a small price to pay for public peace. Ah, to protect the people from themselves, what a noble purpose!

Between sarcasm and bitterness, one might wonder if these laws will mark the arrival of a new era in which the press will no longer be the people’s guardian, but the government’s parrot. Human rights defenders, armed with their pen and their indignation, are speaking out against what they see as an attack on basic freedoms. But maybe Algeria’s military dictatorship knows something the rest of the world doesn’t?