An Algerian general takes over from another general

IT WAS AS if the old general running the country behind the scenes for the past eight months had not died after all. A bare week after a heart attack felled General Gaid Salah on December 23rd, another septuagenarian in a green uniform under a brocaded peaked hat harangued a hall full of generals (all similarly attired). The army, said General Said Chanegriha, the country’s new top military man, must confront a “serious conspiracy against stability”. No one doubted he was referring to the protest movement known as Hirak that has convulsed Algeria since last February. In April it brought down the country’s despot, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, after 20 years in office. Though a new civilian president, Abdelmajid Tebboune, had been elected in early December, the new general in charge said the risk of chaos was too great for the army to return to the barracks.

Algeria had a few months of civilian rule after independence in 1962. But the generals have dominated ever since. Keeping their grip is getting harder. What began as a protest against corrupt politicians has turned on the generals. The hundreds of thousands who cheered when the army removed an ailing Mr Bouteflika in April now march every Friday against those who ousted him. They hiss at the phalanx of anti-riot forces facing them and call for the isaba, or gang of top brass, to go. “You can’t recycle this rubbish,” they cry. “Civilian not military rule.”