Since winning Algeria's election with nearly 95 percent of the vote on Saturday, incumbent President Abdelmadjid Tebboune now faces numerous economic challenges and social demands. But analysts and activists are concerned that the repression of human rights observed under his watch will continue.
Youth unemployment rates, inflation, lack of infrastructure and a growing public deficit are all major issues that await newly re-elected President Tebboune.
Since the beginning of his campaign, Tebboune has made many promises, among them, the creation of 450,000 jobs by 2026 and an increase in unemployment benefits from 15,000 (€102) to 20,000 Algerian dinars per month.
He also said he would increase civil servants' salaries and create four million social housing units.
For some time, Algeria's economy has been relying on oil and gas revenues, which are doing well, but many Algerians expect other strategic sectors to take off again, especially industry, which represents just a tiny part of the country's economy.
Tebboune promised to double the gross domestic product within three years, declaring that he would make Algeria "the second economy in Africa", behind South Africa.
Algeria's recent integration in the BRICS development bank is also seen as an opportunity to mobilise more resources for investment projects.
Socio-economic challenges
Mohamed Loucif, a professor of economics and public finance in Algeria says the country is experiencing too much dependence on oil to diversify the economy.
"The lack of diversification of the economy results in a declining industrial sector. That is the Algerian paradox. What could be considered a comparative advantage is counter-intuitively something that can obstruct the development of an economy."
For instance, "cereal imports exceed 60 percent for example," he told RFI, while Algeria could produce much more food.
Algeria's president re-elected with nearly 95 percent of vote
What could boost the industrial sector would be direct foreign investment, but this has been in sharp decline for several years.
Despite this, businessman Slim Othmani says that there is definitely an interest in Algeria as an investment destination.
"However, I think that international investors expect more stability from the legal framework," he says.
While Algerians hoped the Hirak protest movement of 2019 and the departure of former president Abdelaziz Bouteflika would offer them more freedom, the first mandate of President Tebboune saw a clampdown on civil liberties and seen the army take on a more important role.
In an interview with French daily Le Monde in 2023, researcher Mouloud Boumghar underlined that recent constitutional changes made any criticism of the army almost impossible.
“What is criminalised here is the very demand of the Hirak, namely the radical change of the political system," he said.
Any critic is met with "accusation of terrorism", which has "a dissuasive effect".
This issue has been decried by rights group Amnesty International in a recent report.
Army support
Another issue of concern is the increasing presence of the army in the political sphere.
A few days before Tebboune's declaration of candidacy, in August, a decree was published to legalise the transfer of the senior civil administration under the direct authority of the army.
The Algerian army magazine, El Djeich, published an editorial late in 2023 praising Tebboune.
"All the achievements obtained so far have confirmed the correctness of the option chosen by the President of the Republic as a reformist path for the construction of a new Algeria," it read.
For many observers, this statement was a signal that the army command supported Tebboune's second term.
For Ali Bensaad, analyst and university professor at the French Institute of Geopolitics in Paris VIII, the weight of the army in this election was decisive.
"The army tends to replace civil society on many levels," he told RFI's Christophe Boisbouvier. And it wants, beyond governing, to also administer the country directly," according to Bensaad.
But for Hasni Habidi, Algerian analyst and director of the CERNAM research centre, based in Geneva, the past few years have shown that the Algerian society is changing, and this is visible in the dynamic growth in small businesses and social enterprises.
It would therefore be difficult to deny people's aspiration for a freer political life for too long.
