Arab Spring 2.0

Analyzing the mass movements in Algeria and Sudan

Change is the only permanent phenomenon in this world. The longevity of status quo makes it only more vulnerable against evolution. Some of these transitions are short-lived while some last long but the world is never like before when it goes through revolution. International politics also undergoes change from time to time. Revolution and evolution have pushed the history of nations. Arab Spring is also one of these evolutionary phenomena which challenged the status quo in global politics.

 Arab Spring is a democratic wave that has swept through the Middle East, since 2011. Most of the states in this region have been ruled by autocrats, either monarchs or dictators, since Second World War. But political, economic and social circumstances effected transformation of the region. Politically, these autocrat regimes were susceptible to democratic change as the United States was unwilling to interfere in Middle Eastern affairs after the disastrous Iraq War. These societies were also hit in economic terms as prices of oil and gas started to decline at the onset of the decade. Unemployment rates soared as these economies were dependent on hydrocarbons or a large proportion of their workforce was employed in hydrocarbon industry in neighbouring states. Social media also transformed the society by creating Arab Public Space as Paul Danahar called it in his book ‘The New Middle East: The World After the Arab Spring’.

The self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi, a Tunisian street vendor, pulled the trigger that blew up the whole region. When the Tunisian youth swarmed the streets to demand justice for their peer, their sentiments resonated with the whole Arab world as they all were angry, suppressed and motivated. Moreover, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the then President of Tunisia, was no different than other autocrats like Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, Libya’s Muammar al-Qaddafi, Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh and Bahrain’s Hamad bin Isa bin Salman al-Khalifa. The tide of anger uprooted the regimes of Ben Ali, Mubarak and Qaddafi. Tunisians’ success in ousting Ben Ali was followed in Egypt by the resignation of President Hosni Mubarak in February 2011, by Col. Muammar Gaddafi’s death in Libya the following October, and by the departure of president Ali Abdullah Saleh from Yemen in February 2012. Four autocrats went in just over a year. But al-Khalifa was saved by Saudi interference. Assad and Saleh’s successor Mansoor Hadi resisted and their countries plunged into an unending civil war.

Then, “Arab Fall” started. In Egypt, the elected government of Muslim Brotherhood was overthrown in a military coup. Libya effectively divided into warring warlords and factions. Syria started to reclaim the rebel territory and democratic forces in Yemen were crushed in civil war between Houthis and Saleh’s autocratic successor Hadi’s government with Saudi Arabia and her allies playing their traditional role as suppressors of dissent and change. Within few years, the changes which took decades to come through were wiped out.  Defeating the Islamic State became greater preference than establishing democracy in the region.

With regional rivalries between Iran and Turkey towards Saudi Arabia and Israel, these competing blocs have one similarity, that is, autocracy. When it seemed that democratic change has become a distant dream, a second wave of democracy hit the Middle East. Political pundits were taken aback – as they were when the first wave of Arab Spring hit the region. This is because the conditions which gave birth to the first phase of Arab Spring, e.g. resentment among youth, use of social media as a tool to express these resentments, mass unemployment and dismal economy, were pretty much there.

Algeria, the first country hit by second wave of Arab Spring, had half its population of 42 million below 27 years of age. Its economy was in shambles and unable to absorb this youth bulge in its workforce. But due to social media, expectations centred on good jobs, education, economic opportunity and more open, democratic governance were growing irresistibly.

On 10 February 2019, a press release signed by long-ailing Abdelaziz Bouteflika emerged whereby he announced to seek a fifth consecutive term as the country’s president. This enraged the Algerians and provoked widespread discontent. Protests erupted that engulfed the whole country from 22 February onwards. These demonstrations were organized via social media. The protests in the country’s capital of Algiers, where street protests were illegal, were the biggest in nearly two decades. Protestors ripped down a giant poster of Bouteflika from the landmark Algiers Central Post Office. As other Arab countries, state apparatus in Algeria was not prepared to deal with such expressions of discontent and dissent which exposed the vulnerability of autocratic regime against any mass movement. That exposure eroded the legitimacy of Bouteflika regime.

Bouteflika gave in to sustained protests, and announced that he would not seek a new term. However, that was not enough for the protesters; they wanted his resignation and a thorough, real change in the government. Succumbing to the pressure by the country’s armed forces, Bouteflika finally resigned on 2 April, bringing his 20-year rule to an unceremonious end.

At the same time, protests were in full swing in Sudan. Although these protests had erupted in Sudan on 19 December 2018, when a series of demonstrations spurred by dramatically rising costs of living and the country’s deteriorating economy broke out in several cities, they went, largely, ignored. But, with government’s failure to stop the protesters or placate them, protests became more widespread and from January onwards the protesters demanding the resignation of Omar al-Bashir, the country’s long-term President.

With protests in Algeria, however, international attention was attracted to those in Sudan which had grown exponentially in volume and sentiment. By February, Bashir had declared the first state of national emergency in twenty years. National emergency only exposed weakness of the Bashir regime in the face of mass dissent. The resignation of Algerian president Bouteflika created snowball effect in Sudan just like the end of Tunisian regime had done in first phase of the Arab Spring.

Later, on 11 April, the Sudanese military removed Omar al-Bashir from power, dissolved the cabinet and the National Legislature, and announced a three-month state of emergency to be followed by a two-year transition period. But, protestors did not buy it as a real change. They saw it as just the change of masters, not the system. The example of Egyptian military moving in to oversee the change but ending up in decimating that was also still fresh in their memories.

As protests had brought the country to a virtual halt, the ruling military agreed on 12 April to shorten its rule to “as early as a month” and transfer control to a civilian government if negotiations could result in a new government being formed, but still the protesters did not budge; they called for a civilian transition government. To break the deadlock, an agreement was reached, on 27 April, to form a transitional council made up jointly of civilians and military, though the exact details of the power-sharing arrangement were not yet agreed upon. Protesters are still in the streets vowing that they will not leave until civilians take over. These protesters consider themselves guardians of the revolution and they believe that their presence in the streets is necessary to protect the revolution and steer it in the right direction.

But to sustain a revolution is more difficult than to bring one. Sudanese and Algerians are cautious about protecting the change they have struggle so much to bring about. The revolutions in the first phase of Arab Spring were short-lived with exception of Tunisia. Therefore, Algerians are resisting Bouteflika loyalists like Ahmed Gaid Salah who are trying to influence presidential elections set for July 4. So, protesters are still in streets clutching “no to the elections” placards as they fear the polls could be used to keep longtime Bouteflika allies in power. On the other hand, Sudanese are trying to bring more civilians into transition process, so military would not become an autocratic successor of Omar al-Bashir. They are successful to keep military transition setup on their toes as of now. But democratic change will only be permanent when the mass movement will remain united, diverse and tolerant to represent the whole nation in their struggle for democracy.