ALGIERS, Algeria (AP) — Billboards are strikingly empty. There are few campaign posters. And aside from public television broadcasts showing candidates traveling the country, there are few signs of enthusiasm heading into Algeria’s presidential election this weekend.
Prospective voters in the gas-rich North African nation say they are more concerned about prolonged inflation’s effects on the spiking prices of school supplies, potatoes and coffee. Military-backed President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, 78, appears poised to breeze to a second term.
“How can you expect Algerians to have any interest in the elections when life is hell on a daily basis?” asked middle school principal Noureddine Benchikh, who told The Associated Press he wasn’t really in the mood for politics.
The malaise is a far cry from the hopes of April 2019, when pro-democracy activists with the Hirak movement called for broad, structural changes to Algeria’s military-dominated political system after then-octogenarian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika
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