3 Algerian public figures, including the former foreign minister, said on Sunday that President Abdelaziz Bouteflika could "no longer lead" and should be banned from seeking a five-mandate. Bouteflika, who is 80 years old and has been in office since 1999, won the fourth term in 2014, despite having suffered a miniaturist attack last year, which affected his speech and mobility. Since then he used a wheelchair during his rare public appearances. Members of his team publicly proposed to run for the fifth term in the 2019 election. In a joint statement on Sunday, former Foreign Minister Ahmed Taleb Ibrahimi, lawyer and law activist Ali Yahia Abdenour, and Navy Chieftain Rachid Benyelles, said Bouteflika should be blocked from it. ...
“The current head of state, very heavily handicapped, is manifestly no longer able to continue to lead the country,” they said.
They accused “those who really hold power – namely the president’s family circle and a group of powerful oligarchs” – of preparing as candidate “an old man who is impotent and unable to express himself”.
Their statement followed numerous calls over recent weeks by opposition figures, intellectuals and academics for Bouteflika to be dismissed. ❤ ❤ 2348050417551 available for a good time ... spill TEA.... Easy on Shade #jaiyeorie