Hundreds of thousands march for Algeria President Bouteflika’s removal
By Grace Dzuwa
Hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets in Algeria to demand the resignation of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika.
According to BBC,Police used water cannon during the protest in Algiers Video caption Police used water cannon during the protest in Algiers.
Estimates say crowds in the capital, Algiers, reached a million. It is the sixth successive Friday of mass anti-government protests in the country.
Earlier this week an army general, Lt Gen Ahmed Gaed Salah, called for the position of president to made vacant.
But opposition parties in Algeria said it would not guarantee free elections.
Algerian police fired tear gas at crowds as they attempted to reach the presidency, the BBC’s Mohamed Arezki Himeur, in Algiers, said.
Beating the president not enough for protesters
The renewed calls for regime change come just days after Lt Gen Gaed Salah demanded that Mr Bouteflika be declared unfit to rule.
Demonstrations against Mr Bouteflika began last month after the president, who has seldom been seen in public since suffering a stroke in 2013, announced that he would stand for another term.
In response, the president agreed to not stand for a fifth term in upcoming elections, which have been delayed.
However the move did not go down well with protesters, who said his decision not to run was a cynical move to prolong his 20-year rule.
They are now calling for the departure of the president and also an entire generation of Algerian political leaders, including those who would be in line to succeed him.
At the protest in Algiers, one member of the crowd, named as Ali, told Reuters news agency: “We only have one word to say today, all the gang must go immediately, game over.”
