Algeria’s Chief of Army Staff has declared President Adbelaziz Bouteflika unfit to rule and asked him to leave office after weeks of protests against him.
Lt Gen Ahmed Gaed Salah who is also deputy defence minister said
“We must find a way out of this crisis immediately, within the constitutional framework.”
This solution achieves consensus and must be accepted by all,” he added to the applause of officers watching the speech.
He then called for the use of Article 102, which allows the Constitutional Council to declare the position of president vacant if the leader is unfit to rule.
This is coming after thousands of protesters again took to the street of Algiers on Tuesday insisting Abdelaziz Bouteflika must quit
The protesters have kept the pressure for weeks in a bid to topple Bouteflika and those around him that have kept in power for 20-years.
The protests have already seen result after Bouteflika reversed a decision to seek another term and put off elections which had been scheduled for April.
Bouteflika stopped short of quitting which is what the protesters, who have since returned to the streets, want.
“The system must go. There is no point for it in resisting,” Belkacem Abidi, 25, one of about 6,000 mostly student protesters, mostly students, who gathered in downtown Algiers on Tuesday said.
It isn’t clear how successful their protests would be, but if Bouteflika is pushed out, the country also faces uncertainty before a new president emerges in the vast North African country, which is a major oil and gas producer.
The military, one of of the most important kingmaker in the country has taken a back seat, although it praised the protesters as it distanced itself from Bouteflika.
Other important players in Bouteflika’s party have also abandoned him in the wake of the protests, leaving the 82-year old, who suffered stroke in 2013 and has been rarely seen in public since, isolated.