So, the legislative elections orchestrated by President Kais Saied on 17 December were a bust. 8% participation rate. Near total rejection of Saied’s power grab. No big surprise.But parallel to Tunisia’s descent into the political morass is an unfolding commercial calamity. Tunisia’s foreign direct investment is slowing to a trickle and is even showing signs of reversing.
Algeria is potentially planning an oil and gas licensing round for spring 2023. The timing might just be right for Algeria to knock the cover off the ball. Algeria’s last licensing round was in September 2014, and it was a massive flop. But that was years ago and a world away.
Someone has blown up the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines. Norway is deploying its Navy to protect offshore oil and gas installations. Worries about the vulnerability of the two-day old Baltic Pipe Project are increasing. And Algeria is sitting pretty.
These days everyone is engaging with Algeria. They all want something. But what they want is not the same. Sixty years after the first one ended, there’s a new battle for Algiers.
As King Mohammed VI said during his speech commemorating the 23rd anniversary of his ascension to the throne, Morocco and Algeria are indeed “two brotherly peoples, who are bound by...a common destiny,” just maybe not the one he is envisioning.
In Morocco, the king has the government. In Algeria, decision-makers have faux opposition parties and the main étrangère. Following yesterday’s constitutional referendum in Tunisia, President Kais Saied has nothing.
I’ve been working on Algeria for a long time. And I have never been busier. The unprecedented pace is consequence of the unanticipated conflagration of two factors. On the one hand, Algeria is finally stable and secure. On the other hand, the Russia/Ukraine conflict has made Algeria more important to Europe and the US than it has been at any moment in the past.
Much to everyone’s surprise, on 8 June, Algiers announced that it was withdrawing from a friendship and cooperation treaty with Madrid. Algerian gas exports to Spain, which relies on Algerian supplies for nearly 50% of its energy needs, are not in Algiers’ crosshairs. At least for now.
Following the announcement that Spain would reverse the flow of the now dormant Maghreb-España Pipeline (GME) and ship natural gas to Morocco, Algeria declared that if any of the volumes shipped to Morocco were of Algerian origin, it would suspend both piped gas and LNG shipments to Spain. The likelihood of Algeria closing the valves should not be underestimated and there is a very real chance Algeria suspends its Spanish supply contracts...
Last week Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Ghazouani shuffled his cabinet. The upshot is that Ould Ghazouani is in a strong position and is apparently already looking over the horizon to Mauritania’s 2023 parliamentary elections and beyond to the 2024 presidential poll.
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