Title
Author(s)
Journal
Issue Date
Type
The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the
Relationship between the Political and the Religious in
Contemporary Algeria
Djerbal, Daho
上智アジア学, (25)
2007-12-27
紀要/Departmental Bulletin Paper
Text Version 出版者/Publisher
URL
Rights
http://repository.cc.sophia.ac.jp/dspace/handle/123456789/155
65
The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. ２５（２００７）
The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning
the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in
Contemporary Algeria
Daho DJERBAL＊*
Introduction
Before talking about the relationship between the FLN and Islam, we need to get straight
some features concerning the relationship between the religious and the political within
Algerian society, in a mean-duration perspective.
The FLN/ALN(1), which appeared first on November 1, 1954, is in every respect new
within the political field. However, it attracted a huge inheritance of many decades of
fighting for national independence and clashes against hostile forces, both with reference to
colonization as well as from its own society.
The proclamation of the creation of the FLN and the beginning of the armed struggle
specified the broad outlines of its political programme. The principal objective was national
independence, by “the restoration of the sovereign, democratic and social Algerian State
within the framework of Islamic principles.” Even though the proclamation specified that
this objective should be achieved while “respecting all fundamental liberties irrespective of
color or creed,” many political and religious leaders of those decades interpreted this as an
essential reference to the specific identity of the Algerian revolution, and as the foundation
of the sovereign Algerian state.
We are not commenting on the text of the proclamation, its contents or its impact, the
context where it was written, or the qualities of its writers, but it seems suitable to show the
part the religious played or did not play in the rise to power of the FLN/ALN during the war
of liberation and the war of the islamist movements, some twenty years after the
＊Senior Lecturer, Department of History, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, the University
of Algiers Bouzareah.
―
288
proclamation of independence.
The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in Contemporary Algeria
1. The Colonial Period: The hold of the Religious over Algerian
Society under Colonial control
For any historian of the colonized Algeria, it seems obvious that the religious factor
remained one of the last defenses against the French occupying forces, seeking to destroy
the bases of the social life, the symbolic order, and the ancestral representative systems of
the country. But Islam being the religion of the majority of the Algerian population during
the colonial period, this should not be taken as a monolithic fact. If the dominating dogma
was that of the Malekite Sunnis, more or less important demonstrations of Ibadism too
endured in the M’Zab region. In the same way, some jurisdictions and practices related
closely to Hanbalism or Chafi'ism could be noticed in the great urban centers, the seats of
the Ottoman authority.
Whatever the forms of expression of the Muslim faith and its institutional practices, yet
Algerian society remained a long time under the control of numerous religious-based
brotherhoods, circles, and associations. Their attitudes towards the central authorities varied
between integration and dissidence. Neither the liberation war nor the independence of the
country could change the facts, but the truth was that no force, governmental or
anti-government, foreign or indigenous, could get around the omnipresence of the religious
fact in contemporary Algeria.
During the first half of the twentieth century, the heritage of the religious past was
obvious everywhere. It even became stronger because of the systematic abolition of the
traditional community structures by the colonial system. The more the material bases of
social reproduction were weakened by the development of the colonial capitalist economy,
the more the desire to reconstitute the original community was exacerbated. The more the
bonds of this real or unreal community were broken-up by the processes of depaysanisation
and individuation, the more the religious community was established as a
shelter-community or a community by default.
2. In the Urban Area: Official brotherhood networks, preachers and
reformist circles
In spite of the progress of colonization and the development of modern European cities,
some forms of ancient economic, social and cultural organization more or less endured in
the core of the old Algerian cities. Some trade corporations and their leaders and servants,
their owners and workers, their wealth and hierarchical order, went on structuring the life of
the population of the cities (hdars).(2) These corporative networks were reinforced by the
squaring of traditional casbahs by the representatives of religious brotherhoods, whose
sheikhs and moqaddem were often linked to the corporations’ leaders.
The traditional city was also the privileged place of meeting of the Oulemas and other
thinkers. Religion was expressed through them, either in its diffusion and more or less clan
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The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. 25 (2007)
forms of the brotherhoods, or in its more regular and ostentatious form by official
institutions. Sometimes during the Ottoman period, “erudite persons” were attached to the
authorities, who were themselves from religious families, traditional holders of sciences of
that period.(3) With the French arrival these multi-secular dynasties continued to occupy
religious and administrative official positions, in the name of the new political authority.
Alongside these dynasties there was close contact with numerous, cadis, Imam, muezzins
and talebs, etc. who had official administrative and religious positions, and who were also
teaching in Koranic schools. At the same time, erudite men who were rich and powerful or
dependent and miserable, and who constituted as a whole the moral consciousness of the
population of the urban centers, dominated them. What occurred in cities like Algiers,
Constantine, Bejaia or Tlemcen also occurred in urban centers of less importance like Mila
(Northern Constantinois). Slimane L Bentobbal(4), in his description of the religious orders
of the old town of Mila, shows well the importance and complexity of the brotherhoods in
the provincial cities. According to him, the zaouias had during the years 1930-1940 a great
influence on the inhabitants of the old city. Nobody could keep out of their influence. “One
could then be either Rahmanian(5) or Hansalian(6)”, and nothing else.
The Rahmania brotherhood that claimed to follow the Sheikh Belhaddad, one of the great
names of the uprising of 1870, played a major part in the education and instruction of the
young people. Its teaching was entirely founded on science(7) and was far from legends and
superstitious beliefs.
As for Hansalia, it was founded by the Sheikh Zouaoui de Rofag who would have served
within the French ranks as a caid, and “the whole brotherhood was turned towards magic
and religious rites. It organized ritual festivals where animals were sacrificed in the middle
of a huge din, and the animals were offered to some obscure saint. However, the influence
of this brotherhood remained limited, compared to that of the concurrent brotherhood.(8)”
The inter-war period brought deep disruptions in this secular order. Indeed, a wave of
religious reform coming from the East(9) swept through the country and brought forth a new
generation of erudite men (religious). The religious and reformist movement of the
1920-1930, where the most outstanding and durable expression was the Association of the
Algerian Muslim Oulemas,(10) was trying to secure hegemony by dominating the hearts and
souls. Hundreds of associations, circles, and newspapers argued against the representatives
of the old worship, as with the brotherhoods. Everywhere, the reformist Oulemas competed
with leaders of the zaouias. They argued regarding the Arabic language as well as religion.
They opened free schools and built mosques. For the first time, they taught children the
Arabic language as a subject distinct from the Koranic text itself, and also history,
geography and foreign languages. It was an opportunity for all who had joined this new
association to discuss and dispute the supremacy of the elders.(11) Even co-education was
introduced in the majority of the reformist schools.
Concerning this, the testimony of Ahmed Bouda, one of the leading members of the Party
of the Algerian People of the 1940’s, is enlightening: “In the Association of Oulemas we
followed the courses of Sheikh Ben Badis and other sheikhs, but in general, the courses of
Sheikh El Okbi were followed the most. We truly realized then that Islam was a religion
fighting for the present and future life, which as some saints or men of culture said was the
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The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in Contemporary Algeria
element that made it possible to have a heaven on earth, and was only a means to allow us to
reach the celestial paradise. The Moslem had then to conquer the terrestrial world to reach
the hereafter, since both worlds are inseparable, and the first had to guide us towards
paradise or hell. That was the reason for our involvement in the Association of Oulemas
during the years 1931-36. We started to fight even against our former brotherhood’ leaders,
to attract them and coax them towards the cause of the reform movement (El islah).”(12)
By securing a dominating position in the Muslim Congress(13) and its peripheral
organizations (Youth of the Congress, Algerian Muslim Scouts, etc.), the Oulemas extended
their action to the political field where they had to compete with very important opponents.
3. In the Rural Areas: Zaouias and Marabouts
The majority of the rural areas and even more the mountainous areas of the country were
under the reign of zaouias. Villages were squared by a network highly concentrated with
places of worship and Koranic schools. In the area of Soummam, some villages could count
up to 150 tolba (young people studying the Koran). They were boarders, who lived, ate, and
resided in the schools and had an Imam in charge of them.
The whole complex reminds us of “the ribat of the murabitun,” with rules and regulations
and a moral code. They were seen only on Fridays to offer prayers at the mosque.(14) In
some areas in the villages or douars there were many marabouts linked to the Rahmaniya
brotherhood, some to the Qadiriya or Chadiliya brotherhoods, and yet others to the Derqawa
and so on, according to the areas. Bonds of marriage and other types of alliances could be
maintained between nearby villages. Endogamy, autarky, and modes of heredity and agnatic
succession were the dominant forms of social organization.
“Prior to 1954, all the douars of Soummam asked Ahl el fatwa (people of the
religious word) about any religious opinion, or regarding the sharing inheritances, or
marriages or divorces. People did not go to the French courts, but followed shari'a.
[... ] The French authorities closed the medersas several times. All the ` arsh (agnatic
community) were working on the land and helped in the harvest, during the harvesting
periods. The people worked for these zaouias (15) and for these tolba who had no help,
it was the people who supported them. [...] The zaouia was like a military institution,
the tolba prepared their meals themselves, they did not have any contact with people,
they were disciplined and had rules and regulations, etc.”(16)
During the expansion of the reformist religious movement, one can imagine the battle in
which representatives of these two types of religion mobilizations were engaged, in order to
secure hegemony over the minds.
Some documents belonging to the Association of Algerian Muslim Oulemas reveal in
detail the nature of the cells and the sociological bases of the sections which were spreading
in the rural areas.(17) However, the sociological characteristics of the direction of the
reformist cells remained the same as those in large cities. Their outstanding elements were
constituted of big merchants and tradesmen. In rural areas, as in the case of Mila, most of
the schools, the circles, and the reformist worship places, were settled in the new colonial
the pro-independence nationalists
If the long acculturation of the majority of the population to the beliefs, rites, and
brotherhood forms of the organization had to be taken into account; if the big rise in
religious reformism in the 1920s-1930s and 1940s had also to be taken into account; one can
imagine how difficult it was for the nationalist militants to establish themselves and
compete with famous religious personalities and notables of the Federation of elected
officials.(18)
Pro-independence nationalism was born and developed within the emigrant population in
France. During nearly a half-century, the independence elites were acculturated to the
culture and language diffused by France. They were proletarian or influenced when working
in factories and districts by ideologies sympathetic to communism,(19) or were middle-class
men open to the values of the French revolution. The pro-independence political elites were
mainly westernized and French-speaking people, although Arab nationalism was not
unknown to them. Some leaders such as Messali Hadj had to meet and know in the 30s and
40s some outstanding figures like Chakib Arslan or Azzam Pasha, and even some leaders of
the new movement of the Muslim Brothers.(20) Arab nationalism and political Islamism
remained however for a long time confined to minority currents of the pro-independence
nationalism.(21)
When pro-independence nationalism first took root in Algeria in the beginning of the
1930s, it immediately acquired a foothold in the peripheral districts and the suburbs of the
great urban centers. Underprivileged young people and dropouts of the countryside and the
cities joined the movement. The political supervision of the Algerian People’s Party of the
PPA(22) remained for a long time a party of the pioneers of proletarian nationalism,
reinforced by newcomers who could see themselves neither in the liberal formations nor in
the religious associations. They were mostly workers in transport companies or small
shopkeepers, seasonal workers and unskilled workers, of the surrounding cities and
countryside.
5. Fight for Leadership between the Radical Nationalists and
The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. 25 (2007)
4. Fight to Control Populations: Social characteristics and ideology of
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agglomerations, outside the walls of the old medieval cities. They occupied a new space and
represented to some extent a new generation of worshiping men, the generation of the
rebirth of thought, personality, and cultural, linguistic, and religious identity.
From the 1940s until 1954, in the majority of the cities and in the countryside, the
Oulemas were the hardiest obstacle for the PPA-MTLD propagandists to overcome. The
religious cover of the medersas and the use of the Arabic language were the natural
representatives of the Arabs. To be an Arab, one had to be of the Oulemas, and to be
Muslim, one had to be of the Oulemas.
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Moderate Religious
The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in Contemporary Algeria
The militants of the PPA, in the name of the total independence of Algeria, took hold of
the leadership of what was already called “the popular masses” of the urban zones. The
1947 elections and the following years gave them an overwhelming majority of seats as
municipal counselors in the country’s large cities. These elections enabled them to carry
great weight in the political field. The thought and acts of the society moved gradually from
the religious sphere towards the political one that the radical nationalists were leading. The
PPA-MTLD(23) embarked then upon a generalized action aimed at contesting the supremacy
of the Oulemas even in schools and mosques. Radical nationalist associations(24) and circles
appeared everywhere. Their force of attraction was such that some elements of the islahist
movement joined them. Such was the case of Ahmed Bouda:
“It had become obvious for us that the Muslim Congress had betrayed the ideal or
that its thought had not been clearly expressed. The idea of the "unification of Algeria
to France" and that of "assimilation" were not clear enough for us at the time of the
Congress, i.e. so many renunciations of the national cause. It was the nationalist
movement that highlighted this fact, in Algiers as in Paris. It was the president of the
ENA, Messali Hadj, who really formulated and spread publicly the idea of
independence, on August 2nd 1936 at the municipal stadium of Algiers [... ] I was
among those who decided then, finally and irrevocably, to leave the Association of
Oulemas and to dedicate ourselves to defending the cause of the independence of
Algeria. Similarly, we had discovered in the movement of religious reform that Islam
was the light that illumined our hearts, and similarly we understood that the idea of
independence and the nationalist movement was the only way and the only means to
free ourselves from colonialism and make our faith triumph, the only means to be
literally Muslim, and that is how we became the fighters for the religion and the
country.”(25)
This testimony shows the fixation on the idea of independence, but it also shows how the
contribution of elements with strong religious culture within the nationalist party interfered
with the national-revolutionist and socializing credo in its early stages. In the countryside
and towns, the militants of the PPA were obliged to take up again the religious lexicon and
codes even if they were known rather to be laymen in religion:
“Our argumentation varied according to the background. We used the religion. We
said, for example, that we were the successors of the prophet, charged to continue the
jihad. The jihad was an obligation for any Muslim. Algeria, which is a Muslim country,
had been soiled by the infidels, and so it had to be purified. But these propaganda
topics were worth only for agitating the masses. In the party, things were completely
different. There the discussion was political, it was based on the spirit of sacrifice, of
discipline, and the preparation for a difficult future”(26).
The fight for leadership within the urban masses and in the countryside had deeply
marked the spirits and the memories of the militants, to the extent that even an armed
6.1 Contradictory Relationships between the FLN/ALN and the Representatives of Religious
Movements, and The Relative weight of the Community and Religious Factors according
to Areas of the Country
We have very few studies concerning the relationship between the political and the
religious in the maquis during the war of liberation. I shall try to map out the lines of force
of these relationships from the memoirs of some actors of the FLN or the ALN that were
recently published, or from some testimonies that we have collected from political or
military leaders of the FLN/ALN.
What emerges from these sources that concerned the period from 1954 to 1962, is the fact
of the great social and historical diversity of the territories in which the maquis held by FLN
/ALN were developed. The zones that witnessed the first more or less important combat are
The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. 25 (2007)
6. The Religious Factor in the Liberation War:
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293
struggle could not erase it. The Oulemas had supported the AML(27), who were in favor of
an Algerian Republic related to France. At the time of campaign of 1946 for the boycott of
the first elections to the French National Assembly, the militants of the PPA had a brush
with the Oulemas who openly supported Ferhat Abbas and his partisans:
“We had succeeded in a great mobilization around the watchwords of the party(28).
We felt that the trend was for us, and we had envisaged even a boycott of 90% in spite
of the repeated calls of Abbas and the UDMA(29) to participate to the elections. But,
two days before the elections we lost all the benefit of our work. A tract signed by
Sheikh Bachir El Ibrahimi(30) was spread around the town. Its very evocative title said,
"Why I am for the Manifesto". The title did not say "for the UDMA", but it was playing
on the word "bayan" (Manifesto) which could at the same time be the Manifesto of the
AML or that of the UDMA. People did not see any difference, and for them, the
program of the UDMA was that of the AML. There were in the text three Arabic lines
which said approximately this: "Oulemas are with the Manifesto because it defends the
Arabic language and Islam.”(31)
A population thus strongly prepared by the religious culture, conveyed as well by the
brotherhood system as by islahist associations a political alliance between religious
reformists and liberal and moderate laics, were as many barriers that the partisans of total
independence had to overcome, to involve the country in the war of liberation.
But the attitude of the religious reformists was not everywhere identical. In Aurès,
Oulemas were present only at Rassira(32), but they were very different from those of the
cities of the North Constantinois. They were sentimentally for the Oulemas in the schools
and mosques, but politically they were nationalists and against the program of Religious
association. For S.L. Bentobbal who had found refuge there after the dissolution of the O.S.
in 1951, except from the area of Oued Abdi that was full of schools held by the Oulemas,
the “irregular members” of the nationalist party did not encounter any difficulty. This
ambiguous effect of the relationship between the political and the religious was enduring
from the beginning to the end of the armed struggle, directed by the FLN/ALN.
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The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in Contemporary Algeria
those where mountains and forests dominated. Thus Aurès and Kabylie of Djurdjura, the
mounts of Babors, and those of Tlemcen, constituted the first bastions of resistance. The
first fighting units gradually took root in the surrounding valleys and campaigns. The
clandestine organization of the FLN and its armed groups encountered much more difficult
conditions in the cities.
As we saw in the preceding chapters, the religious factor differs in importance, content,
and form of organization, according to whether we are in a rural or urban zone. The zones
with strong brotherhood or maraboutic establishments, like the great Kabylia and the small
Kabylia or the sub-Saharan areas, did not react in a similar manner to the appearance and
rise to power of the fighting units of the ALN. Some brotherhoods had resisted the colonial
conquest, and their hostility to France had taken a heavy toll in causing them to lose their
properties and lands. They, however, continued as an expression of their moral fibre. Other
brotherhoods joined and supported the colonial expansion by serving as auxiliary forces.
They grew rich and gained ostentatious power, without increasing their moral authority over
the population. Since the first battles, the remaining brotherhoods that were resistant to
colonial domination quickly gave their support to the moudjahidines. It is also striking to
note for example that for North Constantinois, Medjana, and the valley of Soummam, it was
the same areas that took part in the uprisings of 1870 and May 8, 1945, that were the zones
of the insurrection of November 1954.
That is also true for Aurès, Algiers and Oran. A more thorough historical study has to be
made to attest the relevance of the correlations. At all events, and while waiting for a
fieldwork, one cannot say that such or such brotherhood was more involved in resistance or
collaboration than another. Within the same brotherhood the branches had different attitudes
from one area to another and from one period to another. This is true for Rahmania as it is
true for other powerful religious congregations. However, by and large, it was the combined
effect of the community and brotherhood membership that won.
For Mohammed Harbi, on November 1, 1954, in Aurès, the community factor played a
greater role than the religious factor. According to him, the armed resistance had a
composite supervision. The organization came down to the incorporation of rural
communities to the project of creation of a Nation-State, by means of a bureaucratic
apparatus. He said that this scaffolding, built in record time, had been called into question
because of a succession of events that had broken the balance between the rural
communities, and had revealed behind the bureaucratic facade, family ties and business
relations. According to the historians of the FLN also, none of the disputing poles disputed
the fact that the leadership had homogeneity. The segmentation at the top had caused chaos
everywhere, particularly between the communities.(33)
In some towns and traditional old cities where the reformist religious movements were
dominant, the question arose more in political terms than religious. The members of the
association of Algerian Muslim Oulemas preferred having alliances with the moderate
parties and communists rather than with the pro-independence nationalists. Their attitude
changed only after August 20, 1955, when Zighout Youcef and the command of the zone of
North Constantinois decided to physically attack the political and religious elements that did
not admit the primacy of FLN/ALN. The groups who took the weapons on November 1,
In the area of the mountains overhanging the valley of Soummam, the influence of the
zaouias and the marabouts was very great. Before 1954, in the douars of Beni Ouaghlis and
Ouzellaguen, people used to ask ahl Al fatwa and ahl eddin (people of the faith and the
religious word) questions regarding any religious issues, or sharing of inheritance, or
marriages or divorces. They did not go to the French courts but followed the sharia. After
1954, in Large or Small Kabylia, all the meetings of the FLN were held in the zaouias or
mosques, or in medersas. The fact that People met there could be used as a cover for the
moudjahidine.
According to the testimony of Mohand Sebkhi, the first meeting of the FLN was held in a
zaouia. In Beni Oughliss, Ouzelaguen, Ighrem, the maraboutic brotherhoods and networks
played a major part in the fight for liberation.
“The most famous and largest zaouias was that of Sheikh Si Mohand Ou Sahnoun,
then came that of If Hadj Hseyen, then that of my maternal uncle, Sidi Yahia, then the
marabouts, then that of Si Ahmed Zerrouk, that of Sidi Moussa Ou Idir, then, in
Ouzelaguen, that of Sidi Ahmed Ou Said where the congress of August 20, 1956 was
held. All these zaouias played a major part like that of markaz (headquarters) for the
FLN [... ]. I had often been put up with the moudjahidine in these zaouias in zone 3,
when the division between the wilaya and zones was made, with Sidi Abderahmane and
Sidi Driss. Some politicians said that the zaouias played a negative part, but that is
wrong. I speak about where I lived. I became a liaison officer since I had a certain
freedom of movement, and thus I was on the ground. I moved everywhere and I noted
it.”(34)
6.3 Differences in opinion between the political direction of the FLN and directions of the
maquis
It is only between August 1955 and August 1956 that on the initiative of the directing
group of the FLN installed in Algiers, that alliances changed and the liberal reformists and
the islahists joined the Front. When Abane Ramdane, on being requested by Krim
Belkacem(35) and Amar Ouamrane(36) took in hand the destinies of the FLN in spring 1955,
he first tried to federate all the political and social forces under the aegis of the Front. He
was looking to prevent openness to the moderate nationalists of Pierre Mendès-France and
then of Jacques Soustelle,(37) seeking to create a political alliance on which would be based
the French colonial capacity to make Algeria, as was the case with Tunisia, proceed to
independence by steps, and under the conditions of France. Abane had given some
guarantees during his secret negotiations with the centralists of the MTLD, the leaders of the
UDMA and those of Oulemas. He had also negotiated with representatives of the Algerian
Communist Party who had taken the initiative to engage in the armed struggle under their
The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. 25 (2007)
6.2 Wilaya 3, zone 2, an overlapping of political, military and brotherhood levels
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295
1954, were all former militants of the PPA-MTLD, and more particularly of its paramilitary
flank, the secret organization. They always recalled the difficulties created by the reformist
islahists and moderate liberals, and these difficulties lasted from November 1954 to August
1955.
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The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in Contemporary Algeria
own flag.
On their side, the leaders of the maquis of Constantinois, who were engaged in a
merciless fight to acquire control over the population, decided to execute the most
well-known representatives of the moderate reformist trends in the town of Constantine. On
August 20, 1955, some attacks picked off members of the municipal council and
well-known personalities, like Allaoua Abbas (nephew of Ferhat Abbas), Me Cherif Hadj
Said, and Abbas Bencheikh el Hocine.(38) The latter had distributed leaflets and published
writings, and they had also made public statements and revealed to the press an official
statement denouncing “terrorism,” and calling the population of Constantine to war. They
thus established themselves as spokesmen for the Algerian people, disputing so to say the
leadership of the FLN.(39)
The first man was killed during the operation, the second was wounded, and the third
took refuge in Algiers. A list taken from the hands of a fidaï who was charged with
executing one of these people had been published in the press. It revealed the names of
personalities of all tendencies, and among them members of the religious reformist
movement. Those who were meant to be on the list or were regarded as such escaped to
Algiers(40) and contacted Abane. He covered them and sent them abroad among the
representations of the FLN, but they were sentenced to death by this same FLN in the
maquis(41).
In fact, in this event, the purpose of the attacks was not so much to reach people as
representatives of political or religious movements. It was to nip in the bud any inclination
to negotiate an intermediate solution that would enable Algeria to reach a kind of internal
autonomy, where the men of the maquis would be regarded as rebels against an Algerian
government established by France.
Among the Algerian personalities requested by the French government, there were also
some leading figures such as Sheikh Kheireddine.(42) He joined the FLN in Morocco and
was designated as the official representative of the Front in this country from 1959 to 1961.
He had been chosen as a member of the national council of revolution (CNRA). Cherif Hadj
Said joined the FLN in 1956 and was a member of the staff of Ahmed Francis at the
ministry of finance of the GPRA. Abbas Bencheikh El Hocine was designated to represent
the FLN and later the GPRA in Saudi Arabia, from 1957 to 1962.
Tewfiq El Madani was a secretary-general of the Association of Oulemas in 1952, and
editor of their periodical Al-baçair. He joined the FLN in April 1956, when he was sent by
Abane to the external delegation of the FLN in Cairo. He was a member of the CNRA and
minister for cultural affairs within the first GPRA in 1958(43).
After the congress of Soummam(44), Brahim Mezhoudi, also a member of the Association
of Oulemas, had been brought by Abane to the committee of the Wilaya 2 (North
Constantinois), bearing the rank of commander.
This way of proceeding was very hard to cope with for the leaders of the maquis, who
considered these initiatives as a deviation from the revolution and a violation of the internal
rule of the common choice of the oldest and the most hardened members of the maquis:
“[... ] When the congress of Soummam indicated that Brahim Mezhoudi be part of
the council of wilaya 2 nobody admitted him, in spite of his rank of commander. He
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The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. 25 (2007)
was well received by the spirit of discipline in the rows of the wilaya, as well by the
djounouds, as also by the persons in charge. But none of them recognized him as a full
member of the directors. He was like a foreign body. However, we never campaigned
against him, nor expressed any word of boycott. He remained there only organically,
but never played any role in Wilaya 2. Why was that? It was because Mezhoudi did not
speak the same language as that of the militants. There was no rapport between them.
He was not of the same political formation and his words did not reflect of the realities
by which the revolution was living(45)”.
It thus appears obvious here that for North Constantinois at least, the intrusion of
religious reformists elements in the maquis held by strongly politicized militants and trained
at the plebeian school of PPA-MTLD, did not work.
If further confirmation is needed, we have the following narration.
“[... ] In the same order of events, we received a group related to the Oulemas that
passed by. We asked them to make a conference to the djounouds as an incentive to the
Djihad. Bourouh, who was in the group, had recited all the verses of Koran and had
pointed out all the hadiths mentioning the Djihad. Everyone listened to him with all the
respect due to the holy words, but nobody followed him. He did not gain a following
and nobody regarded him as a leader. Almost the same thing had occurred to
Mezhoudi. The language that he spoke, I repeat, was not the same as that of the
militants. Moreover, there were those who did not know him. They had never seen him
in action in real operations. We thus never had problems with advocates of the
religious ideology. They went and came with complete freedom. They talked in
whatever way they thought best, but that never had any influence on the
djounouds(46)”.
If that occurred without too many problems for Wilaya 2, the execution of Bachir
Chihani(47) by Adjal Adjoul and Abbès Laghrour and the crises that agitated Wilaya 1, are
considered, by some witnesses to be the result of differences of culture, ideology or religion.
For S.L. Bentobbal, some of those who were in the Association “tarbiya ouat ta' lim”
(education and teaching) like Adjoul caused difficulties, but as a whole the obstacles were
quickly solved.
Because of the openness preached by Abane and the quick disappearance or departure at
the borders of the first leaders of the ALN who had been formed in the PPA and had
absorbed its culture, many of them became members of opposite political formations, and of
the religious reformism that had climbed the levels of the military hierarchy of the
FLN/ALN. In addition to Brahim Mezhoudi, Mohammed Harbi quotes among others
Guettal Louardi, Colonel Chaabani(48), Colonel Mohammed-Salah Yahyaoui, Commander
Amar Mellah, and Colonel Hachemi Hadjerès(49). We could add here the name of Colonel
Mohammedi, who became during the 1990s one of the fervent supports of the religious
fundamentalism in Kabylia.
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Conclusion
The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in Contemporary Algeria
These varied elements collected from written and oral sources can be only a draft of the
relationship between the political and the religious, in the colonial situation and during the
period of the war of liberation. Monographic studies have to be made area-by-area, and
sometimes even sector-by-sector or district-by-district. More exhaustive research on the
brotherhood and on the associated political and religious networks such as those engaged in
by historians and anthropologists like Abdallah Bouchène(50), Mohammed Brahim Salhi(51),
and Kamel Chachoua(52), deserve greater attention, just like the memoirs and
autobiographies of the participants in the war of liberation. Some assumptions and some
leads for research are emerging from the elements we took into account, for the purpose of
such communication.
The forms of expression and influence of the religious factors, while being much
diversified in the whole area of the country remained nevertheless dominant everywhere,
either because of their inscription over a long period or for an average duration. Compared
to the religious factor, the political one is relatively recent. It attained a greater amplitude in
Algeria from 1930-1940, with a paroxysmal increase between 1954 and 1962.
All through the first half of the 20th century, the various forms of organization in the
political sphere had to compose in one way or another with the religious reformists or
traditional currents. They sometimes used their lexicon, their semiotic codes, and their
rituals to gain the mass of believers and practicing peoples. There were liberal republican
parties and communists or pro-independence nationalists, who had all to follow the same
way of disputing with the religious over their ideological domination of the city populations.
They opened under their own banner cultural circles and free schools and founded
associations, to be able to reach and control the minds of peoples.
The men of November 1, 1954, were the first to leave the traditional political field and
peaceful competition by imposing their will by force of weapons. But the course of the
history with its long duration and the socio-cultural inertia gradually gained the upper hand.
When the founders of the FLN/ALN either fell in combat or were arrested and imprisoned
or constrained to live beyond the borders, the extension of the war in the majority of the
cities and the whole countryside allowed people of old factions, circles, or politico-religious
networks to be promoted to the ranks of senior officers of the army of liberation, or senior
executives of the FLN. They gradually imposed their mark and impregnated the thinking of
the powerful with their ideologies. Many crises that shook the direction of the FLN/ALN
could be re-examined in the light of these forward and backward flows of power, in the
struggles that took place between the political and the religious groups. But the struggle for
authority within the leading bodies during the war of liberation as also during the first years
of independence, remained for a time in favor of the men of November 1. The religious, at
least during the first two decades of independence, paid the price of their tergiversations as
for their use of armed struggle.
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
(10)
(11)
(12)
(13)
(14)
(15)
(16)
(17)
(18)
(19)
(20)
National Libération Front : (FLN) Front de Libération Nationale
National Libération Army : (ALN) Armée de Libération Nationale
For any approach of the corporative structures, see Lemouar Merouche, Recherche sur
l’Algérie à l’époque ottomane, T.I, Ed. Bouchène, Paris 2002.
L. Merouche, op. cit. pp. 232 f.
S.L. Bentobbal, former member of the Secret Organization, Leader of the Wilaya 2,
Member of the CNRA, Minister in the Provisory Government of the Republic of
Algeria, a member with Krim and Boussouf in the interministerial counsel of the war.
The brotherhood of Rahmainia is one of the most widespread brotherhoods in the
colonial Algeria, with around 170 centers or zaouias.
S.L. Bentobbal, Memoir to be published.
Concerning the educational programs of the reformist schools, see Ali Merad, Le
réformisme musulman en Algérie, Ed. El Hikma, Alger 1999.
Slimane Lakhdar Bentobbal, Une révolution anonyme, Mémoir to be published.
The wahhabite reformism of the Hijaz and the Azharian reformism of Egypt
Created in Algiers in May, 1931.
For more elaboration on this topic see Mohammed El Korso, “Structures islahistes et
dynamique culturelle dans le mouvement national algérien(1931-1954) ” in Actes du
colloque sur l’Etoile Nord-Africaine et le mouvement national algérien, Ed. Centre
culturel algérien de Paris, 1988.
Ahmed Bouda, person in charge within the organization of the PPA (the Algerian
People Party) and deputy of the MTLD (Movement for the Triumph of the Democratic
Liberties) within the Algerian assembly during the 1940s.
Held in June 1936, it constituted the first understanding of reformist, laic and religious
Algerian Muslims. Its protest platform was advocating the unification of Algeria to
France and was keeping pro-independence nationalist militants at a distance. For more
details, see Mahfoud Kaddache, Histoire du nationalisme algérien, T.1, ENAL, Alger
1993.
Mohand Sebkhi, officer of the ALN in the Wilaya 3, zone 2, Testimony.
Forms of common work called touiza.
Mohand Sebkhi, Entretien, juin-juillet 2006.
Basic texts and documents (1931-1944), archives of the national movement published
by the Direction of Archives of Constantine (document written in Arabic language),
Constantine 1982.
Created in September 1927 to represent the local elected persons within the local
assemblies, the financial delegations and the general councils. See. M. Kaddache,
Histoire du nationalisme algérien, Ed. ENAL, Alger 1993 (2e édition).
See all that concerns the history of the North-African Star, the ancestor and melting pot
of the pro-independence nationalism, and its relations with the international 3rd.
See. Sadek Sellam, “Les mémoires de Tewfiq al Shaoui” , Cirta N°19, Paris 2000,
pp. 20-21.
The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. 25 (2007)
(1)
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Notes
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(21) See. L. Merouche, “Intellectual situations and group notions “, in NAQD no. 14/15,
Autumn-winter 2004, pp.55-65.
The National Liberation Front (FLN) and Islam Concerning the Relationship between the Political and the Religious in Contemporary Algeria
(22) The Algerian people party (PPA) was created on March 11, 1937, to take over the
North-African Star (ENA) that was dissolved by the French authority.
(23) The movement for the triumph of the democratic liberties (MTLD) was created in
October 1946 to enable the banned PPA to take part to the elections.
(24) See. M. El Korso, Les affinités politiques des islahistes à partir d’une approche
monographique. Le cas de l’Oranie (1931-1940), in L’Etoile Nord-Africaine et le
mouvement national algérien. Publications du centre culturel algérien, Paris 1988.
(25) A. Bouda, op.cit.
(26) S.L.Bentobbal, op.cit.
(27) The Association of the Friends of the Manifesto and of Freedom (L’Association des
Amis du Manifeste et de la Liberté) was created in 1943 by Ferhat Abbas. It made
itself out to be the union of all the national political and religious components with an
intermediary program between the moderate attitude of the elected-people federation
and the more radical of the PPA.
(28) The PPA had launched the watchword “man antakhaba kafar” (electing is committing
a blasphemy).
(29) Democratic union for the Algerian Manifesto (Union démocratique pour le Manifeste
algérien), created in march 1946 by Ferhat Abbas.
(30) President of the Algerian Oulemas Association and successor of Abdelhamid Ben
Badis.
(31) S.L. Bentobbal, op.cit.
(32) East of Ahmar Khaddou between Batna and Biskra.
(33) Mohammed Harbi, “Le complot Lamouri” , in Acts of the Round Table, the war of
Algeria and the Algerians (1954 – 1962), Ed. Armand Collin, Paris 1997, p. 151 f.
(34) Mohand Sebkhi, op.cit. Testimony.
(35) Krim Belkacem was a member of the so-called “committee of the six”, who decided to
launch the armed struggle and was the first leader of the zone 3 of the Kabylia in 1954.
He became then a member of the FLN coordination and execution committee and
minister in the GPRA (provisory government).
(36) Having deserted the French army and member of the maquis prior to 1954, he
commanded the zone 4 of Algiers.
(37) To the ancient members of the parties, to the leaders of the UDMA and to the Oulemas,
(38)
(39)
(40)
(41)
to the members of the central committee of the MTLD and to the Messalists, Jacques
Soustelle came to set a secret dialogue with the nationalists, through the intermediary
of Vincent Monteil and Germaine Tillon.
Teacher of the Arabic language in the medersa and an important member of the
Oulemas in Constantine, he became, after 1962 President of the Islamic Council and
then succeeded Boubekeur as Director of the mosque of Paris.
S.L.Bentobbal, op.cit.
Mohammed Harbi, “FLN : Mirage et réalité”, Ed. ENAD/NAQD, Algiers, p.133.
S.L.Bentobbal, op.cit. See also, M. Harbi, op.cit. pp. 136-137 and note 16, Chapter 10.
meetings with the representatives of the French government in March 1955.
L’Harmattan, Paris 1985, p. 348.
(44) First congress of the FLN held on August 20, 1955, at Ifri (valley of Soummam). He
set the doctrinal and organizational bases of the FLN, among which was that of the
primacy of the political over the military. In the name of this principle, it had been
decided to charge only the CCE with the appointment to the upper ranks within the
ALN.
(45) S.L. Bentobbal, op.cit.
(46) S.L. Bentobbal, op.cit.
(47) Appointed by Mustafa Ben Boulaid as his successor at the leadership of the Wilaya 1
during his absence.
(48) Officer of the ALN, coming from the association of Oulemas, who moved up into
becoming a Colonel, leader of the Wilaya 4 (Sahara). After independence he was
judged for rebellion by the government of Ben Bella, sentenced to death and executed
on September 3, 1964.
(49) M. Harbi, op.cit. p.404, note 17, Chapter 10.
(50) Adballa Bouchène, Le rôle de l’Islam dans la guerre d’Algérie, Thèse de 3e cycle,
Université de Montpellier III, 1975.
(51) Mohammed Brahim Salhi, Religious brotherhood in Great Kabylia in the middle of the
twentieth Century: the Rahmania, CNRS editions, Paris 1996.
(52) Kamel Chachoua, L'islam kabyle, XVIIIe-XXe siècles : religion, Etat et société en
Algérie : autour de la Rissala "épître"... d'Ibnou Zakri "1853-1914", clerc officiel dans
l'Algérie coloniale, Maisonneuve et Larose Paris, 2001.
The Journal of Sophia Asian Studies No. 25 (2007)
(43) Benjamin Stora, Dictionnaire biographique des militants nationalistes algériens, Ed.
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(42) Member of the new staff of the Oulemas Association in 1935, he took part to the secret