Writer Boualem Sansal imprisoned in Algeria for saying historic truths

Since his arrest on November 16 in Algiers, French-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal has been behind bars without a trial. His arrest came after an interview with a French media in which he said historical facts about the artificial borders of the post-colonial Algerian state.

In a country where demonizing Morocco is the currency of the regime, Sansal was bold enough to challenge a regime’s narrative that is based on false historical recounts.

According to analysts, the Algerian regime was particularly irked when Sansal made a comparison between the centuries-old nation state of Morocco which preceded colonialism and the Turkish dependency that Algeria was when France entered the country.

He also pointed out to the Moroccan origin of much of current Western Algeria.

These historical facts were enough to throw Sansal in jail, confirming once more the endemic enmity nurtured by the Algerian regime towards anything Moroccan.

Instead of building a strong integrated Maghreb where borders will serve as an administrative issue, the Algerian regime insists on closing borders, hindering freedom of movement and stoking tension.

Any thinker who ventures to criticize this policy will face the fate of Sansal and other opponents who are either silenced, intimidated or forced to live in exile.

As a nation that is forced by a military regime to live in an imagined past, Algeria’s present and future seem to be doomed unless thinkers are bold enough to raise questions and historic facts to expose the state of repression of the regime.

The manipulation of history is also reflective of a regime tactic to build its legitimacy after failing at the economic and social levels to meet the ambition of a mostly younger population that is fed up with rehashing empty independence war slogans.