Former Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who fought for independence from France and ousted amid pro-democracy protests in 2019 after two decades in power, has died at age 84, state television ENTV announced Friday.
A statement from the office of current President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, did not provide the cause of death or information about funeral arrangements.
Bouteflika had suffered a stroke in 2013 and it subsequently weakened him.
Concerns about his state of health and it being kept secret from the Algerian public, helped feed public frustration with his 20-year, corruption-tarnished rule. Mass public protests by the Hirak movement led to his departure.
As a politician, Bouteflika had been known as a survivor ever since he fought for independence from Algeria’s colonial ruler France in the 1950s and 1960s.
He had stood up to Henry Kissinger as Algeria’s long-serving foreign minister, successfully negotiated with the terrorist known as Carlos the Jackal to free oil ministers taken hostage in a 1975 attack on OPEC headquarters, and helped reconcile Algerian citizens with each other after a decade of civil war between radical Muslim militants and Algeria’s security forces.
Upon taking office, Bouteflika promised “to definitively turn the somber pages of our history to work for a new era.”
Born March 2, 1937, to Algerian parents in the border town of Oujda, Morocco, Bouteflika was among Algeria’s most enduring politicians.
In 1956, Bouteflika entered the National Liberation Army, formed to fight Algeria’s bloody independence war. He commanded the southern Mali front and slipped into France secretly.
After the war’s end, Bouteflika became foreign minister at just 25, at a time when Algeria was a model of doctrinaire socialism tethered to the Soviet Union. Its capital, Algiers, was nicknamed “Moscow on the Med.”
Algeria’s army held the reins of power throughout that time. The National Liberation Army had been transformed into a single party that ruled until 1989, when a multiparty system was introduced.
But as the Islamic Salvation Front party, or FIS, rapidly gained support, the army canceled Algeria’s first multi-party legislative elections in 1992 to thwart a likely victory by the Muslim fundamentalists.
An insurgency erupted that left an estimated 200,000 dead over the ensuing years.
Bouteflika took office in 1999, Algeria’s first civilian leader in more than three decades.He managed to bring stability to a country nearly brought to its knees by the violence.
The former president stood with the United States in the fight against terrorism after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, particularly on intelligence-sharing and military cooperation.
It marked a turnaround from the militantly anti-American, Soviet-armed Algeria of years past when figures like Black Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver took refuge there.
Ultimately, corruption scandals over infrastructure and hydrocarbon projects dogged him for years and tarnished many of his closest associates.
Bouteflika was increasingly absent from view during his third and fourth presidential terms after suffering a stroke.
The secrecy surrounding Algeria’s leaders is such that it’s unclear whether Bouteflika ever married or had any survivors.