Exclusive: A First Person Account Of Crowd Violence In Algeria
Eighty kilometres west of Algiers in the ancient Roman city of Tipaza, a pathway leads out of the ruins, over a verdant hillock and into a clearing, where a mud stump of about three feet stands.
Natives of Tipaza will tell you that the pillar was a favourite of Nobel Literature laureate Albert Camus. He would spend hours against it, watching waves crash over waves and scribbling cursive in a moleskin notepad.
In his brief essay, “Les Noces de Tipasa,” Camus wrote, “There’s a time to live and a time to recount. There’s also a time to create, which is less natural. Experience Tipaza, bear witness to it, and a work of art will follow.”
Camus was essentially preaching the necessity of living in the moment. The philosopher’s words certainly hold in the face of sublime beauty. However, in scenarios of utter chaos, a restructuring of Camus’ words is probably in order.
On Saturday July 12, I found that it was necessary to bear witness to a demoralizing event I never wanted to find myself present in again.
f*cking sh*t up!
On the day, MC El Eulma hosted ES Setif in Group B of the CAF Champions League. Only 20 kilometres separate El Eulma and Setif, so it was only natural that their meeting last weekend would prove a fractious affair.
El Eulma were clearly the better side on the night. The men in green traced passing triangles around the visitors who seemed lost after a mass exodus of experienced cadres in defense.
The match’s turning point came with the introduction of Setif’s El Hadi Belameiri late on. The French-born winger provided incisive running and his impetus pushed Setif to a last-minute goal.
The collective mood at the Messaoud Zoughar stadium immediately soured.
A few elders to my right, dressed in camelhair qashabias held their intertwined hands on their heads, their mouths gaped in disbelief. Two rows down, an ultra group started singing, “tonight, we’re f*cking sh*t up!”
Crowd violence is not new to Algeria. During the 2014-2015 season, 58 matches were played behind closed doors in the country’s top two divisions because of hooliganism.
One player was stabbed in Saida, some supporters have been killed in clashes outside of the stadium, and most notoriously, Cameroonian striker Albert Ebossé was hit in the head with a projectile in August that caused him to hemorrhage to death.
In the middle of chaos
At the final whistle of the MC El Eulma vs ES Setif I had attented, a group of supporters in the “tribune officiel” began breaking plastic chairs and launching them onto the pitch.
Two-liter water bottles flew at Setif players that had the temerity to celebrate with travelling support. Rocks were dug up from nowhere and launched at paramedics. Police officers chased gangs of supporters around the stands with their wooden batons.
The bedlam shocked me, but it was nothing compared to what was taking place outside of the stadium.
The parking lot was a warzone. On my right close to a 100 adolescents formed a scattered vanguard. Half of them wielded cement blocks the size of my head. On my left, riot police, with their scuffed plastic shields were collectively backpedaling, catching “missiles” on their shields, or dodging them deftly.
I found myself bang in the middle.
Every fiber of my being urged me to counter Camus’ words: to not be present, to head back into the stadium that was relatively safer. But I found it necessary to document what was happening. It was more than a responsibility; doing so was my obligation as a journalist.
Every other minute, the supporters collected enough blocks to charge and launch. I sided with the kids, filming this otherworldly scene with my back towards them. I took my canvas Nike backpack and placed it on my head. It probably would not have provided much protection, but I felt safer with any sort of makeshift helmet.
I kept a safe distance, keeping the camera rolling with 30-or-so youth in my buffer zone. The naivety of my actions did not dawn on me until a gangly kid with a bad case of acne accosted me.
“Delete It Now”
“Delete my face off of your footage.” It was only then that I truly realized the danger I was in.
“No problem,” I said, meaning every word. “‘I’ll delete it now.” But GoPro owners know that it’s a time-consuming process and the columns of riot police were now encroaching on my teenage buffer zone.
Ten seconds later another four or five parroted the first kid, who was now holding my arm. “Delete it now, delete it now.”
“Give me the camera!” another bellowed. Later I understood that they must have believed me to be an undercover agent, filming the scene for identification purposes.
One reached for the GoPro. Not knowing if they intended to steal the camera, I decided to keep a firm grip on the metallic silver picture box, stuffing my hand and the camera in my shirt pocket. Fifteen or so now surrounded me, and realizing that I was not giving into their demands, they turned to aggression.
One grabbed my neck; another threw a punch that grazed the top of my head. Violence is by nature contagious and now a teenager, who could not have been older than 17, was in my face.
He made yet another demand for the camera, his fist raised beside his ear and his eyebrows raised, as if to assure me, “I will hit you.”
I remember feeling a little bemused before bowing my head in anticipation and trying to head-butt his fist. His blow landed just under my balding cowlick.
After several blows landed, I was sure that the chances of having a calm, logical conversation was now out of the question. Keeping my hands in my pocket like a running back I ploughed through a very skinny defensive line and pumped my legs, breaking free.
One last straggler had a hold of my Nike helmet-backpack. I let him have it, and stumbled over to a line of police, eating a mouthful of dust and crashing into several thorn bushes on the way.
Socioeconomic demographics and poor infrastructure are the petri dish in which stadium violence breeds in Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia.
In a survey taken in early February 2009 by two private newspapers — El-Khabar (Arabophone) and Liberté (Francophone) — 74.4 percent of a sample of 1,340 15–to–39 year-olds indicated that they believed there’s a correlation between harsh socio-economic conditions in Algeria and violence in football.
What Can Be Done?
Algeria has a youth unemployment rate of 25 percent, Tunisia 30 precent, and Morocco 22 percent. It is also culturally taboo for women to attend matches.
A handful of booths sell tens of thousands of tickets matchday, creating bottlenecked entrances. Online or electronic ticketing services are not yet available. Spectators are then subjected to multiple full body searches, and their safety is often compromised.
Two teenage USM Alger fans fell to their deaths two years ago when the cement gave out from under their feet in the upper bowl of Algiers’ Stade 5 Juillet. They fell 50 feet, dying upon impact. Both families were compensated, and the stadium is undergoing renovations.
On March 23, 2009, whilst campaigning for a third term in office, Algeria’s President, Abdelaziz Bouteflika addressed violence in national stadia.
“The glory of Algerian sport is fading, and sport is witnessing increasing forms of violence. This issue could have grave repercussions if things remain as they are,” he said.
Bouteflika spoke those words less than a year after Algeria’s second largest city, Oran, witnessed widespread riots, following relegation of the city’s historic club, Mouloudia Club d’Oran.
Banks were torched, shopping malls looted, and public administration buildings vandalized.
In response to riots, the Algerian government often reduces prices for basic products such as cooking oil, sugar and flour, and cancels football league matches for weeks at a time, in order to defuse tense scenarios.
Subsidies are temporary fixes, but the global solution to stadium violence remains drastic improvements in infrastructure. No North African stadium is currently equipped with a thorough surveillance system that could be used to identify perpetrators of violence.
Online ticketing is another solution, which would relieve congested entries to venues. An open avenue of communication between official supporters’ associations and club administrations would also ensure fans have a voice and that their support is conducive to a sportsmanlike atmosphere.