On May 23, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune unexpectedly dismissed the governor of the Bank of Algeria, Rostom Fadhli, who had held the post for just over eighteen months.
In the absence of official explanations, the Algerian media, which in recent years have silenced their most critical voices under the battering of the executive, curiously interpret the replacement of Rostom Fadhli as a new manifestation of “reforming will” of the Algerian head of state.
The now ex-governor would not have shown sufficient diligence in the expected reform of the law on currency and credit, which governs the functioning of the financial sector.
The Algerian president also wanted to show his dissatisfaction with the delay in the process of internationalization of Algerian banks.
The Arlesian of economic reforms
The opening of bank branches abroad by Algerian public banks has been a project regularly mentioned by the Algerian authorities for a quarter of a century.
It is currently piloted by the Ministry of Finance. In mid-May, the Algerian Prime Minister, Aïmene Benabderrahmane, put this eternal project back on track and assured that “all the steps relating to the implementation of the first phase of the project to open bank branches abroad must be finalized before the end of the current year”.
Three public banks – the National Bank of Algeria (BNA), the People’s Credit of Algeria (CPA) and the External Bank of Algeria (BEA) – plan to set up subsidiaries in several African countries.
The BEA has also “committed to the process” for the opening of an office in France “in order to respond to the concerns raised by our national community established in this country”, according to an official statement.
Problem : the “reforming will” of the Head of State, illustrated by numerous declarations of intent, but which comes up against the inertia of the administration, has so far not obtained any concrete application.
Almost two years ago, in September 2020, the president assured that Algeria was heading “towards an economy open to the world”.
“We need a big reform of the banks, a big reform of the tax system. There is no more income, from now on, we count our money”, he said, referring to the drying up of tax revenues linked to hydrocarbons.
Less than two years later, the opening of the economy, the reform of subsidies, the tax reform, the reform of the banks and a few other projects that have been in the cards for several decades are at best still in the works, at worst forgotten.
Only the second part of the program announced by Abdelmadjid Tebboune is actively being implemented: the Algerian government is counting its money.
Divine surprise
The surge in oil prices has been there. It was a divine surprise for our leaders, who saw the risk of cessation of payments, the threat of recourse to the IMF and the abandonment of sovereignty over national economic decision-making associated with it recede.
For almost a year, money has been flowing again in waves in the coffers of the State, and the foreign exchange reserves, after