Background
A.Bouteflika was born on March 2, 1937 in Oujda (Morocco).
A.Bouteflika was born on March 2, 1937 in Oujda (Morocco).
He successively attended three schools: "Sidi Ziane", "El Hoceinia" and the "Abdel Moumen" high-school, where he reportedly excelled academically.
After getting a high education he studied philosophy. At his studying years he was a general secretary of the Universal Union of all Mussulmen students department.
In his early days as Foreign Minister he had a strong anti-Western streak but subsequently he has balanced the country’s foreign policy skilfully with good relations in the West as well as the Fast and a high reputation in the Third World.
During the student strike in May 1956 he abandoned his studies and joined the National Liberation Army (ALN). Posted to Wilaya V sector, he soon struck up a close friendship with an older student from Cairo, Boumedienne, the sector commander who used to send him on a tour of the kitchens as a two-way communications link between headquarters and small units. In 1960 he was sent on special missions to seek support from Mali and Guinea. Later that year with Cherif Belkacem and Ahmed Medeghri he became one of the group of staff officers working with Boumedienne at Ghardimaou in Tunisia.
In January 1962 he was spokesman for the young captains who wanted to air their grievances to the provisional government. In a secret visit to Ben Bella in detention at the Chateau d’Aulnoy he paved the way for the alliance between Boumedienne and Ben Bella.
After independence he was elected MP for Tlemcen on September 20, 1962, and joined the government on September 29, 1962, as Minister of Youth and Sport. A year later when Mohamed Khemisti was assassinated Bouteflika was made his successor as
Foreign Minister. He settled down fast at the ministry and showed a quick grasp of problems but after 18 months his position became difficult. At the first major clash between Ben Bella and Boumedienne at the party congress in April 1964 he took his old army chief’s side and subsequently found more and more foreign affairs responsibilities being taken over by Ben Bella.
By early summer 1965 it seemed only a matter of time before he would be dismissed as Foreign Minister. His resistance to Ben Bella was one of the factors which made Boumedienne decide there would be enough backing for a coup. His staff work helped ensure the success of the revolution on June 19, 1965.
Since the coup as a member of the Revolution Council as well as Foreign Minister he has had an influential voice on internal and international issues. His vigour quickened the pace of nationalisation. At the important Foreign Ministers’ meeting of the Arab League in Cairo in January 1973 he helped keep the Middle East strategy on realistic lines instead of rash retaliation, while promoting the Palestine cause to the maximum. At Maghreb meetings he has won high esteem for creating a new climate of improved relations between Algeria, Tunis and Morocco.
His resistance to Ben Bella was one of the factors which made Boumedienne decide there would be enough backing for a coup. His staff work helped ensure the success of the revolution on June 19, 1965.
Small, thickset with black hair and a moustache, he enjoys a film-star style reputation as Algeria’s Omar Sharif. But his elegant clothes and soft voice only thinly disguise the tough man of iron will whom it is dangerous to cross. Although not equipped with the academic training of many other men around the President he has an incisive mind and quick powers of analysis which make him more than a match for the others in the cabinet.
Son of a small merchant who emigrated to Morocco soon afterwards to run a Turkish bath house at Oujda. His father, Ahmed Bouteflika, was born in 1898 and his mother, Mansouriah Ghezlaoui, in 1916 - they are both from the region of Tlemcen, Nedroma.
In August 1990, Abdelaziz married Amal Triki, the daughter of a diplomat, Yahia Triki.