The novel “Houris” by Kamel Daoud, recently awarded the Goncourt Prize, triggered a real political and literary earthquake in Algeria. This distinction, although prestigious, propelled the work into an explosive controversy, going well beyond the literary merits, which were nonetheless well-founded.
Banned from sale in Algeria, the book is now an essential work for all those interested in the deep wounds of Algerian history, in particular the black decade (1991-2002), a period marked by extreme violence, executions summary and brutal repression.
Daoud, through fiction, awakens a past that the Algerian power would have preferred to keep in oblivion, resurrecting the questions around the famous “who-kills-who”, a slogan which questioned the responsibility for the crimes of this period .
In Algeria, the dark decade left deep scars, with a human toll estimated between 200,000 and 250,000 dead, thousands missing and families still searching for answers. To turn the page, the authorities promulgated the Civil Concord Law in 1999, then the Charter for Peace and National Reconciliation in 2005.
Read also | Algerian Kamel Daoud, whose book is banned in Algeria, wins the Goncourt Prize
These initiatives aimed to end hostilities by amnestying many actors in the conflict, but they also laid the foundations for imposed amnesia.
“Amnesiac and amnesty forgiveness”
War crimes, forced disappearances and torture have remained without legal action, in the name of peace. Kamel Daoud tackles, through Houris, this institutionalized amnesia, revealing the gap between a facade of reconciliation and a truth that many families are still demanding.
For these families and critical observers, Algerian national reconciliation is more akin to an “amnesiac and amnesty pardon”. This “pardon” erased hundreds of blood crimes and established a culture of impunity, maintained by the regime.
The position of the Algerian state vis-à-vis Daoud’s work is a striking illustration of this: the book is censored and the author is castigated, not for his literary talents, but for having recalled this buried history and posed the questions that those in power would like to see relegated to silence.
Read also | Kamel Daoud, Prix Goncourt 2024: A consecration that disturbs the Algerian military power
The bans, the trials, the repression of freedom of expression in fact still recall today an authoritarian system whose military vestiges from the dark decade still occupy influential positions of power.
A reconciliation as a cover for the torturers
The testimony of certain exiled soldiers, such as Habib Souaïdia in “The Dirty War”, also brought to light inhumane abuses carried out by the army during the civil war. The stories of executions, torture, killings and disappearances have, however, not provoked a judicial or institutional reaction in Algeria. Instead, reconciliation measures provided cover for many of the military leaders of that era, spared by the law, comforted in their silence.
This status quo situation is increasingly contested, both nationally and internationally. In 2023, former Algerian Defense Minister Khaled Nezzar was indicted in Switzerland for war crimes and crimes against humanity, and is due to face trial soon.
Read also | Ihsane El Kadi, the castigator of Algerian generals released
For many observers, this trial could open a breach in the wall of impunity from which these officials in Algeria have so far benefited. Fear of these prosecutions has forced some of them to avoid traveling to Europe, for fear of being arrested.
A poorly healed trauma
The consequences of this institutionalized amnesia on Algerian society are disastrous. The Black Decade remains a poorly healed trauma, and the absence of transitional justice or recognition of the suffering inflicted by the various protagonists of the conflict has frozen this trauma in the collective memory.
Many Algerians live in a society where history is repressed, where questions of justice are systematically avoided, and where the repression of any form of critical expression remains. Kamel Daoud’s work opens a window onto this painful past and the way it still haunts the present. By asking the questions “who killed who?” and “who is imprisoning who today?”, he questions the continuity of a repressive system, where the army and the State closely control the narrative of history and society.
Read also | Who is Marco Rubio, the likely next American secretary of state who called for sanctions against Algeria?
This state censorship does not, however, extinguish memory. On the contrary, the ban on “Houris” strengthened its impact. For many, it symbolizes the state’s inability to enable true reconciliation. Instead of responding to the aspirations for justice of families and citizens, the regime seems to perpetuate a culture of forced forgetting and silence, stifling attempts at revelation.
The reflection of contemporary struggles
In the eyes of the younger Algerian generations, who did not directly experience the dark decade but feel its echoes through their families, this official silence is seen as a betrayal of the principles of truth and justice. By exacerbating the repression against criticism, the Algiers regime is only fueling frustration and fueling the desire to see the truth finally emerge.
The banning of “Houris” illustrates the unresolved tension between a bloody past and a present marked by censorship and state control. Daoud’s work, through its literary outlook and its symbolic force, thus becomes a reflection of contemporary struggles for freedom of expression and the search for truth in Algeria.
While certain generals continue to exercise their power, protected by reconciliation laws and the barriers of censorship, voices like that of Kamel Daoud remind us that peace is not built on erasure, but on the recognition of crimes. and respect for victims.
Through this novel, the author sends a clear message: memory and justice are inseparable for a peaceful future, and no amnesty can indefinitely stifle the demands for truth that rise from the depths of Algerian society.
Related News :