Five candidates are standing in Thursday’s ballot in the Algeria. They are all children of the regime, says the protest movement.
Polling is on Thursday morning opened in Algeria to elect a new president in the country.
But a protest movement, which has gathered hundreds of thousands of people to oppose the elections and call it an attempt by the old regime to cling to power.
All 61.000 polling stations in the country opened at 8.00.
There have not been published in any opinion polls in advance. But observers say that one can expect a very low turnout.
There are five candidates on the ballot. But they are all rejected by the opposition as “children of the regime” under the former long-serving authoritarian leader Abdelaziz Bouteflika.
Bouteflika was forced from power in april, two months after a large weekly demonstrations against the regime took its beginning. They have been repeated ever since.
/ritzau/AFP