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A Nervous Leader. Boumediene's power base is his army, and he is spending almost one-third of the national budget on military hardware, most of it bought from Russia. In the process, Boumediene has built Algeria into the third largest military power in Africa, after Egypt and South Africa. He has also built a menacing opposition. Though he has purged his enemies from the Algerian Labor Federation and sacked rivals on the 24-man Revolutionary Council, many pro-Ben Bella men still surround him in high government posts. Outside the country, powerful exiles like Independence Hero Mohammed Boudiaf are threatening to organize subversion against him. Ben Bella, who could well be the leader of such a revolt, is regularly shifted from prison to prison by special order of his nervous successor.
Under the circumstances, Boumediene still does not feel safe enough to restore the constitution and National Assembly, which were suspended after the coup that raised him to power; instead, Boumediene rules by decree through his Revolutionary Council. His one grudging concession to democracy has been a promise of municipal elections in February. "A country such as ours," Boumediene says, "which has everything to do, which has need for order, organization and discipline after the terrible crises it has undergone, cannot allow itself the luxury of a formal democracy."