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Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika on Tuesday sacked his personal aide, also the former leader of the ruling National Liberation Front (FLN), and banned him from all state service, which local media said was due to infighting in the ruling party.
Citing a source at the President's Office, the official APS news agency said President Bouteflika issued a decree on Tuesday to dismiss Abdelaziz Belkhadem in his capacity as the minister of state and the special adviser to president, and banned him of all activities related with state institutions.
The source added that the former FLN secretary-general had been informed, while all necessary measures have been taken for carrying out this decision.
But the source did not provide any further information on why such a decision was taken, as Belkhadem has been seen as one of the key state officials in Bouteflika's government.
Belkhadem served as prime minister for several terms. In the latest cabinet reshuffle after Bouteflika was re-elected for a fourth term in office in April, Belkhadem was appointed as the minister of state and the president's special adviser, after a short "desert crossing" following his "forced" departure from the ruling party in May 2013.
Belkhadem has repeatedly tried to remove the FLN's current chief Amar Saadani, though both were among Algeria's top politicians who had helped ailing Bouteflika win a fourth five- year term.
The FLN, with Bouteflika as the honorary president, and the army have largely controlled energy-rich Algeria since its independence in 1962. The North African country is still traumatized by a decade-long war with armed Islamists in the 1990s, during which more than 200,000 people were killed.
