On Feb. 16, the Algerian town of Kherrata held a demonstration to mark the first anniversary of the Hirak protest movement. It was in this small northeast city where the year before, the first mobilization against now-deposed President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and his regime erupted. That protest is largely considered to have paved the way for similar events in other cities in the days after that would finally crystalize in nationwide demonstrations on Feb. 22, the formal beginning of the Hirak movement.

This year's protest in Kherrata took place amidst calls for mass mobilization on Feb. 21, to commemorate the birth of the movement and support the protests that have been asking for radical change in Algeria for 52 consecutive weeks. During this time, the Hirak has become what many consider one of the most powerful political movements in the country’s recent history, forcing the reshuffling of much of the political and economic leadership under Bouteflika.

In a speech the same day, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune referred once again to the Hirak as “blessed” and expressed his will to introduce radical changes in the country in line with the demands of the movement.

“The 22nd of February was the end of one Algeria and the beginning of another,” Zine Labidine Ghebouli, an Algerian scholar at the American University of Beirut, told Al-Monitor. “It is the very first time that we have a national movement against the entire system, which has already collapsed,” he said. “The system is no longer as powerful as it used to be, people are no longer divided and marginalized as they used to be and [the Hirak] also came within an economic context [within which] it is very challenging for the system to keep buying social peace.”