ALGIERS, March 17, 2005 (IslamOnline.net) – The government's allocation of some US $30 million for the coming Arab summit, schedule for March 22-23, drew outrage from unemployed Algerians, asking that the sum be channeled into combating poverty and creating more jobs.

“I don't care about the Arab summit,” Mahmoud, 22, told IslamOnline.net on Thursday, March 17.

“All I care about is to have a job to make ends meet. Since my graduation from colleague seven years ago, I have been jobless. All my efforts to seek a job were fruitless,” he lamented.

The Algerian government sees the summit as a golden chance to restore its regional political clout.

The summit is expected to bring together most of the heads of state of the 22-member Arab League as well as UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

Hotels have been requisitioned to host some 3,000 delegates, expected to attend the gathering.

Heavy vehicles have also been banned from the Algerian capital, official events cancelled, many administration offices shut and school holidays brought forward.

More than 12,000 police, paramilitary, army and anti-terrorist forces are also to patrol the capital during the event.

“The summit will offer me nothing and the rhetoric about polishing Algeria's international image is a nonsense that only plays into the hands of politicians and decision-makers,” said Abdel Qader, another jobless Algerian.

“I only want to eke out a living,” said Abdel Qader, who has been seeking a job since his graduation in 1995.

Um Nasser, an Algerian housewife, agreed.

“The Arab summit is an opportunity for Algeria to play a leading role on the Arab arena as it used to during the 1970s and the early 1980s,” she said.

“However, the government should focus at present on mobilizing efforts to improve the living conditions of its people by combating unemployment and street violence.”

More than a third of Algeria's 32 million people lives under the poverty line, according to the United Nations.

The rate of unemployment in the Arab country is estimated at more than 20 percent of the labor force, according to a Reuters tally.

Other Algerians, mostly well-offs and academics, counter such views and consider the summit an opportunity for the Arab-African country to play a leading regional role.

“Algeria has been living in a diplomatic isolation because of the 12-year cycle of violence but now President Abdelaziz Bouteflika is doing his utmost to end such isolation and restore the leading role of the Algerian diplomacy,” said Abdel Rahman Daho, professor of political sciences and international relations.

Algeria had fallen into a bloody, vicious cycle of violence in early 1992 after the government had annulled the results of the 1991 legislative election in which the Islamic Salvation Front was about to secure a landslide victory.

The authorities then disbanded the Islamic movement and unleashed a crackdown on its members, arresting scores of them.

The government move had triggered a bloody armed conflict that lingered on for several years, claiming the lives of some 150,000 people, mostly civilians.

“Algeria, which wants to become a key player in the Arab world, has to pay the price and seek the tools helping to realize this end,” an aide to the Algerian parliament speaker told IOL on condition on anonymity.

“Somehow, Algeria has succeeded in regaining its role in Africa and at the Mediterranean level as a result of the country’s successful efforts in combating terrorism. Now Algeria is seeking to become a key player in the Arab world,” he stressed.

The Nations Palace, located in the coastal city of Stawli, will host the meetings of Arab leaders.