Provinces of Algeria

Politics of Algeria
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Algeria is currently divided into 48 wilayas (provinces), 553 daïras (circles, or counties) and 1541 baladiyahs (municipalities, in French: commune). The capital city of a baladiyah, daïra, or province (which is also the largest city of those) always gives those entities their name, even Algiers, the capital of the country gave it its name ("El Djazayar", the Arabic name for both the city and the country).

According to the Algerian constitution, a wilaya is a territorial collectivity enjoying economic and diplomatic freedom, the APW, or "Popular Provincial Parliament/Provincial Popular Parliament" (the "Assemblé Populaire Wilayale", in French) is the political entity governing a province, directed by the "Wali" (Governor), who is chosen by the Algerian President to handle the APW's decisions, the APW has also a president, who is elected by the members of the APW, which is elected by Algerians.

The province numbers are the first 31 provinces (see the second section) in Arabic alphabetical order, after the adding pf 17 other provinces in 1974, the old numbering was kept and the 17 new provinces have been assigned codes from 17-48, in Arabic alphabetical order. There are 48 provinces (since 1983) in Algeria, they are:

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1974-1983

The 15 départments were reorganized to form 31 provinces:

1 Adrar 2 Chlef 3 Laghouat 4 Oum el-Bouaghi 5 Batna 6 Béjaïa 7 Biskra 8 Béchar 9 Blida 10 Bouira 11 Tamanghasset 12 Tébessa 13 Tlemcen 14 Tiaret 15 Tizi Ouzou 16 Algiers 17 Djelfa 18 Jijel 19 Sétif 20 Saida 21 Skikda 22 Sidi Bel Abbes 23 Annaba 24 Guelma 25 Constantine 26 Médéa 27 Mostaganem 28 M'Sila 29 Mascara 30 Ouargla

1957-1974

Immediately after independence, Algeria retained its 15 former French départements, which were renamed wilayas (provinces) in 1968, for the most part, with some name changes:

*9A-Alger (Algiers)
*9C-Annaba (Formerly Bône, English: Bona)
*9B-Batna
*9D-Constantine
*9H-Orélansville (Then El Asnam, now Chlef)
*8A-El Wahat (Currently Ouargla, formerly Oasis)
*9E-Médéa
*9F-Mostaganem
*9G-Oran
*9R-Saïda
*8B-Saoura (Currently Béchar)
*9J-Sétif
*9K-Tiaret
*9L-Tizi-Ouzou
*9M-Tlemcen

1954-1962

During the Algerian War of Independence, the FLN adopted an organizational system divided by 6 numbered "wilayas":

#Aurès
#Constantine
#Kabylie
#Algiers
#Oran
#Sahara

with France sometimes described as a "wilaya 7".

ee also

*Municipalities of Algeria
*List of Algerian Provinces by population
*List of Algerian Provinces by area