[1][2] It began on 12 January, when 26-year-old Mohamed Aouichia set himself on fire in Bordj Menaiel in the compound of the daira building.
He had been sharing a room of 30 square meters with seven other people, including his sister, since 2003; he had repeatedly approached local authorities to get on the social housing list and been rebuffed.
He had gone with about twenty others to protest in front of the town hall of Boukhadra in Tebessa demanding jobs and houses, after the mayor refused to receive them.
[6] Al Jazeera described the suicide as "echoing the self-immolation that triggered the protests that toppled the leader of neighboring Tunisia.
[7] These suicides were followed by dozens more attempted or successful self-immolations across the country, so far without triggering nationwide demonstrations, most of them after the Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali fled his country on 14 January; cases included: The Ministry of Religious Affairs responded to this wave of self-immolations by devoting the Friday sermons of 21 January to admonitions of patience and reminders that suicide is forbidden in Islam.