Editing Abdelaziz Bouteflika (section)

== Early life and education ==
[[File:Oujda Rue du marché.JPG|left|thumb|210x210px|Market street in Oujda, around 1920.]]
Abdelaziz Bouteflika was born on 2 March 1937 in Oujda, French Morocco. He was the son of Mansouria Ghezlaoui and Ahmed Bouteflika from Tlemcen, Algeria. He had three half-sisters (Fatima, Yamina, and Aïcha), as well as four brothers (Abdelghani, Mustapha, Abderahim, and Saïd) and one sister (Latifa). [[Saïd Bouteflika]], 20 years his junior, would later be appointed special counselor to his brother in 1999. Unlike Saïd, who was raised mostly in [[Tlemcen]], He successively attended three schools in Oudja: Sidi Ziane, El Hoceinia, and Abdel Moumen High Schools, where he reportedly excelled academically. He was also affiliated with Qadiriyya Zaouia in Oujda.
[[File:Clan d'Oujda 1958.jpg|left|thumb|219x219px|Oujda Group in 1958]]
In 1956, Bouteflika went to the village of Ouled Amer near Tlemcen and subsequently joined—at the age of 19—the [[National Liberation Army of Algeria|National Liberation Army]], which was a military branch of the [[National Liberation Front of Algeria|National Liberation Front]]. He received his military education at the École des Cadres in Dar El Kebdani, Morocco. In 1957–1958, he was designated a controller of Wilaya, making reports on the conditions at the Moroccan border and in west Algeria, but later became the administrative secretary of [[Houari Boumédiène]]. He became one of his closest collaborators and a core member of his [[Oujda Group]]. In 1960, he was assigned to leading the Malian Front in the Algerian south and became known for his nom de guerre of Abdelkader al-Mali, which has survived until today In 1962, at the arrival of independence, he aligned with Boumédienne and the border armies in support of [[Ahmed Ben Bella]] against the [[Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic]].