What do Algeria's five state-approved presidential candidates want most of all? For Sunday to arrive as soon as possible and the electoral campaign that only began Nov. 17 to finally be over.

The bizarre race is the inevitable outcome of an even stranger political climate in which the powers that be are determined to replace deposed President Abdelaziz Bouteflika next Thursday despite widespread public opposition. Heavy police protection around the candidates and steep penalties — 18 months in prison for anyone accused of disrupting the electoral process — have failed to dissuade protesters from jeering at the candidates in almost every town in which they've campaigned.

Those who have been arrested are considered heroes by Hirak, the popular movement that wants to get rid of the old regime altogether. In the western town of Tlemcen, protesters massed under the prison's walls and chanted the names of four of their condemned companions.

By contrast, the campaign events of the five candidates — Ali Benflis, Abdelaziz Belaid, Azzedine Mihoubi, Abdelmadjid Tebboune and Abdelkader Bengrina — have largely been shunned by Algerians. Town halls ostensibly aimed at convincing would-be voters are taking place in front of carefully selected audiences in closed rooms teeming with security; the real spectacle is outside, where hostile protesters make their disgust for the candidates and the process.