Jean-Bédel Bokassa
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| Bokassa I | ||
|---|---|---|
| Emperor of Central Africa | ||
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| Reign | December 4, 1976 - September 20, 1979 | |
| Coronation | December 4, 1977 | |
| Born | 22 February 1921 | |
| Died | 3 November 1996 | |
| Predecessor | New Empire | |
| Successor | Empire abolished | |
| Consort | Empress Catherine | |
| Issue | Crown Prince Jean-Bédel | |
| Royal House | Bokassa | |
Bokassa I of Central Africa (IPA: [ʒɑ̃ bedɛl bɔkasa]; February 22, 1921–November 3, 1996), also known as Jean-Bédel Bokassa and Salah Eddine Ahmed Bokassa, was the military ruler of the Central African Republic from January 1, 1966 and the Emperor of the Central African Empire from December 4, 1976, until his overthrow on September 20, 1979.
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[edit] Early life
Bokassa was born in Bobangi, a village in Moyen-Congo, in the present Central African Republic (then a French colony called French Equatorial Africa). His father Mgboundoulou, a village chief, belonged to the M'Baka, a small tribe in the forest south of Bangui, distinguished for contributing an inordinate number of the country's civil servants. In 1927 he was arrested, promptly judged and executed by the French.[1] A week after his death, Mgboundoulou's wife committed suicide from grief, leaving behind twelve children.
[edit] Army
One of the orphans was Jean-Bedel, who was called "Bokassa" (meaning 'little forest' in M'Baka). He was educated by Catholic missionaries but soon became a soldier. Bokassa joined the Free French Forces and ended World War II as a sergeant major with the Legion d'Honneur award created by Napoleon and the Croix de Guerre. By 1961 he had risen to the rank of captain. He left the French army in 1964 to join the army of the Central African Republic. As a cousin of the President David Dacko and nephew of Dacko's predecessor Barthélémy Boganda, Bokassa rose to the rank of colonel and chief of staff of the armed forces.
[edit] Coup d'état
On January 1, 1966, with the country in economic turmoil, Bokassa overthrew the autocratic Dacko in a swift coup d'état and assumed power as president of the Republic and head of the sole political party, the Mouvement pour l'Evolution Sociale de l'Afrique Noire (MESAN: "Movement for the Social Evolution of the Black Africa"). Bokassa abolished the constitution of 1959 on January 4 and began to rule by decree.
In April 1969, an attempted coup was the impetus for Bokassa further consolidating his power. In March 1972, Bokassa declared himself president for life. He survived another coup attempt in December 1974 and an assassination attempt in February 1976.
[edit] Foreign support
Because of the Central African soil's mineral resources (including uranium and diamonds), some countries like France, Switzerland and The United States supported Bokassa and dealt with him. In 1975, the French president Valéry Giscard d'Estaing declared himself a "friend and family member" of Bokassa. By that time France supplied its former colony's centrafican regime with financial and military backing. In exchange, Bokassa frequently took d'Estaing on hunting trips in Africa and supplied France with uranium, a mineral which was vital for France's nuclear energy and weapons program in the Cold War era.
The "friendly and fraternal" cooperation with France -according to Bokassa's own terms- reached its peak with the imperial coronation ceremony of Bokassa I on December 4, 1977. The French Defense Minister sent a battalion to secure the ceremony; he also lended 17 aircrafts to the Central African Empire's government, and even assigned French Navy personnel to support the orchestra.[2]
On October 10, 1979, the Canard Enchaîné satiric newspaper unveiled - in what soon became a major political scandal known as the diamonds affair - that the president Bokassa had offered the then Minister of Finance Valéry Giscard d'Estaing two diamonds, back in 1973. This kind of present was common to the president for life's friends, and so the United States Secretary of State Henry Kissinger received the same gift.
The franco-centralafrican relationship drastically changed when the French intelligence service Renseignements Généraux learned about Bokassa's willing to become a partner of Qadhafi. In early December 1979, the French council officially stopped all support to Bokassa.
After a meeting with Moammar al-Qadhafi of Libya, Bokassa decided to convert to Islam and changed his name to Salah Eddine Ahmed Bokassa. It is presumed that this was a ploy calculated to ensure ongoing Libyan financial aid. When no funds promised by Qadhafi were forthcoming, Bokassa abandoned his new faith. It also was incompatible with his plans to be crowned emperor in the Catholic cathedral in Bangui.
[edit] Proclamation of the Empire
In September 1976, Bokassa dissolved the government and replaced it with the Conseil de la Révolution Centrafricaine 'Central African Revolutionary Council'. On December 4, 1976, at the MESAN congress, Bokassa declared the republic a monarchy, the Central African Empire. He issued an imperial constitution, converted back to Catholicism and had himself crowned "S.M.I. Bokassa Ier", with S.M.I. standing for Sa Majesté Impériale: "His Imperial Majesty", on December 4, 1977. Bokassa's full title was Empereur de Centrafrique par la volonté du peuple Centrafricain, uni au sein du parti politique national, le MESAN ("Emperor of Central Africa by the will of the Centrafrican people, united within the national political party, the MESAN"). Both his lavish coronation ceremony and his regime were largely inspired by Napoleon I, who had converted the French Revolutionary Republic of which he was First Consul into the First French Empire.
Bokassa attempted to justify his actions by claiming that creating a monarchy would help Central Africa "stand out" from the rest of the continent, and earn the world's respect. Over $20 million was spent on the coronation (consuming one third of the C.A.R.'s annual budget and all of France's aid that year), but despite generous invitations, no foreign leaders attended the event. Many thought Bokassa was insane, and compared his egotistical extravagance with that of Africa's other well-known eccentric dictator, Idi Amin. Tenacious rumors that he occasionally consumed human flesh were found unproven during his trial.
Though it was claimed that the new Empire would be a constitutional monarchy, no significant democratic reforms were made, and suppression of dissenters remained widespread. Torture was said to be especially rampant, with allegations that even Bokassa himself occasionally participated in beatings.
[edit] Overthrow
[edit] Repression
By January 1979, French support for Bokassa had all but eroded after riots in Bangui led to a massacre of civilians [citations needed]. On April 17 to April 19 a number of schoolchildren were arrested after they had protested against wearing the expensive, government-required school uniforms. Around 100 were killed.
Former President Dacko was able to gain French support and lead a successful coup using French troops while Bokassa was absent in Libya on September 20, 1979.
[edit] Operation Barracudas
Opération Barracudas started on September 20 at night and ended the day after early in the morning. Bokassa's overthrow by the French government was named "the last colonial expedition of France" (dernière expédition coloniale de la France) by French diplomat veteran Jacques Foccart. An undercover commando squad of the counterintelligence service SDECE (now DGSE) joined by Colonel Brancion-Rouge's 1er RPIMa of the Forces Spéciales -which had landed by Transall- managed to secure the Bangui Mpoko airport. Then two other transport aircrafts landed and a message was sent to Colonel Degenne to join in with his barracudas (codename for eight Puma choppers and Transall aircrafts) taking off from the neighboor Chad's N'Djamena military airport.[3]
[edit] Fall of the empire
On September 21st, by 12:30PM, the pro-French Dacko proclaimed the fall of the centrafrican empire. David Dacko remained president until he was overthrown on September 20, 1981 by André Kolingba.
Bokassa fled to Ivory Coast where he spent four years at Abidjan, then he followed his in France near Paris. France gave him political asylum because of the French Foreign Legion obligations.
[edit] Trial
Bokassa had been sentenced to death ‘in absentia’ in December 1980 but he returned from exile in France on October 24, 1986. He was arrested and tried for treason, murder, cannibalism and embezzlement. Following an emotional trial over some months he was cleared of the cannibalism charges but was sentenced to death on June 12, 1987. His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in February 1988 and then reduced further to twenty years. With the return of democracy in 1993, Kolingba declared a general amnesty for all prisoners as one of his final acts as president, and Bokassa was released on August 1. He had 17 wives and a reported 50 children.
At the end of his life he proclaimed himself the 13th Apostle and claimed to have secret meetings with the Pope. He died of a heart attack on November 3, 1996.
| Styles of Bokassa I of Central Africa |
|
|---|---|
| Reference style | His Imperial Majesty |
| Spoken style | Your Imperial Majesty |
| Alternative style | Sir |
[edit] Notes
[edit] Media links
- Jean-Bedel Bokassa video interview while exiled at Abidjan in 1983 (French)
- Various documentaries about Bokassa (French)
[edit] Sources and external links
- Imperial stamp example
- Imperial currency example
- Imperial flag
- WorldStatesme- CAR
- The Big Man (Info on Bokassa and other African Rulers)
- Werner Herzog's documentary film on Bokassa
- Amusing story about Emperor Bokassa's "crown jewel"
- Jean-Barthelemy Bokassa's blog (about his first book "Diamonds of treason" dealing with Jean-Bedel and Martine bokassa
| House of Bokassa Born: February 22, 1921 Died: November 3, 1996 |
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|---|---|---|
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by David Dacko |
President of Central African Republic 1966–1976 |
Vacant Title next held by David Dacko |
| Regnal Titles | ||
| New Title Previously President |
Emperor of the Central African Empire 1976-1979 |
Republic restored |
| Titles in pretence | ||
| New Title | * NOT REIGNING * Emperor of the Central African Empire (1979-1996) |
Succeeded by Crown Prince Jean-Bédel |
| Presidents of the Central African Republic |  |
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|---|---|---|
| Dacko | Bokassa | Dacko | Kolingba | Patassé | Bozizé Emperor: Bokassa (1976–1979) |
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Categories: Articles lacking sources from February 2007 | All articles lacking sources | Articles with unsourced statements since February 2007 | All articles with unsourced statements | Central African politicians | Past leaders by coup | Ouster by coup | Emperors | African royalty | Former Muslims | Croix de guerre recipients | Légion d'honneur recipients | Roman Catholic politicians | Central African adoptive parents | 1921 births | 1996 deaths | Field Marshals | Cold War leaders
