Houari Boumédiène[a] (Arabic:هواري بومدين,romanized: Hawwārī Būmadyan; bornMohammed ben Brahim Boukharouba;[b] 23 August 1927 – 27 December 1978) was anAlgerian military officer and politician who was thesecond head of state of independent Algeria from 1965 until his death in 1978. He served as Chairman of theRevolutionary Council of Algeria from 19 June 1965 until 12 December 1976 and thereafter aspresident of Algeria until his death.
After the FLN's victory over the French in theAlgerian War of Independence in 1962, Boumediene became theMinister of Defense in Algeria's new government. However, in June 1965, he overthrew President Ben Bella in abloodless coup before proceeding to abolishAlgeria's parliament along with itsconstitution and ultimately becoming the country's actinghead of state. In the 1970s, Boumediene initiated a gradual restoration of parliamentarism and civil institutions in Algeria. This process ended with the adoption of thenew constitution in 1976. The presidency was reinstated, and Boumediene emerged as the sole candidate inan election later that year, winning with 99.46 per cent of the votes. Subsequently, he pursuedArab socialist andPan-Arabist policies. He was also strongly opposed toIsrael and offered logistic assistance to anti-colonial movements and freedom fighters across theArab world and Africa.
From the beginning of 1978, Boumediene appeared less and less in public. He died on December 27, 1978, after unsuccessful treatment for a rare form of blood cancer,Waldenström's macroglobulinemia. His funeral was attended by two million mourners.[1] He was succeeded as president byChadli Bendjedid.
Not much is known about Boumédiène's early life. His place of birth variously appear asGuelma, the village of Clauzel near Guelma, orHéliopolis, and his date of birth as 16 August 1925, 23 August 1927, or in most sources as 1932.[2] His father said in a 1965 interview that his date of birth was 23 August 1932.[3] His birth name was Mohammed ben Brahim Boukherouba, and his father was a penniless wheat-farmer and was an Arab and strict Muslim who did not speak French.[4][5] According to theEncyclopaedia of Islam, his family is Arabic-speaking and ofBerber origins.[6] He was educated at a Quranic school in Guelma until he was 14, then an Arabic secondary school inConstantine.[3]
The country's constitution and political institutions were abolished, and he ruled through a Revolutionary Council of his own mostly military supporters. Many of them had been his companions during the war years, when he was based around theMoroccan border town ofOujda, which caused analysts to speak of the "Oujda Group". One prominent member of this circle was Boumédiène's long-time foreign minister,Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who served as Algeria's president from 1999 until 2019.
Initially, he was seen as potentially a weak leader, with no significant power base except inside the army, and it was not known to what extent he commanded the officer corps. He remained Algeria's undisputed leader until his death in 1978. No significant internal challenges emerged from inside the government after the 1967 coup attempt. After the coup, he insisted on collective rule.[9]
Houari Boumediene standing in a row with the other politicians, 1965.
Economically, Boumédiène turned away from Ben Bella's focus on rural Algeria and experiments in socialist cooperative businesses (l'autogestion). Instead, he opted for a more systematic and planned programme of state-driven industrialization. Algeria had virtually no advanced production at the time, but in 1971 Boumédiène nationalized the Algerian oil industry, increasing government revenue tremendously (and sparking intense protest from the French government). He then put the soaring oil and gas resources—enhanced by the oil price shock of 1973—into building heavy industry, hoping to make Algeria theMaghreb's industrial centre. His years in power were in fact marked by a reliable and consistent economic growth, but after his death, in the 1980s, the drop in oil prices and increasingly evident inefficiency of the country's state-run industries, prompted a change in policy towards gradual economicalliberalization. Boumédiène imposedArab socialism as the state ideology and declared Islam the state religion.[10] He was a strong supporter ofArabization and was more assertive than Ben Bella in Arabizing Algeria, especially between 1970 and 1977, and declared 1971 the year of Arabization.[11]
In the 1970s, along with the expansion of state industry and oil nationalization, Boumédiène declared a series of socialist revolutions, and strengthened the leftist aspect of his administration. A side-effect of this was the rapprochement with the hitherto suppressed remnants of theAlgerian Communist Party (thePAGS), whose members were now co-opted into the government, where it gained some limited intellectual influence, although without formal legalization of their party. Algeria formally remained a single-party state under the FLN.
Political stability reigned, however, as attempts at challenging the state were generally nipped in the bud. As chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, Boumédiène and his associates ruled by decree. During the 1970s, constitutional rule was gradually reinstated and civilian political institutions were restored and reorganized. Efforts were made to revive activity within the FLN, and state institutions were reestablished systematically, starting with local assemblies and moving up through regional assemblies to the national level, with the election of a parliament. The process culminated with the adoption of a constitution (1976) that laid down Algeria's political structure. This was preceded by a period of relatively open debate on the merits of the government-backed proposal, although the constitution itself was then adopted in a state-controlled referendum with no major changes. The constitution reintroduced the office of president. As the leader of the FLN, Boumédiène was the sole candidate for president, and was confirmed in office in a December referendum.
Boumediene with Cuban communist leader Fidel Castro in 1972.
At the time of his death, later that year, the political and constitutional order in Algeria was virtually entirely of FLN design. This structure remained largely unchanged until the late 1980s, when political pluralism was introduced and the FLN lost its role as dominant single party. (Many basic aspects of this system and the Boumédiène-era constitution are still in place.) However, throughout Boumédiène's era, the military remained the dominant force in the country's politics, and military influence permeated civilian institutions such as the FLN, parliament and government, undercutting the constitutionalization of the country's politics. Intense financial or political rivalries between military and political factions persisted, and was kept in check and prevented from destabilizing the government mainly by Boumédiène's overwhelming personal dominance of both the civilian and military sphere.
Algeria experienced significant economic and social development under his government. Between 1962 and 1982, the Algerian population increased from 10 to 20 million people and, massively rural before independence, 45% of the population was urbanized. Annual per capita income, which did not exceed 2,000 francs in 1962, exceeds 11,000 francs twenty years later, while the enrolment rate varies from 75 to 95% depending on the region, far from the 10% of French Algeria. However, Boumédiène's regime prioritized industrial development, which led it neglecting agriculture.[12]
Boumédiène pursued a policy of non-alignment, maintaining good relations with both the communist bloc and the capitalist nations, and promoting third-world cooperation. In theUnited Nations, he called for a unity built on equal status for western and ex-colonial nations, and brought about by asocialist-style change in political and trade relations. He sought to build a powerful third world bloc through theNon-Aligned Movement, in which he became a prominent figure. He unconditionally supported freedom fighters, justice and equality seekers. He offered logistic assistance to anti-colonial movements and other militant groups across Africa and the Arab world, including thePLO,ANC,SWAPO and other nations.
Algeria remained strongly opposed to Israel and a strong supporter of thePalestinian cause. In the early 1970s, Boumédiène famously said: "We are with Palestinians, whether they are the oppressed or the oppressor".[13] Algeria reinforced the Arab coalition with air forces against Israel in theSix-Day War in 1967, and sent an armored brigade of 150 tanks in theYom Kippur War in 1973, where Algerian fighter jets participated in attacks together with Egyptians and Iraqis. It also deposited $200 million with the Soviet Union to finance arms purchases for Egypt and Syria.[14] In response to the US support for Israel in theSix-Day War, Algeria severed diplomatic ties with USA. It participated in the1973 oil embargo after the US supported Israel in the Yom Kippur War.[15] In response to Egypt's normalization of ties with Israel, Algeria along with other Arab countries condemnedAnwar Sadat and severed ties with Egypt in 1977.[16]
Algeria bought the majority of arms from the Soviet Union.
A significant regional event was his 1975 pledge of support forWestern Saharanself-determination, admittingSahrawi refugees and thePolisario Front nationalliberation movement to Algerian territory, afterMorocco andMauritania claimed control over the territory. This ended the possibility of mending relations with Morocco, already sour after the 1963Sand War, although there had been a modest thaw in relations during his first time in power. The heightened Moroccan-Algerian rivalry and the still unsolved Western Sahara question became a defining feature of Algerian foreign policy ever since and remains so today.
In 1978, his appearances became increasingly rare. After lingering in a coma for 39 days, he died in Algiers of a rare blood disease,Waldenström's macroglobulinemia, following unsuccessful treatment in Moscow. Rumors about his being assassinated or poisoned have surfaced occasionally in Algerian politics,[citation needed] especially after two other participants of the1975 Algiers Agreement events —the Shah (d. 1980) and his Minister of CourtAsadollah Alam (d. 1978) — also died ofcancers around the same time. The death of Boumédiène left a power vacuum in Algeria which could not easily be filled; a series of military conclaves eventually agreed to sidestep the competing left- and right-wing contenders, and designate the highest-ranking military officer, ColonelChadli Bendjedid, as a compromise selection.[17]
Boumédiène's state funeral took place in Algiers on 29 December 1978. A crowd of two million mourners attended, breaking through police cordons and blocking the routes.[18] The Algerian government promised to continue his socialist revolution and declared 40 days of official mourning. Despite their differences over theCamp David Accords, Egyptian presidentAnwar Sadat paid tribute to Boumédiène and said he received the news of his death "with sorrow and sadness" and sent a delegation to attend the funeral.[1] PLO leaderYasser Arafat attended the funeral with the second in command of hisFatah guerrilla organization,Abu Iyad, who had built close relations with Boumédiène.[19] US PresidentJimmy Carter expressed deep regret and said that Boumédiène "played an outstanding role in Algeria's long struggle for independence. His devotion to duty and his contributions as an international statesman are well known. But it is for his efforts to help create and strengthen an independent, self-sufficient Algerian nation that he will be most remembered".[1] A large United States delegation attended, which includedMuhammad Ali.[19] The Soviet press praised Boumédiène as "a great friend of the Soviet Union" and that he had "made a great contribution to Algeria's social and economic progress."[1]
^Ottaway, Professor Marina; Ottaway, David; Ottaway, Marina (December 15, 1970)."Algeria: The Politics of a Socialist Revolution". University of California Press.Archived from the original on May 21, 2024. RetrievedDecember 15, 2019 – via Google Books.
^John, Peter St. (1968). "Independent Algeria from Ben Bella to Boumédienne: I. The Counter-Revolution and Its Consequences".The World Today.24 (7). Royal Institute of International Affairs:290–296.JSTOR40394141.
^Shazly, Saad (2003).The crossing of the Suez (Revised ed.). San Francisco: American Mideast Research. p. 278.ISBN0-9604562-0-1.OCLC54538606.
^Assessment, United States Congress Office of Technology (1977).Transportation of Liquefied Natural Gas. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment.Archived from the original on 2023-04-04. Retrieved2022-11-24.
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