Word: coupes
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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This system has resulted in a political stability rare for Latin America; Mexico has not faced an attempted coup in more than 60 years. But the P.R.I.'s dominance has also provided ample documentation of Lord Acton's dictum that power tends to corrupt. Says an experienced Mexican attorney: "When a Mexican official gets an important post, he steals from it instead of serving in it. It's unfortunate, but that's the way it is." From policemen to Cabinet officers, officials routinely ask for and get bribes, ranging from the $2 that will persuade a traffic cop to tear...
...have been a quiet little coup, executed with characteristic French panache from behind the scenes. The successor had been picked, paratroops were at the ready, and when the despised dictator left the country, voilà! "Operation Barracuda" would go into effect. So well, in fact, did the plot come off that when tyrannical Emperor Bokassa I was overthrown in the Central African Empire two weeks ago, it was hailed as a triumph of sanity over murderous despotism. By last week, however, the French connection in the affair was proving an embarrassment, and the all too Francophile new regime of President...
...declared Dacko disingenuously. "Why shouldn't we call upon French troops, since they are our friends?" French officials, mindful of criticism about previous interventions in Chad, Zaire and Mauritania, at first denied all, then admitted "helping out," and finally delivered a confession boasting that it was the only coup lately in which not a "single drop of blood had been shed...
...from Amin and reduce his power. Taraki responded by replacing Amin as Defense Minister last March. But he was unable to reduce Amin's influence with the top Khalq military officers; their support enabled him to repossess the defense portfolio in June and, presumably, to carry out his coup...
...empire was mercifully short-lived. While Bokassa was away in Libya last week, he was deposed in a bloodless, midnight coup by former President David Dacko, himself overthrown by Bokassa in 1966. The downfall of the "Butcher of Bangui" gave Africa something to cheer about: the continent is now rid of its three most notorious dictators. In April, Field Marshal Idi Amin Dada was driven from Uganda by rebels and invading Tanzanian troops. Last month the equally despised President-for-Life of tiny Equatorial Guinea, Francisco Macias Nguema, was booted by a military coup...