Word: mobutu
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...weeks of denial for Africa's most durable dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, finally came to an end on Thursday, when his three top generals asked for an urgent meeting. The trio was uncharacteristically blunt. They told Mobutu they could no longer protect him or the capital of Kinshasa from the approaching rebel army of Laurent Desire Kabila, and that if Mobutu valued his life he should flee. A commander had driven to the front east of Kinshasa that morning and concluded that government soldiers would not fight to save Mobutu's crumbling regime...
After a few final hours of procrastination, Mobutu, 66, ultimately accepted the harsh but just verdict of history. His grossly ruinous reign was finished. On Friday he flew without fanfare to his garish mansion at Gbadolite, 700 miles north of Kinshasa, leaving Information Minister Kin-Kiey Mulumba to announce to the press that the President had "ceased all intervention in the conduct of the affairs of state." Mobutu, who had said he would never be known as "ex-President," only "late President," still refused to give up his title. The President "reigns but does not govern," said Kin-Kiey...
...Belgium and then as a Belgian colony, Congo won its independence in 1960. But within months its first elected Prime Minister had been killed by Belgium- and U.S.-backed opponents because of his growing ties to the Soviet Union, an assassination that eventually opened the way for army general Mobutu Sese Seko to grab power. A U.S. favorite during the cold war, Mobutu presided over one of the most corrupt regimes in African history, siphoning off billions from state-owned companies and allowing most of the country to languish. In 1996 neighboring Rwanda and Uganda jointly invaded Congo to eliminate...
...Fifteen years is long enough. I was beginning to feel like Mobutu,” he jokes, referring to the former dictator of Zaire, Mobutu Sésé Seko...
...from time to time. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega Saavedra, shod in Adidas, alighted from his silver sedan to jog in Central Park. He also stopped at Cohen's Fashion Optical to buy, using a credit card, $3,000 worth of eyeglasses for himself and his family. Zarian President Mobutu Sese Seko rented two Amtrak club cars loaded with caviar and champagne to take his entourage of 50 people to Washington and back (cost: $9,800). Outside the U.N., West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl had to be snatched from the path of an onrushing New York City police car bringing...