Word: strongman
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Fresh from a state visit to King Hassan II in Rabat, Ethiopia's Emperor Haile Selassie flew to Algeria aboard the imperial Boeing 720 jet. Wearing a British field marshal's uniform, the Lion of Judah was warmly greeted by Socialist Strongman Ahmed ben Bella, who happened to be wearing his own favorite costume, Castro-type fatigues. Other envoys and messages descended on Morocco from the Arab League, the President of the Sudan, the Redeemer of Ghana, the President of Tunisia, and the feuding rulers of Egypt and Iraq...
...Bella's bags were all packed when the Berber revolt in the Kabylia forced him to change plans. Then, after proclaiming with some exaggeration that the rebellion was crushed, Ben Bella confidently put the U.N. trip back on his schedule. Last week it was off again as the strongman faced a new crisis: a nasty border war with neighboring Morocco. Far from avoiding the clash, Ben Bella had reason to welcome it, since it camouflaged his internal problems...
Political enmity heated up the feud over territory. Hassan, a reform-minded but high-living monarch, preserved his ties to the West, kept on thousands of French teachers and technicians to help independent Morocco get started. This policy of moderation was abhorrent to austere, leftist Strongman Ben Bella and his vindictive brand of socialism. The Algerian regime launched a virulent propaganda war against Morocco...
...revolution must go on!" cried Strongman Ahmed ben Bella. Countered Colonel Mohand Ou el Hadj: "The time has come to give the right of speech to all revolutionaries." Thus the first revolt broke out last week against Ben Bella's year-old regime. To be sure, the motives included provincial pride, poverty and political ambition. But the root cause was Ben Bella's drive toward absolute power at the expense of his onetime, rebel comrades in Algeria's struggle for independence. Stronghold of the revolt was fabled Kabylia, a sweep of razor-spined mountains and deep gorges...
Jeweler in the Rough. Kabylia discontent was tailor-made for a disenchanted native son, Hocine Aït Ahmed, who shared a French prison with Ben Bella but is now among the several revolutionary "chiefs" who have been elbowed aside by the strongman. A dreamy Marxist, Aït Ahmed, 37, opposed Ben Bella's outlawing the Communist Party last year. Then last June, on the floor of the National Assembly, Aït Ahmed denounced the government's arrest of an independent chief and Ben Bella critic, leftist Mohammed Boudiaf. Repairing to his Kabylia village of Michelet...