ALGERIA: Residents mourn the death of Ahmed Ben Bella, first president, who died on Wednesday aged 96

Record ID: 187127

  • Title: ALGERIA: Residents mourn the death of Ahmed Ben Bella, first president, who died on Wednesday aged 96
  • Date: 13th April 2012
  • Summary: ALGIERS, ALGERIA (APRIL 12, 2012) (REUTERS) CARS ENTERING PALAIS DU PEUPLE VARIOUS OF PEOPLE STANDING IN QUEUE TO PAY RESPECTS
  • Embargoed: 28th April 2012 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Algeria
  • Country: Algeria
  • Topics: Obituaries,Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA4HPNKJB1F3Y013YZJG5AMLXUQ
  • Story Text: Algiers residents paid homage to Ahmed Ben Bella on Thursday (April 12), Algeria's first president, who died aged 96 in the Algerian capital on Wednesday morning after an illness.
    Ben Bella helped lead Algeria's fight for independence from France and after victory became its first president, a figure who symbolised the romance of the national liberation struggle before the harsh reality of running a country intruded.
    A funeral of sorts was held in the Palais du Peuple in Algiers where people paid their respects in front of Ben Bella's coffin.
    Emotion ran high among the crowd.
    "He is the father of Algeria, and he suffered a lot. France treated him badly for seven years, and our brothers treated him badly for fifteen years and he lived in exile," said one mourner, Mohamed.
    "It is really so sad, and I am so touched, he left us suddenly like that, he was a good president," said another, Saadia.
    The son of peasant farmers who grew up near Algeria's border with Morocco, Ben Bella was a decorated soldier in the French army during World War Two, and then joined Algeria's outlawed national independence movement, spending several years in French prisons.
    When France relinquished control of Algeria in 1962, Ben Bella became president. In orders issued in the heady days after independence, he helped shape the young country by nationalising industry and becoming a champion of Third World anti-colonialism.
    But he lacked the political weight to build the young country and fend off challenges to his power. After three years he was pushed out by Houari Boumediene, from the independence movement's military wing, who took over as head of state.
    That event established a pattern, still in place half a century later, of the military exerting strong influence over Algeria's political life.
    Ben Bella subsequently spent years in jail and exile, only finally settling back in Algeria after Abdelaziz Bouteflika, the serving president, was elected in 1999.
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