Central African Republic

The Central African Republic (CAR; Sango: Ködörösêse tî Bêafrîka ; French: République centrafricaine pronounced [ʁepyblik sɑ̃tʁafʁikɛn] , or Centrafrique [sɑ̃tʁafʁik] ) is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It is bordered by Chad to the north, Sudan to the northeast, South Sudan to the east, the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the south, the Republic of the Congo to the southwest and Cameroon to the west. The CAR covers a land area of about 620,000 square kilometres (240,000 sq mi) and had an estimated population of around Four.7 million as of two thousand fourteen [update] .

Ködörösêse tî Bêafrîka (Sango)
République centrafricaine (French)

La Renaissance (French)

– in Africa (light blue & dark grey)

and largest city

Baya
Banda
Mandjia
Sara
Fulani
Mboum
M’Baka
Yakoma
others

Most of the CAR consists of Sudano-Guinean savannas, but the country also includes a Sahelo-Sudanian zone in the north and an equatorial forest zone in the south. Two thirds of the country is within the Ubangi Sea basin (which flows into the Congo), while the remaining third lies in the basin of the Chari, which flows into Lake Chad.

What is today the Central African Republic has been inhabited for millennia; however, the country’s current borders were established by France, which ruled the country as a colony beginning in the late 19th century. After gaining independence from France in 1960, the Central African Republic was ruled by a series of autocratic leaders; by the 1990s, calls for democracy led to the very first multi-party democratic elections in 1993. Ange-Félix Patassé became president, but was later eliminated by General François Bozizé in the two thousand three coup. The Central African Republic Thicket War began in two thousand four and, despite a peace treaty in two thousand seven and another in 2011, fighting broke out inbetween various factions in December 2012, leading to ethnic and religious cleansing of the Muslim minority and massive population displacement in two thousand thirteen and 2014.

Despite its significant mineral deposits and other resources, such as uranium reserves, crude oil, gold, diamonds, cobalt, lumber, and hydropower, [7] as well as significant quantities of arable land, the Central African Republic is among the ten poorest countries in the world. As of two thousand fifteen [update] , according to the Human Development Index (HDI), the country had the lowest level of human development, ranking 188th out of one hundred eighty eight countries. [Five] It is also estimated to be the unhealthiest country [8] as well as the worst country to be youthful in. [9]

Early history Edit

Approximately Ten,000 years ago, desertification coerced hunter-gatherer societies south into the Sahel regions of northern Central Africa, where some groups lodged and began farming as part of the Neolithic Revolution. [Ten] Initial farming of white yam progressed into millet and sorghum, and before three thousand BC [11] the domestication of African oil palm improved the groups’ nutrition and permitted for expansion of the local populations. [12] This Agricultural Revolution, combined with a “Fish-stew Revolution”, in which fishing began to take place, and the use of boats, permitted for the transportation of goods. Products were often moved in ceramic pots, which are the very first known examples of artistic expression from the region’s inhabitants. [Ten]

The Bouar Megaliths in the western region of the country indicate an advanced level of habitation dating back to the very late Neolithic Era (c. 3500–2700 BC). [13] [14] Ironworking arrived in the region around one thousand BC from both Bantu cultures in what is today Nigeria and from the Nile city of Meroë, the capital of the Kingdom of Kush. [15]

During the Bantu Migrations from about one thousand BC to AD 1000, Ubangian-speaking people spread eastward from Cameroon to Sudan, Bantu-speaking people lodged in the southwestern regions of the CAR, and Central Sudanic-speaking people lodged along the Ubangi Sea in what is today Central and East CAR. [ citation needed ]

Bananas arrived in the region [ when? ] and added an significant source of carbohydrates to the diet; they were also used in the production of alcoholic beverages. Production of copper, salt, dried fish, and textiles predominated the economic trade in the Central African region. [16]

16th–19th century Edit

During the 16th and 17th centuries gimp traders began to raid the region as part of the expansion of the Saharan and Nile Sea gimp routes. Their captives were enslaved and shipped to the Mediterranean coast, Europe, Arabia, the Western Hemisphere, or to the victim ports and factories along the West and North Africa or South the Ubanqui and Congo rivers. [17] [Legal] In the mid 19th century, the Bobangi people became major gimp traders and sold their captives to the Americas using the Ubangi sea to reach the coast. [Nineteen] During the 18th century Bandia-Nzakara peoples established the Bangassou Kingdom along the Ubangi Sea. [Eighteen] In 1875, the Sudanese sultan Rabih az-Zubayr governed Upper-Oubangui, which included present-day CAR.

French colonial period Edit

The European invasion of Central African territory began in the late 19th century during the Scramble for Africa. [20] Europeans, primarily the French, Germans, and Belgians, arrived in the area in 1885. France created Ubangi-Shari territory in 1894. In one thousand nine hundred eleven at the Treaty of Fez, France ceded a almost 300,000 km² portion of the Sangha and Lobaye basins to the German Empire which ceded a smaller area (in present-day Chad) to France. After World War I France again annexed the territory.

In one thousand nine hundred twenty French Equatorial Africa was established and Ubangi-Shari was administered from Brazzaville. [21] Modeled on King Leopold’s Congo Free State, concessions were doled out to private companies that endeavored to unwrap the region’s assets as quickly and cheaply as possible before depositing a percentage of their profits into the French treasury. The concessionary companies coerced local people to harvest rubber, coffee, and other commodities without pay and held their families hostage until they met their quotas. Inbetween 1890, a year after the French very first arrived, and 1940, about half of the population died as a result. [22] During the 1920s and 1930s the French introduced a policy of mandatory cotton cultivation, [21] a network of roads was built, attempts were made to combat sleeping sickness and Protestant missions were established to spread Christianity. Fresh forms of compelled labor were also introduced and a large number of Ubangians were sent to work on the Congo-Ocean Railway. Many of these compelled laborers died of exhaustion, illness, or the poor conditions which claimed inbetween 20% and 25% of the 127,000 workers. [23] In 1928, a major insurrection, the Kongo-Wara rebellion or ‘war of the hoe treat’, broke out in Western Ubangi-Shari and continued for several years. The extent of this insurrection, which was perhaps the largest anti-colonial rebellion in Africa during the interwar years, was cautiously hidden from the French public because it provided evidence of strong opposition to French colonial rule and compelled labor.

In September 1940, during the 2nd World War, pro-Gaullist French officers took control of Ubangi-Shari and General Leclerc established his headquarters for the Free French Coerces in Bangui. [24] In one thousand nine hundred forty six Barthélémy Boganda was elected with 9,000 votes to the French National Assembly, becoming the very first representative for CAR in the French government. Boganda maintained a political stance against racism and the colonial regime but step by step became disheartened with the French political system and returned to CAR to establish the Movement for the Social Evolution of Black Africa (MESAN) in 1950.

Since independence (1960–present) Edit

In the Ubangi-Shari Territorial Assembly election in 1957, MESAN captured 347,000 out of the total 356,000 votes, [25] and won every legislative seat, [26] which led to Boganda being elected president of the Grand Council of French Equatorial Africa and vice-president of the Ubangi-Shari Government Council. [27] Within a year, he proclaimed the establishment of the Central African Republic and served as the country’s very first prime minister. MESAN continued to exist, but its role was limited. [28] After Boganda’s death in a plane crash on twenty nine March 1959, his cousin, David Dacko, took control of MESAN and became the country’s very first president after the CAR had formally received independence from France. Dacko threw out his political rivals, including former Prime Minister and Mouvement d’évolution démocratique de l’Afrique centrale (MEDAC), leader Abel Goumba, whom he coerced into exile in France. With all opposition parties suppressed by November 1962, Dacko proclaimed MESAN as the official party of the state. [29]

Bokassa and the Central African Empire (1965–1979) Edit

On thirty one December 1965, Dacko was overthrown in the Saint-Sylvestre coup d’état by Colonel Jean-Bédel Bokassa, who suspended the constitution and dissolved the National Assembly. President Bokassa proclaimed himself President for Life in 1972, and named himself Emperor Bokassa I of the Central African Empire (as the country was renamed) on four December 1976. A year later, Emperor Bokassa crowned himself in a lavish and expensive ceremony that was ridiculed by much of the world. [30]

In April 1979, youthfull students protested against Bokassa’s decree that all school attendees would need to buy uniforms from a company possessed by one of his wives. The government violently suppressed the protests, killing one hundred children and teenagers. Bokassa himself may have been personally involved in some of the killings. [31] In September 1979, France overthrew Bokassa and “restored” Dacko to power (subsequently restoring the name of the country to the Central African Republic). Dacko, in turn, was again overthrown in a coup by General André Kolingba on one September 1981.

Central African Republic under Kolingba Edit

Kolingba suspended the constitution and ruled with a military junta until 1985. He introduced a fresh constitution in one thousand nine hundred eighty six which was adopted by a nationwide referendum. Membership in his fresh party, the Rassemblement Démocratique Centrafricain (RDC), was voluntary. In one thousand nine hundred eighty seven and 1988, semi-free elections to parliament were held but Kolingba’s two major political opponents, Abel Goumba and Ange-Félix Patassé were not permitted to participate. [ citation needed ]

By 1990, inspired by the fall of the Berlin Wall, a pro-democracy movement arose. Pressure from the United States, France, and from a group of locally represented countries and agencies called GIBAFOR (France, the USA, Germany, Japan, the EU, the World Bank, and the UN) ultimately led Kolingba to agree, in principle, to hold free elections in October one thousand nine hundred ninety two with help from the UN Office of Electoral Affairs. After using the excuse of alleged irregularities to suspend the results of the elections as a excuse for holding on to power, President Kolingba came under intense pressure from GIBAFOR to establish a “Conseil National Politique Provisoire de la République” (Provisional National Political Council, CNPPR) and to set up a “Mixed Electoral Commission”, which included representatives from all political parties. [ citation needed ]

When a 2nd round of elections were ultimately held in 1993, again with the help of the international community coordinated by GIBAFOR, Ange-Félix Patassé won in the 2nd round of voting with 53% of the vote while Goumba won 45.6%. Patassé’s party, the Mouvement pour la Libération du Peuple Centrafricain (MLPC) or Movement for the Liberation of the Central African People, gained a ordinary but not an absolute majority of seats in parliament, which meant Patassé’s party required coalition playmates. [ citation needed ]

Patassé Government (1993–2003) Edit

Patassé purged many of the Kolingba elements from the government and Kolingba supporters accused Patassé’s government of conducting a “witch hunt” against the Yakoma. A fresh constitution was approved on twenty eight December one thousand nine hundred ninety four but had little influence on the country’s politics. In 1996–1997, reflecting steadily decreasing public confidence in the government’s erratic behaviour, three mutinies against Patassé’s administration were accompanied by widespread destruction of property and heightened ethnic strain. During this time (1996) the Peace Corps evacuated all its volunteers to neighboring Cameroon. To date, the Peace Corps has not returned to the Central African Republic. The Bangui Agreements, signed in January 1997, provided for the deployment of an inter-African military mission, to Central African Republic and re-entry of ex-mutineers into the government on seven April 1997. The inter-African military mission was later substituted by a U.N. peacekeeping force (MINURCA). Since 1997, the country has hosted almost a dozen peacekeeping interventions, earning it the title of “world champ of peacekeeping”. [22]

In 1998, parliamentary elections resulted in Kolingba’s RDC winning twenty out of one hundred nine seats but in 1999, in spite of widespread public anger in urban centers over his corrupt rule, Patassé won a 2nd term in the presidential election.

On twenty eight May 2001, rebels stormed strategic buildings in Bangui in an unsuccessful coup attempt. The army chief of staff, Abel Abrou, and General François N’Djadder Bedaya were killed, but Patassé regained the upper forearm by bringing in at least three hundred troops of the Congolese rebel leader Jean-Pierre Bemba and Libyan soldiers. [32] [ citation needed ]

In the aftermath of the failed coup, militias loyal to Patassé sought vengeance against rebels in many neighborhoods of Bangui and incited unrest including the murder of many political opponents. Eventually, Patassé came to suspect that General François Bozizé was involved in another coup attempt against him, which led Bozizé to flee with loyal troops to Chad. In March 2003, Bozizé launched a surprise attack against Patassé, who was out of the country. Libyan troops and some 1,000 soldiers of Bemba’s Congolese rebel organization failed to stop the rebels and Bozizé’s compels succeeded in overthrowing Patassé. [ citation needed ]

Civil wars Edit

François Bozizé suspended the constitution and named a fresh cabinet which included most opposition parties. Abel Goumba was named vice-president, which gave Bozizé’s fresh government a positive picture. Bozizé established a broad-based National Transition Council to draft a fresh constitution and announced that he would step down and run for office once the fresh constitution was approved.

In two thousand four the Central African Republic Thicket War began as compels opposed to Bozizé took up arms against his government. In May two thousand five Bozizé won a presidential election that excluded Patassé and in two thousand six fighting continued inbetween the government and the rebels. In November 2006, Bozizé’s government requested French military support to help them repel rebels who had taken control of towns in the country’s northern regions. [33] However the originally public details of the agreement pertained to logistics and intelligence, the French assistance eventually included strikes by Mirage jets against rebel positions. [34]

The Syrte Agreement in February and the Birao Peace Agreement in April two thousand seven called for a cessation of hostilities, the billeting of FDPC fighters and their integration with FACA, the liberation of political prisoners, integration of FDPC into government, an amnesty for the UFDR, its recognition as a political party, and the integration of its fighters into the national army. Several groups continued to fight but other groups signed on to the agreement, or similar agreements with the government (e.g. UFR on fifteen December 2008). The only major group not to sign an agreement at the time was the CPJP, which continued its activities and signed a peace agreement with the government on twenty five August 2012.

In two thousand eleven Bozizé was reelected in an election which was widely considered fraudulent. [7]

In November 2012, Séléka, a coalition of rebel groups, took over towns in the northern and central regions of the country. These groups eventually reached a peace deal with the Bozizé’s government in January two thousand thirteen involving a power sharing government [7] but this deal broke down and the rebels seized the capital in March two thousand thirteen and Bozizé fled the country. [35] [36]

Michel Djotodia took over as president. Prime Minister Nicolas Tiangaye requested a UN peacekeeping force from the UN Security Council and on thirty one May former President Bozizé was indicted for crimes against humanity and incitement of genocide. [37] By the end of the year there were international warnings of a “genocide” [38] [39] and fighting was largely from reprisal attacks on civilians from Seleka’s predominantly Muslim fighters and Christian militias called “anti-balaka.” [40] By August 2013, there were reports of over 200,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) [41] [42]

French President François Hollande called on the UN Security Council and African Union to increase their efforts to stabilize the country. On eighteen February 2014, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on the UN Security Council to instantaneously deploy Trio,000 troops to the country, bolstering the 6,000 African Union soldiers and Two,000 French troops already in the country, to combat civilians being murdered in large numbers. The Séléka government was said to be divided. [43] and in September 2013, Djotodia officially disbanded Seleka, but many rebels refused to disarm, becoming known as ex-Seleka, and veered further out of government control. [40] It is argued that the concentrate of the initial disarmament efforts exclusively on the Seleka inadvertently passed the anti-Balaka the upper mitt, leading to the compelled displacement of Muslim civilians by anti-Balaka in Bangui and western CAR. [22]

On eleven January 2014, Michael Djotodia and Nicolas Tiengaye resigned as part of a deal negotiated at a regional summit in neighboring Chad. [44] Catherine Samba-Panza was elected as interim president by the National Transitional Council, [45] becoming the very first ever female Central African president. On twenty three July 2014, following Congolese mediation efforts, Séléka and anti-balaka representatives signed a ceasefire agreement in Brazzaville. [46] By the end of 2014, the country was de facto partitioned with the anti-Balaka in the southwest and ex-Seleka in the northeast. [22] On fourteen December 2015, Séléka rebel leaders proclaimed an independent Republic of Logone. [47]

Central African Republic

Ködörösêse tî Bêafrîka (Sango)
République centrafricaine (French)

La Renaissance (French)

– in Africa (light blue & dark grey)

and largest city

Baya
Banda
Mandjia
Sara
Fulani
Mboum
M’Baka
Yakoma
others

What is today the Central African Republic has been inhabited for millennia; however, the country’s current borders were established by France, which ruled the country as a colony kicking off in the late 19th century. After gaining independence from France in 1960, the Central African Republic was ruled by a series of autocratic leaders; by the 1990s, calls for democracy led to the very first multi-party democratic elections in 1993. Ange-Félix Patassé became president, but was later eliminated by General François Bozizé in the two thousand three coup. The Central African Republic Thicket War began in two thousand four and, despite a peace treaty in two thousand seven and another in 2011, fighting broke out inbetween various factions in December 2012, leading to ethnic and religious cleansing of the Muslim minority and massive population displacement in two thousand thirteen and 2014.

Early history Edit

Approximately Ten,000 years ago, desertification compelled hunter-gatherer societies south into the Sahel regions of northern Central Africa, where some groups lodged and began farming as part of the Neolithic Revolution. [Ten] Initial farming of white yam progressed into millet and sorghum, and before three thousand BC [11] the domestication of African oil palm improved the groups’ nutrition and permitted for expansion of the local populations. [12] This Agricultural Revolution, combined with a “Fish-stew Revolution”, in which fishing began to take place, and the use of boats, permitted for the transportation of goods. Products were often moved in ceramic pots, which are the very first known examples of artistic expression from the region’s inhabitants. [Ten]

16th–19th century Edit

During the 16th and 17th centuries sub traders began to raid the region as part of the expansion of the Saharan and Nile Sea victim routes. Their captives were enslaved and shipped to the Mediterranean coast, Europe, Arabia, the Western Hemisphere, or to the victim ports and factories along the West and North Africa or South the Ubanqui and Congo rivers. [17] [Eighteen] In the mid 19th century, the Bobangi people became major victim traders and sold their captives to the Americas using the Ubangi sea to reach the coast. [Nineteen] During the 18th century Bandia-Nzakara peoples established the Bangassou Kingdom along the Ubangi Sea. [Legal] In 1875, the Sudanese sultan Rabih az-Zubayr governed Upper-Oubangui, which included present-day CAR.

French colonial period Edit

In one thousand nine hundred twenty French Equatorial Africa was established and Ubangi-Shari was administered from Brazzaville. [21] Modeled on King Leopold’s Congo Free State, concessions were doled out to private companies that endeavored to de-robe the region’s assets as quickly and cheaply as possible before depositing a percentage of their profits into the French treasury. The concessionary companies coerced local people to harvest rubber, coffee, and other commodities without pay and held their families hostage until they met their quotas. Inbetween 1890, a year after the French very first arrived, and 1940, about half of the population died as a result. [22] During the 1920s and 1930s the French introduced a policy of mandatory cotton cultivation, [21] a network of roads was built, attempts were made to combat sleeping sickness and Protestant missions were established to spread Christianity. Fresh forms of coerced labor were also introduced and a large number of Ubangians were sent to work on the Congo-Ocean Railway. Many of these compelled laborers died of exhaustion, illness, or the poor conditions which claimed inbetween 20% and 25% of the 127,000 workers. [23] In 1928, a major insurrection, the Kongo-Wara rebellion or ‘war of the hoe treat’, broke out in Western Ubangi-Shari and continued for several years. The extent of this insurrection, which was perhaps the largest anti-colonial rebellion in Africa during the interwar years, was cautiously hidden from the French public because it provided evidence of strong opposition to French colonial rule and coerced labor.

In September 1940, during the 2nd World War, pro-Gaullist French officers took control of Ubangi-Shari and General Leclerc established his headquarters for the Free French Compels in Bangui. [24] In one thousand nine hundred forty six Barthélémy Boganda was elected with 9,000 votes to the French National Assembly, becoming the very first representative for CAR in the French government. Boganda maintained a political stance against racism and the colonial regime but little by little became disheartened with the French political system and returned to CAR to establish the Movement for the Social Evolution of Black Africa (MESAN) in 1950.

Since independence (1960–present) Edit

In the Ubangi-Shari Territorial Assembly election in 1957, MESAN captured 347,000 out of the total 356,000 votes, [25] and won every legislative seat, [26] which led to Boganda being elected president of the Grand Council of French Equatorial Africa and vice-president of the Ubangi-Shari Government Council. [27] Within a year, he announced the establishment of the Central African Republic and served as the country’s very first prime minister. MESAN continued to exist, but its role was limited. [28] After Boganda’s death in a plane crash on twenty nine March 1959, his cousin, David Dacko, took control of MESAN and became the country’s very first president after the CAR had formally received independence from France. Dacko threw out his political rivals, including former Prime Minister and Mouvement d’évolution démocratique de l’Afrique centrale (MEDAC), leader Abel Goumba, whom he coerced into exile in France. With all opposition parties suppressed by November 1962, Dacko proclaimed MESAN as the official party of the state. [29]

Bokassa and the Central African Empire (1965–1979) Edit

Central African Republic under Kolingba Edit

When a 2nd round of elections were eventually held in 1993, again with the help of the international community coordinated by GIBAFOR, Ange-Félix Patassé won in the 2nd round of voting with 53% of the vote while Goumba won 45.6%. Patassé’s party, the Mouvement pour la Libération du Peuple Centrafricain (MLPC) or Movement for the Liberation of the Central African People, gained a ordinary but not an absolute majority of seats in parliament, which meant Patassé’s party required coalition playmates. [ citation needed ]

Patassé Government (1993–2003) Edit

On twenty eight May 2001, rebels stormed strategic buildings in Bangui in an unsuccessful coup attempt. The army chief of staff, Abel Abrou, and General François N’Djadder Bedaya were killed, but Patassé regained the upper mitt by bringing in at least three hundred troops of the Congolese rebel leader Jean-Pierre Bemba and Libyan soldiers. [32] [ citation needed ]

In the aftermath of the failed coup, militias loyal to Patassé sought vengeance against rebels in many neighborhoods of Bangui and incited unrest including the murder of many political opponents. Eventually, Patassé came to suspect that General François Bozizé was involved in another coup attempt against him, which led Bozizé to flee with loyal troops to Chad. In March 2003, Bozizé launched a surprise attack against Patassé, who was out of the country. Libyan troops and some 1,000 soldiers of Bemba’s Congolese rebel organization failed to stop the rebels and Bozizé’s coerces succeeded in overthrowing Patassé. [ citation needed ]

Civil wars Edit

François Bozizé suspended the constitution and named a fresh cabinet which included most opposition parties. Abel Goumba was named vice-president, which gave Bozizé’s fresh government a positive photo. Bozizé established a broad-based National Transition Council to draft a fresh constitution and announced that he would step down and run for office once the fresh constitution was approved.

In two thousand four the Central African Republic Pubic hair War began as coerces opposed to Bozizé took up arms against his government. In May two thousand five Bozizé won a presidential election that excluded Patassé and in two thousand six fighting continued inbetween the government and the rebels. In November 2006, Bozizé’s government requested French military support to help them repel rebels who had taken control of towns in the country’s northern regions. [33] Tho’ the originally public details of the agreement pertained to logistics and intelligence, the French assistance eventually included strikes by Mirage jets against rebel positions. [34]

In two thousand eleven Bozizé was reelected in an election which was widely considered fraudulent. [7]

French President François Hollande called on the UN Security Council and African Union to increase their efforts to stabilize the country. On eighteen February 2014, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on the UN Security Council to instantaneously deploy Three,000 troops to the country, bolstering the 6,000 African Union soldiers and Two,000 French troops already in the country, to combat civilians being murdered in large numbers. The Séléka government was said to be divided. [43] and in September 2013, Djotodia officially disbanded Seleka, but many rebels refused to disarm, becoming known as ex-Seleka, and veered further out of government control. [40] It is argued that the concentrate of the initial disarmament efforts exclusively on the Seleka inadvertently transferred the anti-Balaka the upper forearm, leading to the coerced displacement of Muslim civilians by anti-Balaka in Bangui and western CAR. [22]

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Central African Republic

Central African Republic

Contents

Early history Edit

16th–19th century Edit

French colonial period Edit

Since independence (1960–present) Edit

Bokassa and the Central African Empire (1965–1979) Edit

Central African Republic under Kolingba Edit

Patassé Government (1993–2003) Edit

Civil wars Edit

Central African Republic

Contents

Early history Edit

16th–19th century Edit

French colonial period Edit

Since independence (1960–present) Edit

Bokassa and the Central African Empire (1965–1979) Edit

Central African Republic under Kolingba Edit

Patassé Government (1993–2003) Edit

Civil wars Edit

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