Ben Bella's government and
Che Guevara, Cuba, 1962 , with Tunisia's
Bourguiba and Ben Bella, 1963 After Algeria's independence, Ben Bella quickly became a popular leader. In June 1962, he challenged the leadership of the premier, Benyoucef Benkhedda. This led to several disputes among his rivals in the FLN, which were quickly suppressed by Ben Bella's rapidly growing number of supporters, most notably within the armed forces, whose chief was
Houari Boumédiènne. Boumédiènne marched his supporter troops to Algiers and Ben Bella seized power on 4 August in a coup d'état. By September 1962, Bella was in control of Algeria in all but name. He was elected premier in a one-sided election on 20 September, which was recognized by the United States on 29 September. Algeria was admitted as the 109th member of the United Nations on 8 October 1962. As prime minister, Ben Bella arranged to legalize the seizures of
autogestion spontaneously undertaken by Algerian workers. In March 1963, he drew up (with his circle of advisers) a set of decrees to nationalize all previously European-owned land. In his words, the "Tripoli program remained a dead letter, and independence and revolution made no sense, as long as Algerian soil was in hands of the big landowners". He used his position to push for the approval of the constitution drawn up by the FLN, and alienated allies.
Mohammed Khider and
Ferhat Abbas resigned their political offices in 1963, dismayed by the dictatorial tendencies on display in Ben Bella's proposed constitution, which enshrined a one-party state and rejected political pluralism. Nevertheless, this action presented no problem to the Algerian people:
the constitution was approved and, on 15 September 1963, Ben Bella was
elected president of the country, unopposed and with an immense majority. During his presidency, Ben Bella was confronted with the challenge of building a postcolonial state infrastructure from the ground up; the country had no independent state traditions and its senior civil servants had always been staffed by the French. Despite a predisposition toward an
egalitarian way of governing and a lifestyle lacking in extravagance (he did not live in the governor's palace, and maintained an open-door policy with Algerian citizens), Ben Bella's actions in government did not always match his intentions. After stabilizing the country, he embarked on a series of initially popular but chaotically handled land reforms for the benefit of landless farmers, and increasingly turned to
socialist rhetoric. His policy of autogestion, or self-management, was adopted after Algerian peasants seized former French lands and was inspired by
Marxist Yugoslavian leader
Josip Broz Tito. He also worked on the development of his country, instituting reforms, undertaking campaigns for national
literacy, and
nationalizing several industries and calling for socialization of the economy and
Arabization. On many occasions, however, he improvised government policy as he went, as with his National Solidarity Fund, for which he asked the Algerian people to "voluntarily" hand over jewellery and banknotes. In international relations, he had to maintain connections with the former colonial master France, and also accepted economic aid from both the US and the
Soviet Union, as each sought to move his regime into its orbit and into opposition to the other. At the same time, Ben Bella wished Algeria to become a leader of
Third World liberation movements and of the Third World itself. He also established good relations with
Fidel Castro,
Che Guevara and Cuba. After his 1962 visit, Cuba sent a health mission to Algeria, with doctors and medical help, and later sent weapons and soldiers as aid during the
Sand War against Morocco. He was awarded the title
Hero of the Soviet Union on 30 April 1964. During his tenure, Ben Bella encountered political struggles with former leaders of the FLN, including Mohammed Khider, Ferhat Abbas,
Mohammed Boudiaf and
Hocine Aït Ahmed. Ahmed founded the Front des Forces Socialistes (
Socialist Forces Front) (FFS) to confront Ben Bella, and the others joined after being alienated by Ben Bella's dictatorial leadership. In 1963, the FFS called for an armed revolt against the regime. However, it had force only in the
Kabylia region, and by the summer of 1964 the revolt was controlled and FFS leaders were arrested. In addition to political resistance, Ben Bella faced religious opposition. The Association of the Algerian
Ulema claimed that the "state Islam" that Ben Bella wanted to achieve was not an application of true Muslim values, but rather an attempt to please the population. His government was
overthrown in June 1965 while he was planning to host an Afro-Asian international meeting, in a
bloodless coup led by his defense minister
Houari Boumédiène. He was held for eight months in an underground prison, then for the next 14 years lived under house arrest.
House arrest and later freedom After being deposed in 1965, Ben Bella was detained for eight months in prison. He was then transferred to an isolated villa in Birouta, where he was placed under house arrest for 14 years. He was, however, permitted a private life there, and in 1971 he married , an Algerian journalist; their meeting was arranged by Ben Bella's mother. They became religiously observant Muslims, and adopted two girls, Mehdia and Nouria. After Boumedienne's death in 1978, restrictions on him were eased in July 1979, and he was freed on 17 January 1980. Ben Bella briefly resided in France but was then expelled in 1983. He moved to
Lausanne, Switzerland, and launched the
Mouvement pour la Démocratie en Algérie (MDA), a moderate Islamic opposition party, in 1984. In September 1990, he returned to Algeria, and, in 1991, led the MDA in the first round of the country's abortive
parliamentary elections. He led campaigns in support of the
Palestinian cause, against
United States foreign policy, and expressed support for the
Iraqi invasion of Kuwait by
Saddam Hussein in 1990. The MDA was banned in 1997. ==Later life==