From 1862 until 1894, the land to the north of the
Gulf of Tadjoura was called
Obock and ruled by
Somali and
Afar Sultans, local authorities with whom
France signed various treaties between 1883 and 1887 to gain a foothold in the region. There were also allegations of widespread
vote rigging. The majority of those who had voted no were Somalis who were strongly in favour of joining a
united Somalia, as had been proposed by
Mahmoud Harbi, Vice President of the Government Council. In 1966, France rejected the
United Nations recommendation that it should grant French Somaliland independence. In August of the same year, an official visit to the territory by then French President, General
Charles de Gaulle, was also met with demonstrations and rioting. In response to the protests, de Gaulle ordered another referendum. with some 10,000 Somalis deported under the pretext that they did not have valid identity cards. According to the UN, there was an inordinate number of invalid ballots in Somali districts, which implied that the plebiscite had been manipulated. Although the territory was at the time inhabited by 58,240 Somali and 48,270 Afar, official figures indicated that only 14,689 Somali were allowed to register to vote versus 22,004 Afar. Somali representatives also charged that the French had simultaneously imported thousands of Afar nomads from neighbouring
Ethiopia to further tip the odds in their favor, but the French authorities denied this, suggesting that Afars already greatly outnumbered Somalis on the voting lists. coin, with image of
waterbuck. In 1967, shortly after the referendum was held, French Somaliland was renamed Territoire français des Afars et des Issas. This was both in acknowledgement of the large Afar constituency and to downplay the significance of the Somali composition (the
Issa being a Somali subclan).
Hassan Gouled Aptidon, a Somali politician who had campaigned for a yes vote in the referendum of 1958, eventually wound up as the nation's first president (1977–1999). ==See also==