WAR CRIMES AND ATROCITIES (True Crime) (31 page)

Bokassa: The Devil Emperor

1921–96

It is little wonder that Jean-Bédel Bokassa was nicknamed the ‘Ogre of Berengo’ and ‘Cannibal Emperor’. Apart from reportedly murdering members of his own army and poisoning his own grandchild, Bokassa also personally participated in the massacre of over 100 schoolchildren who protested against paying for school uniforms bearing his picture.

MILITARY
 
BACKGROUND

Jean-Bédel Bokassa was born on 22 February, 1921, in the village of Bobangi in the Moyen-Congo, in the present-day Central African Republic. His father, Mgboundoulou, was a tribal chef of the M’Baka, which was a small tribe in the forest south of Bangui. In 1927, when Bokassa was only six, his father was murdered by French colonial occupiers. His mother never got over the loss of her husband and committed suicide one week later, leaving Bokassa and his 11 siblings, to be raised by Catholic missionaries.

As soon as he was old enough, Bokassa enlisted in the army, fighting for the French in World War II in Indo-China and Algeria, and heended the war as sergeant major. He was awarded the Legion d’Honneur award, which was created by Napoleon, and also the Croix de Guerre, a military decoration of both France and Belgium. Bokassa left the French army in 1961 and joined the military ranks of the Central African Republic. Bokassa rose quickly through the ranks, becoming both colonel and chief of staff of the armed forces.

SELF
-
PROCLAIMED
 
EMPEROR

In 1966, with his country in a state of economic confusion, Bokassa decided to overthrow the autocratic David Dacko (who was his cousin), in a
coup d’état
, after a threatened nationwide strike. Bokassa immediately assumed power as the President of the Republic and head of the
Mouvement pour l’évolution Sociale de l’Afrique Noire
, which was the only political party at that time. In 1972, Bokassa declared himself president for life, and in 1974 he survived an attempt on his life and a coup attempt later that same year.

Bokassa decided to convert to Islam after a meeting with Muammar al-Qadhafi of Libya and also changed his name to Salah Eddine Ahmed Bokassa. It is thought that this was simply a ploy to try and obtain funds from Libya, and when no financial aid was forthcoming, Bokassa abandoned his newly acquired faith.

In September 1976, Bokassa dissolved the government and replaced it with the Central African Revolutionary Council. In December of that year, Bokassa declared the republic a monarchy, giving it a new name, the Central African Empire. So that he could legally crown himself Emperor Bokassa I, he quickly converted back to Catholicism, and he almost ruined his country financially with his overly-extravagant coronation, costing an alleged $20 million. For the next 14 years that he was in power, he abused his position and looted his country of any riches that it contained. Many of his subjects thought that he was totally insane, and they compared his egotistical extravagance to that of the other well-known dictator, Idi Amin. Bokassa even bragged that Pope John-Paul II had made him an apostle of the Catholic Church. Rumours of torture were rife, and it has even been suggested that Bokassa himself took part in the thrashings. In 1979, everything was to change.

THE
 
LAVISH
 
PALACE

Bokassa’s once lavish palace rose out of a palm grove, approximately 80 km (50 miles) from the capital of Bangui. Inside the palace was a garish Italian bathroom and a luxury kitchen. The bedroom, where the emperor slept, had a gold-plated bed surrounded by piles of gold and diamonds. Next to the palace was an airstrip, and one terrified neighbour reported that Bokassa used to simply pick up beggars and drop them into the Obangui River. In the grounds were once ornate cages containing lions and crocodiles, and today natives make money selling the tall grasses growing inside to inquisitive tourists. What is even more strange, are the late emperor’s 62 children, once the elite of the country, now dressed in tatters and living in derelict outhouses in the grounds of the palace.

THE
 
GRIM
 
DISCOVERY

The French remained loyal supporters of Bokassa and the French president, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, became a close friend. He often accompanied Bokassa on hunting trips in Africa and was given uranium, which was a vital ingredient for the manufacture of France’s nuclear weapons. D’Estaing was frequently given personal gifts of gold and diamonds by Bokassa, but eventually these tokens of friendship became an embarrassment for the president. The French grew increasingly critical of the friendship, and after a riot in Bangui in 1979, which led to the massacre of many civilians, French support ran out.

Bokassa was ousted from his luxurious home when it was stormed by French troops in 1979, after they arranged a coup in order to remove him from power. Bokassa fled to the Ivory Coast. When the authorities searched his palace, Villa Kolongo, a strange smell came from the freezer. When they opened it they found the bodies of some of his political opponents, and some children, not only in the walk-in freezer, but in the bottom of his swimming pool, too.

Apparently, in 1979 Bokassa had declared that all the nation’s schoolchildren should wear uniforms and, ironically, the only producer in Bangui happened to be one of his wives. The families of the children were exceptionally poor, and they couldn’t even begin to pay for the uniforms. One day they gathered in the streets and threw rocks at Bokassa’s car as it drove past. Bokassa was furious and rounded up approximately 100 children, both innocent and guilty, and had them all murdered. Bokassa killed many himself and kept many of their remains in his freezer at his palace. In the same freezer, he kept the corpses of some of his political enemies he had eliminated, and he was said to have frequently snacked on their brains and hearts.

In 1980, Bokassa,
in absentia,
was condemned to death not only for mass murder but also for cannibalism. Bokassa remained in exile in the Ivory Coast for four years and then fled to France, who gave him diplomatic immunity due to his past history with the French Foreign Legion.

In 1986, Bokassa came out of exile and returned to Bangui, where he was immediately arrested and tried for treason, murder, cannibalism and embezzlement. The trial lasted for several months and, although he was cleared of the cannibalism charges, Bokassa was again sentenced to death on 12 June, 1987. In February 1988, however, his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment and then reduced further to just 20 years.

Bokassa was released from prison in 1993, when the country returned to a democratic state. Bokassa lived the rest of his life in the ruins of his former palace in Bangui. It is thought he had at least 17 wives and concubines and as many as 62 children. Bokassa died of a heart attack on 3 November, 1996.

LEGACY OF CORRUPTION AND GREED

Even today Africa remains a continent that is tangled up with poverty and corruption. Selfish leaders, such as Jean-Bédel Bokassa, have done nothing to raise the population out of a state of deprivation. He took advantage of impoverished Africans to further his own wealth, using public funds to fund his own lavish lifestyle. On top of that he was a ruthless murderer, annihilating anyone who got in his way or didn’t kowtow to his demands. His regime was most definitely characterized by many human rights atrocities.

The Butcher Of Africa

1971–79

Idi Amin was President of Uganda from 1971 to 1979, but his term of office was witness to one of the bloodiest dictatorships in the history of Africa. Under his rule as many as 400,000 people are believed to have been killed and many more were imprisoned and tortured. Although Amin gave himself the exalted titles of ‘His Excellency President for Life’, ‘Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Idi Amin, VC, DSO, MC’, ‘Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea’ and ‘Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular’, to the rest of the world he was known as the ‘Butcher of Africa’.

HIS EARLY YEARS

Idi Amin was born, Idi Awo-Ongo Angoo, between the years of 1923 and 1925, into the Kakwa tribe in Koboko, in the north-west corner of Uganda. Shortly after Amin was born, his father, a farmer and a follower of Islam, abandoned the family, leaving his son to be raised by his mother, Assa Aatte, a self-proclaimed sorceress. He was the third eldest of eight children and received only a rudimentary education, excelling in sports and reciting the Qur’an. He converted to Islam at an early age, which is when he changed his name to Idi Amin. In 1946, he joined the King’s African Rifles as an assistant cook and laundry assistant. In 1947, as a private, he transferred to Kenya for infantry service, and he was promoted to corporal in 1948.

By 1954, Amin had made the rank of
effendi
(or warrant officer), which is the highest possible rank for a black African in the colonial British army. He allegedly got his nickname ‘Dada’ while serving in Kenya, because every time he was caught with a woman in his tent, to avoid being punished, he pleaded that she was his
dada
, which is Swahili for ‘sister’.

During his service in the army Amin trained as a boxer and took the title of Uganda’s light heavyweight boxing champion, which he held from 1951 to 1960. Amin returned to his homeland of Uganda in 1954, and by 1961 he had become one of the first two Ugandans to be appointed commissioned officers, with the rank of Lieutenant. He was described by a former officer as ‘an incredible person who certainly isn’t mad – very shrewd, very cunning and a born leader’.

FIRST SIGNS OF BRUTALITY

The first signs of the brutality that Amin became famous for appeared in 1962, when troops under his command committed the Turkana massacre. It was during an operation to try and stop tribesmen from stealing cattle from the neighbouring region of Turkana in Kenya that his true character came to the fore. Investigations carried out by British authorities in Kenya, later revealed that the victims of the massacre had been tortured, beaten to death, had their genitalia removed and, in many cases, were buried alive. However, with Uganda’s independence only a few months away, the authorities decided against court-martialling Amin for what they described as his ‘over-zealous’ methods.

Uganda gained its independence from the UK on 9 October, 1962, and the king of the Baganda tribe, Sir Edward Mutesa became the first president. Milton Obote became the country’s first prime minister and received the full support of Amin. Overlooking the rumours of torture, Obote rewards Amin for his loyalty by promoting Amin to major in 1963, and to colonel and deputy commander of the army and air force in 1964. Shortly after Uganda’s independence, Amin was sent to Israel on a paratrooper training course. During this period he became a favourite with the Israelis when he acted as a go-between for the supply of arms and ammunition to Israeli-backed rebels fighting a war in southern Sudan.

In 1965, both Obote and Amin were involved in a scandal involving the smuggling of gold, coffee and ivory out of what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo. When President Mutesa demanded a parliamentary investigation into the financial scandal, Obote decided to take defensive action. He suspended the constitution, arrested almost half of his cabinet and installed himself as president for life. He drove Mutesa from his palace in a military operation led by Amin, which forced him into exile in the UK, where he remained until his death in 1969. Obote formed a new constitution that abolished all of the country’s previous kingdoms. Amin, who was now in charge of the army and air force, starts to build a strong base by recruiting members of the Kakwa, Lugbara and other ethnic groups into his army. However, his relations with Obote began to turn sour when Amin was charged with misappropriation of millions of dollars of military funds.

AMIN SEIZES POWER

When Amin learned that Obote was about to have him arrested, he organized a military coup while Obote was out of the country attending a Commonwealth seminar in Singapore. Amin’s new military government accused Obote and his regime of corruption, economic mismanagement, failing to maintain law and order and suppressing democracy. Initially, the coup was fully supported by the Ugandans and welcomed by the British, with Amin’s promise of abolishing Obote’s secret police, freeing of all political prisoners, introducing economic reforms and also pledging to return the country to civilian rule as quickly as possible.

After taking power, Amin said, ‘I am not an ambitious man, personally, I am just a soldier with a concern for my country and people.’ Little did people realize that giving Amin a free rein would be the worst thing possible for Uganda. No sooner was he in charge than he ordered the mass executions of officers and troops who he believed to be loyal to the overthrown Obote. Forming his own ‘State Research Bureau’ he sent death squads out to eradicate military leaders and intelligentsia who Amin believed would oppose his rule. An explosion in a prison cell at the Makindye Prison in Kampala killed 32 army officers, and it is believed that as many as two-thirds of the army’s 9,000 officers were executed during Amin’s first year in power, many by beheading.

Obote, who had taken refuge in Tanzania, tried to regain control through a military invasion in September 1972, but his attempt failed. Amin immediately retaliated by bombing Tanzanian towns and getting rid of any Acholi and Lango officers in the army.

Amin becomes more and more paranoid, fearing a coup within his own government, and he started his own system of ethnic cleansing. Determined to make Uganda ‘a black man’s country’, Amin started to expel the country’s 40,000 to 80,000 Indians and Pakistanis from Uganda, giving them just 90 days to leave. They were only allowed to take what they could physically carry with them and were warned by Amin, ‘If they do not leave, they will find themselves sitting on fire’. Any possessions they left behind, along with their businesses and homes, were divided among Amin’s favourites within his army.

Aware of the true nature of Amin’s regime, the British and Israel governments started to remove their support and refused to sell him any more arms or ammunition. Amin then looked to other countries for support and turned to Libya for aid, with the promise to their leader, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, that he will turn Uganda into an Islamic state. Amin broke any relations with the UK, the USA and Israel, and gave his support to the Palestinian liberation movement. All British property in Uganda was seized and business relations between the two countries was severely restricted. Any Britains still living in Uganda were threatened with banishment. By 1973, the USA had closed its embassy in Kampala, followed by the UK closing its High Commission in Uganda in 1976.

CAMPAIGN OF PERSECUTION

Still paranoid that his regime was under threat, Amin started a campaign of persecution against rival tribes and Obote supporters. It is alleged that as many as 500,000 people died under Idi Amin’s regime, including ordinary citizens, former and serving cabinet ministers, the chief justice, judges, diplomats, academics, teachers, prominent Roman Catholic and Anglican clergy, senior bureaucrats, doctors, bankers, tribal leaders, business executives, journalists and a number of foreigners living in Uganda. In certain cases, entire villages were wiped out, and there are reports that so many bodies were thrown into the Nile that workers had to continually drag them out to stop the dam from clogging up. There are also reports that he threw corpses to crocodiles and then held ‘conversations’ with the decapitated heads of his victims, which he kept in his freezer. On top of this there are also allegations that he committed cannibalism.

As a result of all the terror and the displacement of the country’s economic backbone, Uganda starts a rapid downhill spiral. Always having to look over his shoulder for fear of being assassinated, Amin doubled his presidential guard and increased the size of his army. Meanwhile, the remainder of the world was disgusted by Amin’s policies and use of extreme tactics.

AMIN
 
AND
 
THE
 
ENTEBBE
 
RAID

Amin had strong ties with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), and in 1976 he became personally involved in hostage negotiations with Israel. It all started on 27 June, when four pro-Palestinian guerrillas hijacked an Air France flight, flying from Israel to Paris via Athens, with 250 passengers on board. Amin, on hearing about the hijack, invited the guerrillas to stop at Entebbe International Airport in the city of Entebbe, just 32 km (20 miles) outside of Kampala. The hijackers, two from the PLO and two from Germany’s Baader-Meinhof gang, diverted the plane to Entebbe, where it landed on 28 June. Here they were joined by three more colleagues, where they demanded the release of 53 PLO and Red Army Faction prisoners in return for the hostages on the plane. Idi Amin arrived at the airport to give a speech in support of the PLO and even supplied the hijackers with extra troops and weapons.

On 1 July, the hijackers agreed to release a large number of the hostages, but they decided to hold captive the remaining 100 passengers who were either Jewish or Israeli. Amin arranged for a transport plane to take the freed hostages to Europe. The crew were offered their freedom but decided to stay with the plane, while the remaining hostages were transferred into the airport building. Then the hijackers set a deadline for 11.00 p.m. for their demands to be met, and if they weren’t, they threatened to blow up the aeroplane and passengers. However, their plan was foiled when Israeli commandos stormed the the airport at midnight on 3 July. They managed to free all the hostages, with the exception of two, one of whom was killed by the Israeli forces and another, 75-year-old Dora Bloch, who had been taken to a hospital shortly before the raid, was killed under the direct orders of Amin.

During the 35-minute shoot-out, 20 Ugandan soldiers were killed along with all the hijackers. The leader of the assault force, Lieutenant Colonel Yonatan Netanyahu, was also killed by an Ugandan sentry. The Israelis managed to destroy 11 Russian-built MiG fighters, which amounted to a one-quarter of the Ugandan air force. From this time onwards, partly due to the success of the Israeli operation, the Amin regime started to crumble.

DEPOSITION AND EXILE

In the last few years of his regime, Idi Amin became increasingly erratic, bordering on madness. He became more outspoken and had his tunics specially tailored so that he was able to wear many World War II medals, including the Military Cross and Victoria Cross. He gave himself a number of different titles, including ‘King of Scotland’. When his diplomatic relations broke down with the UK, Amin decorated himself with the title of CBE or ‘Conqueror of the British Empire’.

It wasn’t until 1977 when the first indepth exposé of his murderous rule really became known. In an attempt to try and divert the world’s attention from his country’s internal problems, Amin launched a major attack on Tanzania. However, Tanzanian troops, with the help of armed Ugandan exiles, quickly put a stop to Amin’s army and he was forced to flee to Libya, taking with him four of his wives, several of his mistresses and about 20 of his children. After being asked to leave Libya, Amin found final asylum in Saudi Arabia, where he was told he would be allowed to stay as long as he remained out of any political activity. The Saudis provided him with a monthly stipend of about US$1,400, domestic servants and cars enabling to end his last few years in comfort.

Meanwhile, he left behind him a trail of destruction in Uganda. Not only had he eradicated a large majority of the population, but he also left his country with a massive annual inflation rate of 200 per cent and a national debt of US$320 million.