"By the mid-1960s many Africans, especially, found that they were worse off in their daily lives than they had been under colonial rule. They were beginning to look for more stability, order, and incremental progress than the postcolonial regimes were able to offer. Algeria is a good case in point. The man who emerged as the key leader of the FLN, Ahmed Ben Bella, had become radicalized when he served in the French army and later in France as a political prisoner. When the country finally got its independence, Ben Bella’s government nationalized most industries and aimed for a gradual nationalization of Algeria’s oil industry, the most important economic activity in the country. Land that had been abandoned by its European owners, most of whom fled to France after 1962, was given over to peasants’ and laborers’ self-managing collectives. Agricultural production dropped as a result of lack of expertise, equipment, and investments. The plans to build new industries were mainly unfulfilled, in part because those who were supposed to build them had enough to do fending for themselves and their families as prices rose and rapid urbanization drove rents up."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Odd Arne Westad, The Cold War: A Global History (2017)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ahmed_Ben_Bella
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Ahmed Ben Bella
Ahmed Ben Bella (Arabic: أحمد بن بلّة) (25 December 1916 – 11 April 2012) was an Algerian politician, soldier, and socialist revolutionary who served as the first President of Algeria from 1963 to 1965. He is respected for his role in the anti-colonial struggle and was seen by many Arab intellectuals as one of the last original Arab nationalists.
33 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Ahmed Ben Bella →
Related Quotes
"I want to talk about what I observe here, in the West. I am convinced that the liberal system does not have a future.…"
"We did not want a biased solidarity. We did not want a State that, like Israel, would be a favourite tool of this cru…"
"The global system presiding over everything, as we have said, invented another form of domination: globalization. "Gl…"
"I myself, speaking as a man of the south, note that something has changed in the north, which is a very important poi…"
"I paid much in my fight for justice and liberty of people. But clearly, I did what I felt to be a duty, an obligation…"
"I was always religious but I feel it more today because our epoch demands it. Keep in mind that Islam played a big ro…"
"Immediately after independence, I was associated with all those who, in the world, themselves undertook the struggle …"
"My life has been a bit special, this is true. I participated in the liberation of my country. I was one of the organi…"
"My fight to bring better conditions of life to Algerians thus plunged into great poverty, and my fight to help other …"
"I am a Muslim, but I do not wish that the response be religious. It’s not the religious act in itself that I reject, …"