Ahmed (Ali) Mahsas
Native name
أحمد (علي) محساس
BornAli Mahsas
17 November 1923
Boudouaou, Boumerdès Province, Algeria
Died24 February 2013
Djasr Kasentina, Algiers Province, Algeria
Pen nameSi Ali Mahsas
OccupationPolitician, academic
LanguageArabic, Berber, French
NationalityAlgerian people
Alma mater
Literary movement
Notable works

Ahmed Mahsas (November 17, 1923 – February 24, 2013) was an Algerian militant in the nationalist movement against French Algeria.[1][2]

Early life

Ahmed Mahsas was born on 17 November 1923 in Boudouaou, Kabylia (now Boumerdès). He grew up in the wooded and mountainous region of the Col des Beni Aïcha.[3][4]

His family is from the village of Mahsas near Tidjelabine and the Zawiyet Sidi Boumerdassi. His parents settled in Boudouaou at the start of the 20th century.[5][6]

Algerian nationalism

Mahsas was an early independence activist, and joined the Algerian People's Party (PPA) in Boudouaou in 1940 when he was 16.[7][8]

He was arrested by French authorities for the first time in 1941 with Mohamed Belouizdad for his actions within the PPA in the Belcourt (Belouizdad) district of Algiers.[9][1]

He became a militant in Algiers within organizations related to the PPA, such as the Central Youth Committee of Grand Paris (French: Comité central jeune du grand Paris) (CCJGA) and the Youth Committee of Belcourt (French: Comité de la jeunesse de Belcourt) (CJB).[10][11]

Mahsas was imprisoned several times for his militant activities and had important responsibilities within the PPA where he was a member of the Central Committee and the Organizing Committee. He also participated in organizational work at the territorial and national levels.[3]

Mahsas was drafted during World War II to serve under France between 1944 and 1945, but he refused to join the colonial French army. As a result, he was arrested in 1949 and sentenced by the court.

He was appointed as the head of wilaya (administration district) Constantine and member of the organizing committee of the PPA.[12][13]

Special Organisation

Book of Ahmed Mahsas (1974)

In 1947, Mahsas was one of the founders of the Special Organization (OS) of which he was a national staff member with Belouizdad.[10] When OS was dismantled by the French police in 1950, he was second-in-command.[14][15]

Mahsas was arrested in 1950 when OS was dismantled, and was held in a prison in Blida along with other nationalist activists of the Movement for the Triumph of Democratic Liberties (MTLD).[16] From 19 March to 27 May 1950, most of the networks of OS in Constantinois, Algérois, and Orania were dismantled with more than 500 arrests, or half the number of militants.[14]

Five out of seven members of the staff were imprisoned: Ahmed Ben Bella, Djillali Belhadj, Djillali Reguimi, M'hamed Yousfi, Ahmed Mahsas, Driss Driss, while others, including Mohamed Maroc, Lakhdar Ben Tobbal, Mohamed Boudiaf, and Mourad Didouche, escaped.[17]

Mahsas escaped with Ahmed Ben Bella from an Algiers prison in 1952.[18][19]

He then left Algeria for France, where he joined members of the Revolutionary Committee of Unity and Action to prepare for the Algerian Revolution.[20]

During the crisis that arose in the MTLD after the April 1953 congress, Mahsas refused to choose between Messali Hadj and the centralists.[2]

Algerian Revolution

As soon as the Algerian Revolution began after the publication of the Declaration of 1 November 1954, Mahsas joined the National Liberation Front (FLN).[21][22]

When the FLN Federation of France was created in December 1954, Mahsas was part of the first circle which worked to root the militancy of the FLN, which competed with the Messalists to gain the support of Algerian emigrants.[23]

Mahsas joined the city of Cairo in 1955 in order to join the FLN external delegation and become a member of the National Council of the Algerian Revolution in 1956 and 1957.[24][25]

Mahsas, like Ben Bella, denounced the results of the Soummam conference, and in December 1956 and early 1957 tried to bring dissident elements from the border regions with Tunisia together.[24][26][27]

After Ben Bella was arrested in 1956, Mohamed Boudiaf, Hocine Aït Ahmed, Mohamed Khider, and Mostefa Lacheraf started a power dispute between supporters of Ben Bella and those of Abane Ramdane.[28][29]

After a disagreement started between him and the other revolutionary leaders, Mahsas was ousted from the FLN base in Tripoli. He was then sentenced to death by Amar Ouamrane and imprisoned in a Tunisian prison. He escaped with some help, left for Germany, and remained there until Algerian independence in 1962.[30][31]

After Mahsas had taken refuge in Germany, Ouamrane, who was in Tripoli, asked M'hamed Issiakhem to kill Mahsas in Bonn.[32][33] Bachir El Kadi gave 1,000 dollars to Issiakhem to go to Bonn. Issiakhem found Mahsas and informed him about Ouamrane's plan before giving him 500 dollars and a recommendation to leave Germany.[34][35]

Career

After Algeria became independent in 1962, Mahsas held several positions, including director of the home ownership and rural exploitation fund (French: Caisse d’accession à la propriété et à l’exploitation rurale), and director of the National Office for Agrarian Reform (French: Office national de la réforme agraire).[36][37]

He was appointed on 18 September 1963 as Minister of Agriculture in Ben Bella's government, a post that he kept during the government reshuffle of 2 December 1964.[38][39]

He was elected to the People's National Assembly as deputy for the Algiers Province on 20 September 1964, and was then elected member of the political bureau and of the central committee of the FLN.[40][3][1]

The day after Houari Boumédiène organized the 1965 Algerian coup d'état on 19 June against the power of Ben Bella, Mahsas rallied the Revolutionary Council (French: Conseil de la révolution) and was thus maintained in his post of Minister of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform in the new government formed on 10 July.[41][1][42]

Mahsas then was appointed member of the Revolutionary Council resulting from this coup, which led to Ben Bella's incarceration for 14 years.[2][43] But after a little more than a year of service under tutelage of the Revolutionary Council, a conflict arose between Mahsas and Boumédiène, which prompted the former to submit his resignation to be replaced on 24 September 1966 by the lawyer Ali Yahia Abdennour.[44]

Doctoral studies

After settling in France in September 1966, Mahsas resumed his university studies in Paris.[5]

In 1974 Mahsas defended a thesis to obtain a graduation diploma at the École pratique des hautes études (EPHE), the theme of which was Notations on the establishment of agricultural self-management in Algeria (1962-1964) (French: Notations sur la mise en place de l'autogestion agricole en Algérie (1962-1964)).[45]

He obtained a degree in sociology, and in 1978 defended his thesis "The revolutionary movement in Algeria from World War I to 1954" (French: Le mouvement révolutionnaire en Algérie de la Première Guerre mondiale à 1954) under the direction of Jacques Berque.[46][10]

He published his thesis the same year at L'Harmattan, where he explained the theory of the Algerian Revolution and its achievements on the historical level, and describeed the context surrounding creation of the PPA and the OS.[47]

Political opposition

In his Parisian exile with Bachir Boumaza (1927-2009), Mahsas tried to collaborate in an action against Boumédiène power by joining the Clandestine Organization of the Algerian Revolution (French: Organisation clandestine de la révolution algérienne) (OCRA).[48][49][50] the organization was created in April 1966 headed by Mohammed Lebjaoui,[51] a former leader of the Federation of France (French: Fédération de France du FLN).[52][53][54]

Mahsas quickly withdrew from OCRA because he saw leaders like Aït Ahmed and Boudiaf who had distanced themselves from it.[55][56][57]

As a doctor in sociology, Mahsas returned in 1978 to the political struggle a year before Boumédiène's death, and he with Ahmed and Tahar Zbiri, created an opposition structure in Paris called the National Rally for Democracy and Revolution (French: Rassemblement national pour la démocratie et la révolution), which dissolved with the end of the old regime.[58][59][60]

Return to Algeria

Mahsas returned to Algiers in 1981, a day after Boumédiène's death.[61] He was then appointed by the government of the new president, Chadli Bendjedid, as Advisor to the National Publishing and Distribution Company (French: Société nationale d’édition et de diffusion) (SNED).[13]

With the establishment of a democratic multiparty system in Algeria the day after the 1988 October Riots, Mahsas created a political party called the Union of Democratic Forces (French: Union des forces démocratiques) (UFD).[2] The UFD was of Algerian nationalism obedience with an Arab-Muslim orientation according to the precepts of the Declaration of 1 November 1954.[15][62] The UFD was deactivated per the law on political parties adopted by the National Transitional Council (French: Conseil national de transition) (CNT) in 1996.[63]

Mahsas tried to reactivate the UFD in 2006, but failed.[64]

Death

Mahsas died on 24 February 2013 in the Aïn Naâdja military hospital located in Djasr Kasentina at age 90.[65][66][67] He was to have been honored at the Moufdi Zakaria Palace of Culture as a former nationalist activist and previous minister of agriculture, but was evacuated and transferred to the military hospital in Algiers after suffering from a health problem on the sidelines of the ceremony of honor. He was kept in the hospital's intensive care unit, and scans and tests revealed that he was bleeding internally.[68][69] He was buried the next day in the El Alia Cemetery.[70][71][72]

Books

Mahsas had written several books during a long political and academic career, including:[73]

  • Réflexions sur le mouvement d'unité arabe et ses perspectives (1974)[74]
  • L'autogestion en Algérie: données politiques de ses premières étapes et de son application (1975)[75]
  • L'Algérie: la démocratie et la révolution (1978)[74]
  • Le mouvement révolutionnaire en Algérie, de la Première Guerre mondiale à 1954: Essai sur la formation du mouvement national (1979, 1990)[76][77][78]
  • Algérie, réalités coloniales et résistances: origines culturelles et socio-économiques de la révolution (2006)[79]

See also

Bibliography

  • Ahmed Mahsas (1975). L'autogestion en Algérie: données politiques de ses premières étapes et de son application. Paris: Éditions anthropos. p. 297 pages.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Rédaction, La (25 February 2013). "Ahmed Mahsas n'est plus".
  2. 1 2 3 4 "Ahmed Mahsas s'est éteint ce dimanche". Le Matin d'Algérie.
  3. 1 2 3 "Ahmed Mahsas n'est plus: Toute l'actualité sur liberte-algerie.com". www.liberte-algerie.com/. Archived from the original on 26 October 2020. Retrieved 7 March 2021.
  4. ↑ ""C'est moi qui ai recruté Abane Ramdane"". Djazairess.
  5. 1 2 "Le révolutionnaire au long cours s'en est allé | El Watan". www.elwatan.com.
  6. ↑ "Décès de Ali Mahsas, il faisait partie du premier noyau qui a déclenché la révolution – Algerie360". www.algerie360.com. 24 February 2013.
  7. ↑ "Ahmed Mahsas s'est éteint dimanche à 90 ans". Djazairess.
  8. ↑ "Le moudjahid Ahmed Mahsas s'est éteint". الشروق أونلاين. 24 February 2013.
  9. ↑ "Le Moudjahid Ahmed Mahsas tire sa révérence". Djazairess.
  10. 1 2 3 "Décès de Ali Mahsas, il faisait partie du premier noyau qui a déclenché la révolution - Algerie360". www.algerie360.com. 24 February 2013.
  11. ↑ ""Qui se souvient des 3024 disparus de La Casbah ?"". Djazairess.
  12. ↑ "Mahsas sort de sa réserve". Djazairess.
  13. 1 2 "Le Moudjahid Ahmed Mahsas tire sa révérence". Djazairess.
  14. 1 2 "L'OS un épisode méconnu de la lutte pour l'indépendance: Toute l'actualité sur liberte-algerie.com". www.liberte-algerie.com/.
  15. 1 2 "Réflexions d'Ahmed Mahsas à propos du mouvement révolutionnaire arabe (1974) - L'Algérie dans la Gloire de l'Arabité civilisationnelle". algeriearabite.canalblog.com. 1 June 2020.
  16. ↑ "AHMED MAHSAS : "C'est le peuple algérien qui a libéré et défendu l'Algérie" – Algerie360". www.algerie360.com. 17 November 2012.
  17. ↑ "Decidim - Login". sahim.org.
  18. ↑ Cérémonie de recueillement au cimetière d'El Alia à la mémoire de Ahmed Ben Bella
  19. ↑ "Ahmed Ben Bella, un militant nationaliste infatigable et un dirigeant de la Révolution algérienne". الشروق أونلاين. 11 April 2012.
  20. ↑ "Ce que les algériens retiennent de Ben Bella | El Watan". www.elwatan.com.
  21. ↑ "L'écriture, l'arme secrète de Mahsas". Djazairess.
  22. ↑ "Ce qu'ils ont dit sur le 1er novembre 1954". Retrieved 17 March 2023.
  23. ↑ ""Le 1er Novembre 1954 marque une double rupture": Toute l'actualité sur liberte-algerie.com". www.liberte-algerie.com/.
  24. 1 2 "Le naufrage de la plateforme de la Soummam | El Watan". www.elwatan.com.
  25. ↑ 20 août – 28 août 1957 : Le CNRA occulte Le Caire | REPORTERS ALGERIE
  26. ↑ "Le congès de la Soummam : ses enjeux et ses conséquences Par Afif Haouli – Algérie solidaire". Retrieved 17 March 2023.
  27. ↑ "22 octobre 1956 : détournement de l'avion du FLN". L'Opinion. 9 July 2015.
  28. ↑ "Ahmed Ben Bella, un militant nationaliste infatigable et un dirigeant de la Révolution algérienne". الشروق أونلاين. 11 April 2012.
  29. ↑ "Du gouvernement de l'Etat par le parti au gouvernement du parti par l'Etat (4e partie)". Djazairess.
  30. ↑ "20 août – 28 août 1957 : Le CNRA occulte le Caire – Algerie360". www.algerie360.com. 28 August 2018.
  31. ↑ "Le Congrès de la Soummam : ses enjeux et ses conséquences tragiques – الهوقار | Hoggar". hoggar.org. Retrieved 17 March 2023.
  32. ↑ "Mohamed Issiakhem. Militant nationaliste, auteur de Mémoires d'un insoumis : "Je livrais des uniformes et des armes à l'ALN" | El Watan". www.elwatan.com.
  33. ↑ ""Je livrais des uniformes et des armes à l'ALN"". Djazairess.
  34. ↑ "L'Expression: Culture - Mohamed Issiakhem : "Ouamrane m'a ordonné d'abattre Mahsas"". L'Expression.
  35. ↑ "Mohamed Issiakhem: "Ouamrane m'a ordonné d'abattre Mahsas"". Djazairess.
  36. ↑ Ottaway, Professor Marina; Ottaway, David; Ottaway, Marina (1970). "Algeria: The Politics of a Socialist Revolution".
  37. ↑ Chabane, Mohamed (2013). Heurs et malheurs du secteur agricole en Algérie: 1962–2012. ISBN 9782336290515.
  38. ↑ Abdi, Nourredine (7 March 1976). "Ahmed Mahsas, L'Autogestion en Algérie. Données politiques de ses premières étapes et de son application, Editions Anthropos, Paris 1975". Autogestions. 35 (1): 203–204 – via www.persee.fr.
  39. ↑ "Ahmed Mahsas". 22 November 2018.
  40. ↑ "APN".
  41. ↑ Official Gazette of Algeria (in French) Retrieved 17 March 2023
  42. ↑ "Le FLN historique : de la synthèse de la Soummam au schisme de Tripoli (3e partie)". Djazairess.
  43. ↑ Quandt, William B. (21 April 1968). "The Algerian Political Elite: 1954-1967" – via Google Books.
  44. ↑ "Le Conseil de la révolution prend des sanctions contre MM. Boumaza et Mahsas". Le Monde (in French). 31 October 1966.
  45. ↑ "Inventaire de thèses et mémoires africanistes de langue française soutenus: Soutenances ..." CARDAN-Cenre d'études africaines. 21 April 1969 – via Google Books.
  46. ↑ Mahsas, Ahmed (21 April 1979). Le mouvement national en Algérie: formation du courant révolutionnaire de la première guerre mondiale à 1954 (Thesis). École des hautes études en sciences sociales – via Library Catalog - www.sudoc.abes.fr.
  47. ↑ "Il faisait partie du premier noyau qui a déclenché la Révolution". Djazairess.
  48. ↑ "Le ralliement d'un leader syndicaliste renforce l'opposition au gouvernement Boumediene Un regroupement qui s'annonce laborieux". Le Monde.fr. 21 October 1966 – via Le Monde.
  49. ↑ étrangères, Ministère des Affaires (21 April 2006). Documents Diplomatiques Francais: 1966 Tome II (1 Er Juin-31 Decembre). Peter Lang. ISBN 9789052013213 – via Google Books.
  50. ↑ "The Contemporary Review". A. Strahan. 21 April 1966 – via Google Books.
  51. ↑ "LEBJAOUI Mohamed [Dictionnaire Algérie] - Maitron". maitron.fr. 6 April 2014.
  52. ↑ Ottaway, Professor Marina; Ottaway, David; Ottaway, Marina (21 April 1970). "Algeria: The Politics of a Socialist Revolution". University of California Press – via Google Books.
  53. ↑ Adamson, Kay (1 January 1998). Algeria: A Study in Competing Ideologies. A&C Black. ISBN 9780304700127 – via Google Books.
  54. ↑ "L'Année politique africaine". Société africaine d'édition. 21 April 1966 – via Google Books.
  55. ↑ Harbi, Mohammed (21 April 1998). 1954, la guerre commence en Algérie. Editions Complexe. ISBN 9782870277201 – via Google Books.
  56. ↑ "Maghreb Digest". 21 April 1966 – via Google Books.
  57. ↑ "Europe, France outre-mer". Société nouvelle des Editions France Outremer S.A. 21 April 1966 – via Google Books.
  58. ↑ "The Maghreb digest". 21 April 1967 – via Google Books.
  59. ↑ "Jeune Afrique". Les Editions J.A. 21 April 1966 – via Google Books.
  60. ↑ "The Annual Register of World Events: A Review of the Year". 21 April 1967 – via Google Books.
  61. ↑ "Ahmed Mahsas n'est plus". 25 February 2013.
  62. ↑ "L'Union des Forces Démocratiques (اتحاد القوى الديمقراطية) d'Ahmed Mahsas - L'Algérie dans la Gloire de l'Arabité civilisationnelle". algeriearabite.canalblog.com. 19 May 2018.
  63. ↑ "Il sera inhumé aujourd'hui au cimetière d'El-Alia, Ahmed Mahsas n'est plus - Algerie360". www.algerie360.com. 25 February 2013.
  64. ↑ "L'Expression: Nationale - Mahsas offre une tribune à Kebir". L'Expression.
  65. ↑ "Ahmed Mahsas inhumé au cimetière d'El-Alia à Alger". Djazairess.
  66. ↑ "المجاهد أحمد محساس في ذمة الله". جزايرس.
  67. ↑ "أحمد مهساس‮ ‬يوارى التراب بمقبرة العالية‮ ‬". النهار أونلاين. 25 February 2013.
  68. ↑ "مهساس: "إذا حدث لي شيء.. راهي أمك وأختك في رقبتك يا بن يوسف"". الشروق أونلاين. 22 February 2013.
  69. ↑ "المجاهد أحمد مهساس في غيبوبة". جزايرس.
  70. ↑ "Ahmed Mahsas inhumé hier à El-Alia: Toute l'actualité sur liberte-algerie.com". www.liberte-algerie.com/.
  71. ↑ Rédaction, La (25 February 2013). "Ahmed Mahsas inhumé au cimetière d'El-Alia à Alger". www.algerie1.com.
  72. ↑ "أحمد محساس النواة الأولى لجبهة التحرير الوطني". النهار أونلاين. 24 February 2013.
  73. ↑ Mahsas, Ahmed (1923– ) Auteur du texte (7 March 1975). L'Autogestion en Algérie : données politiques de ses premières étapes et de son application / Ahmed Mahsas – via gallica.bnf.fr.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  74. 1 2 Déjeux, Jean (January 1984). Dictionnaire des auteurs maghrébins de langue française. ISBN 9782865370856.
  75. ↑ Mahsas, Ahmed (1975). "L'Autogestion en Algérie: Données politiques de ses premières étapes et de son application".
  76. ↑ Mahsas, Ahmed (January 1979). Le mouvement révolutionnaire en Algérie, de la Première Guerre mondiale à 1954: Essai sur la formation du mouvement national. ISBN 9782307108948.
  77. ↑ "Le Mouvement Révolutionnaire en Algérie. Essai sur La Formation du Mouvement national de Ahmed Mahsas – Algeria and the Arab Nation on the front lines of the Cultural Renaissance and the Africa-Asia-South America Tricontinental". algeriearabite.canalblog.com. 17 October 2019.
  78. ↑ Mahsas, Ahmed (1990). "Le Mouvement révolutionnaire en Algérie, de la 1ère guerre mondiale à 1954. Essai sur la formation du mouvement national".
  79. ↑ Mahsas, Ahmed (2006). Algérie, réalités coloniales et résistances: Origines culturelles et socio-économiques de la révolution. ISBN 9789961483831.
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