1927 - 1978

Algerian officer and government minister.

Ahmed Kaid was born near Tiaret. He attended the French military school at Hussein-Dey and then the Normal School for teacher training in Algiers. Before the Algerian War of Independence (1954 - 1962), he aligned with the moderate nationalist Union Démocratique du Manifeste Algérien (UDMA) of Ferhat Abbas. He joined the Front de Libération Nationale (FLN) and rose to assistant chief of staff of the Armée de Libération Nationale (ALN). Kaid sided with the Ahmed Ben Bella - Houari Boumédienne faction after the war. He was elected to the National Assembly and served as minister of tourism (1963). He resigned in 1964, though he retained his seat on the Central Committee of the FLN. After Boumédienne's coup, he became minister of finance (1967) and then was chosen to head FLN. He resigned in 1972, critical of the party's bureaucracy and of the Agrarian Revolution. In March 1976 while in France, he publicly criticized the Boumédienne government. Given his anti-Boumédienne position, suspicion rose over his death, reportedly from a heart attack. Thousands attended his funeral in Tiaret.

Bibliography

Ottaway, David, and Ottaway, Marina. Algeria: The Politics of a Socialist Revolution. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1970.

— PHILLIP C. NAYLOR