1926 -
Algerian revolutionary, opposition party, and Kabyle (Berber) leader.
Although his father served as a colonial magistrate (caid, or qaʾid), Hocine Ait Ahmed joined Messali Hadj's nationalist Parti du Peuple Algérien (PPA) and its successor, the Mouvement pour le Triomphe des Libertés Démocratiques (MTLD). He headed the paramilitary Organisation Spéciale (OS) until accused of "Berberist" tendencies. He left Algeria in 1951 but became one of the cofounders of the revolutionary Front de Libération Nationale (FLN) in 1954. During the War of Independence he led the FLN delegation to the Bandung Conference in April 1955. French colonial authorities skyjacked an Air Maroc flight carrying Ait Ahmed in October 1956 along with other chief FLN leaders, including Ahmed Ben Bella, Mohamed Boudiaf, and Mohamed Khider. Ait Ahmed spent the rest of the war in prison. After his release, he helped to draft the Tripoli Programme of June 1962.
Opposed to Ben Bella and his ally, Colonel Houari Boumédienne, Ait Ahmed organized the Front des Forces Socialistes (FFS) in 1963 and led the Kabyles in revolt against the government. He was captured but escaped from prison in 1966 and fled to exile in France and then Switzerland. He denounced the National Charter of 1976 as an undemocratic document. Ait Ahmed blamed Algerian special services for the murder in April 1987 of André-Ali Mecili, an activist of Kabyle descent. After the destabilizing October 1988 riots, he returned to Algeria in December 1989. The FFS was legalized as an opposition party. He actively campaigned in the national parliamentary elections of December 1991 to January 1992 and organized a huge rally in Algiers in support of democracy. Although he had reservations regarding the Islamist Front Islamique du Salut (FIS), the expected winner of the elections, Ait Ahmed condemned the forced resignation of President Chadli Bendjedid and the cancellation of the elections by Haut Comité d'Etat in January 1992. In July 2002 he rebuked General Khaled Nezzar, the chief architect of the overthrow of the government, calling the coup d'état "a catastrophe." Ait Ahmed supported the Sant Egidio Platform (national contract) of January 1995. The FFS has participated in national (1997) and local (2002) elections. Ait Ahmed was one of six presidential candidates who withdrew in protest over irregularities before the April 1999 presidential election. He reproached the government of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika after the killing of a Kabyle youth in police detention in April 2001 incited violent protest and severe suppression. Ait Ahmed is a fervent advocate of democracy, political pluralism, and human (especially Berber) rights. He authored La Guerre et l'après guerre (1964; The war and the aftermath) and Mémoires d'un combattant (1983; Memories of a combatant).
Bibliography
Agence France Presse. "Algerian Opposition Leader Accuses General of Election 'Coup.'" 4 July 2002.
Naylor, Phillip C. The Historical Dictionary of Algeria, 3d edition. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2005.
— PHILLIP C. NAYLOR
