Mohamed Ahmed Ben Bella (Muhammad Ahmad Bin Balla) (Arabic: أحمد بن بلة), born December 25, 1918, Maghnia, Algeria) was President of Algeria's first and dubbed as the Father of the Nation.



Before Independence

The following election as city councilor Ben Bella became a founding member of an underground organization pledged to fight the colonial powers, known as the Organization Speciale. This is the direct predecessor of the Front de Libération Nationale. Arrested in 1951 and sentenced to eight years imprisonment Ben Bella escaped from Blida prison, making a trip to Tunisia and then Egypt.
At the outbreak of the Algerian War in 1954, Ben Bella, based in Cairo where he became one of the nine members of the Revolutionary Committee of Unity and Action, led Nationale de Liberation Front (FLN).


He was arrested by the French in 1956, after his plane had been controversially intercepted and taken to France, and was released in 1962. The arrest led to the resignation of Alain Savary, opposed to Guy Mollet's policy. While in prison he was elected as deputy prime minister of the provisional government of Algeria. Ben Bella's first language is French, not Arabic [citation needed]. He studied Arabic at the prison while. While in Egypt, Ben Bella met with Egyptian President Gamal Abdul Nasser. When Nasser brought Ben Bella to speak for the first time to an audience of Egypt, he went into tears because he could not speak Arabic. It has been said that he refused to teach his daughter French because she wanted to learn Arabic first and not in the same position he was. Arab militants like a lot of time, he would come to describe himself as "Nasserist" and developed close ties to Egypt even before independence was achieved. Nasser} material, emotional and political support of the Algerian movement would come to cause him trouble, because it plays a major role in the choice of France to make war on him during the 1956 Suez Crisis.


After Independence

After the independence of Algeria, Ben Bella quickly became more popular. In June 1962, he challenged the leadership of Premier Benyoucef Benkhedda, this led to disputes among several rivals in the FLN, which is quickly suppressed by Ben Bella's rapidly growing number of supporters, especially in the armed forces. In September, Bella of Algeria by controlling all the names, however, and was elected as prime minister in the selection of one hand on the 20th of September, which is recognized by the United States on 29 September. Algeria admitted as 109th member of the United Nations on October 8, 1962.


In 1963 he was elected President in uncontested elections, and also led Algeria's costly defense against the invasion of Morocco in the Sand war. After stabilizing the country, Ben Bella began a series of land reforms are popular but somewhat anarchic for the benefit of landless people, and increasingly turned to the socialist rhetoric. His policy Autogestion, or self-management, adopted after the former French peasants seized the land. In balancing the factions within the government ppAljazair]], in particular the army FLN, the former guerrillas and the state bureaucracy, the government became increasingly autocratic. Eccentric and arrogant behavior towards colleagues is said to have alienated many former supporters, and, while he promoted his own cult of personality development, in 1964 he dedicated more time for foreign affairs of the local political developments. In 1965, Ben Bella was overthrown by the army pimipinan close friend Houari Boumedienne in 1965, and placed under house arrest until 1980, when he was granted exile in Switzerland. He lived for 10 years at Lausanne, but allowed to return to his homeland in 1990.


Ahmed Ben Bella was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on 30 April, 1964