Houari Boumediene
President of Algeria
Died when: 46 years 126 days (556 months)Star Sign: Virgo
Houari Boumédiène (Arabic: هواري بومدين ;ALA-LC: Hawwārī Būmadyan; born Mohammed Ben Brahim Boukherouba; 23 August 1932 – 27 December 1978) was an Algerian politician and army colonel who served as Chairman of the Revolutionary Council of Algeria from 19 June 1965 until 12 December 1976 and thereafter as the second President of Algeria until his death in 1978.
Born in Guelma, he was educated at the Islamic Institute in Constantine.He joined the National Liberation Front in 1955 and adopted the nom de guerre Houari Boumediene.
He received the rank of colonel and in 1960 became the commander of the military wing of the FLN.President Ahmed Ben Bella appointed him Minister of Defense in 1961.
He did not agree with Ben Bella's reforms, and later overthrew him in a bloodless coup in June 1965.He abolished the constitution and the parliament, and he himself was the leader of the 27-member Revolutionary Council, the new institution that governed the state.
The members of the council were mostly from the army.Initially he did not have much influence, but after a group of military officers tried to overthrow him in 1967, he consolidated his power.
The oil industry was nationalized in 1971.From the 1970s, a gradual restoration of parliamentarism and civil institutions in Algeria was initiated.
This process ended with the adoption of the new constitution in 1976.The position of president was reinstated, and Boumediene took over.
Since 1978, Boumediene appeared less and less in public.He died on December 27, 1978, after an unsuccessful treatment for a rare disease, Waldenström's macroglobulinemia.
He was succeeded as president by Chadli Bendjedid, as a compromise solution between left- and right-oriented military officers.
