Congo Republic: Movement to the Right

CONGO REPUBLIC

The first messages from Brazzaville, capital of the Congo Republic, reported that paratroops led by a Maoist officer had overthrown left-wing President Alphonse Massamba-Debat, forcing him to flee to his native village. Hardly 20 hours later, the 47-year-old President was once more in office, called back by the army that had ousted him. Moreover, what originally looked like a left-wing grab for power turned out to be a putsch from the right.

The confusion was understandable. When Massamba-Debat came to power five years ago, he quickly set the former French colony on a course toward what he called "scientific socialism." His National Revolutionary Movement became the sole political party, and the members of its armed youth group, the Jeunesse, ruled the streets of Brazzaville. To guard the palace and to train militiamen, Massamba-Debat imported Cuban advisers. A good deal of economic aid and advice came from China and the Soviet Union, and the President paid a visit to Peking.

Left-wing Threat. Earlier this year, however, Massamba-Debat began to have second thoughts. The extreme left of his movement was threatening his own position. An economic squeeze forced him to look for foreign aid from the West. So, shifting to the right, the President sacked leading left-wing officials, partially disarmed the Jeunesse, and started sending home the Cubans. The government built sentry boxes in front of foreign embassies, ostensibly to keep the Congolese from contacting foreigners but in reality to isolate the large Chinese Embassy staff. Massamba-Debat also re-established relations with Great Britain, which were broken over the Rhodesia crisis 21 years ago. He even hinted that a U.S. mission, pulled out in 1965 because of ill-treatment of American diplomats, might again be welcome. Last month he climaxed his drive by dissolving the leftist-dominated National Assembly and by having several leaders of Jeunesse and his own party arrested.

The coup was triggered by the arrest of French-trained Captain Marien Ngouabi, a popular paratroop leader whom the President suspected of being in league with the extreme left. Freed quickly by his own troops, Ngouabi—ambitious and opportunist perhaps, but not a Maoist—threw the President out. Then he discovered that he and his fellow officers, divided by tribal jealousies, could not agree on who should take over. The coup makers, hailing from tribes in the north and the west, quickly came to realize that the only man with any control over the powerful Bakongo tribe of the south (who make up 53% of the population of 900,000 and dominate commerce) was Massamba-Debat, a Bakongo himself.

Under Control. Once the President was called back, the military indicated that they wanted the move to the right continued. The provisional government that Massamba-Debat formed last week reflected that desire. Nearly all of the Republic's leading left-wingers were excluded from the Cabinet. The battalion-sized army not only retained the key portfolios of defense and interior but also put the free-swinging Jeunesse under its control.