Félix Houphouët-Boigny (French: [feliks ufwɛ(t) bwaɲi]; 18 October 1905 – 7 December 1993), affectionately called Papa Houphouët or Le Vieux ("the old one"), was an Ivorian politician and physician who served as the first president of Ivory Coast, from 1960 until his death in 1993. A tribal chief, he worked as a medical aide, union leader, and planter before being elected to the French Parliament in 1945. He served in several ministerial positions within the Government of France before leading Ivory Coast following independence in 1960. Throughout his life, he played a significant role in politics and the decolonisation of Africa.
Under Houphouët-Boigny's politically moderate leadership, Ivory Coast prospered economically. This success, uncommon in poverty-ridden West Africa, became known as the "Ivorian miracle"; it was due to a combination of sound planning, the maintenance of strong ties with the West (particularly France), and development of the country's significant coffee and cocoa industries. However, reliance on the agricultural sector caused difficulties in 1980, after a sharp drop in the prices of coffee and cocoa.
Throughout his presidency, Houphouët-Boigny maintained a close relationship with France, a policy known as Françafrique, and he built strong ties with Jacques Foccart, the chief adviser on African policy in the administrations of Charles de Gaulle and Georges Pompidou. He aided the conspirators who ousted Kwame Nkrumah from power in Ghana in 1966, took part in the failed coup against Mathieu Kérékou in Benin in 1977, was suspected of involvement in the 1987 coup d'état that removed Thomas Sankara from power in Burkina Faso, and provided assistance to UNITA, a United States-supported, anti-communist rebel movement led by Jonas Savimbi in Angola. Houphouët-Boigny maintained a strong anti-communist foreign policy, which resulted in, among other things, severing diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union in 1969 (after first establishing relations in 1967) and refusing to recognise the People's Republic of China until 1983. He re-established relations with the Soviet Union in 1986.
In the West, Houphouët-Boigny was commonly known as the "Sage of Africa" or the "Grand Old Man of Africa". Houphouët-Boigny moved the country's capital from Abidjan to his hometown of Yamoussoukro and built the world's largest church there, the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace, at a cost of US$300 million. At the time of his death, he was the longest-serving leader in Africa's history and the third longest-serving leader in the world, after Fidel Castro of Cuba and Kim Il Sung of North Korea. In 1989, UNESCO created the Félix Houphouët-Boigny Peace Prize for the "safeguarding, maintaining and seeking of peace".
After his death, conditions in Ivory Coast quickly deteriorated. Between 1994 and 2002, there were a number of coups, a devaluation of the CFA franc, and an economic recession; a civil war began in 2002.
Birth, childhood and education
According to his official biography, Houphouët-Boigny was probably born on 18 October 1905, in Yamoussoukro to a family of hereditary chiefs of the Baoulé people. Unofficial accounts, however, place his birth date up to seven years earlier. Born into the animist Akouès tribe, he was named Dia Houphouët: his first name Dia means "prophet" or "magician". His father was N'Doli Houphouët. Dia Houphouët was the great-nephew through his mother of Queen Yamousso and the village chief, Kouassi N'Go. When N'Go was murdered in 1910, Dia was named to succeed him as chief. Due to his young age, his stepfather Gbro Diby ruled as regent until Dia came of age; Dia's father had already died.
Houphouët-Boigny descended from tribal chiefs through his mother, Kimou N'Dri (also known as N'Dri Kan). She died much later in 1936. Doubts remain as to the identity of his father, N'Doli. Officially a native of the N'Zipri of Didiévi tribe, N'Doli Houphouët died shortly after the birth of his son Augustin, although no reliable information regarding his death exists. Houphouët-Boigny had two elder sisters, Faitai (1898?–1998) and Adjoua (d. 1987), as well as a younger brother Augustin (d. 1939).
The French colonial administration recognised tribal leaders; they arranged to have Houphouët go to school at the military post in Bonzi, not far from his village, to prepare for his future as a leader, despite strenuous objections from relatives, especially his great-aunt Queen Yamousso. In 1915, he was transferred to the école primaire supérieure (secondary) at Bingerville in spite of his family's reluctance to have him go to boarding school. The same year, at Bingerville, Houphouët converted to Christianity; he considered it a modern religion and an obstacle to the spread of Islam. He chose to be christened Félix.
First in his class, Houphouët was accepted into the École normale supérieure William Ponty in 1919, and earned a teaching degree. In 1921, he attended the École de médecine de l'AOF (French West Africa School of Medicine) in French Senegal, where he came first in his class in 1925 and qualified as a medical assistant. As he never completed his studies in medicine, he could qualify only as a médecin africain, a poorly paid doctor.
On 26 October 1925, Houphouët began his career as a doctor's aide at a hospital in Abidjan, where he founded an association of indigenous medical personnel. This undertaking proved short-lived as the colonial administration viewed it unsympathetically, considering it a trade union. As a consequence, they decided to move Houphouët to a lesser hospital in Guiglo on 27 April 1927. After he proved his considerable talents, however, he was promoted on 17 September 1929 to a post in Abengourou, which until then had been reserved for Europeans. At Abengourou, Houphouët witnessed the mistreatment of indigenous cocoa farmers by the colonists.
In 1932, he decided to act, leading a movement of farmers against the influential white landowners and for the economic policies of the colonial government, who favoured the farmers. On 22 December, he published an article titled "On nous a trop volés" (They have stolen too much from us), in the Trait d'union, an Ivorian socialist newspaper. It was published under a pseudonym.
The following year, Houphouët was called by his tribe to assume the responsibilities of village chief. Preferring to pursue his medical career, he relinquished the office to his younger brother Augustin. Wishing to live closer to his village, he obtained a transfer to Dimbokro on 3 February 1934 and then to Toumodi on 28 June 1936. While Houphouët had displayed professional qualities, his attitude had chafed those around him. As a result, in September 1938, his clinical director demanded that he choose between his job as a doctor and his involvement in local politics. The choice was quickly made for him: his brother died in 1939, and Houphouët became the chef de canton (an office created by the colonial administration to collect taxes). Due to this, Houphouët ended his medical career the next year.
In 1930, Houphouët married Kady Racine Sow (1913–2006) in Abengourou; their union was controversial because he was a practising Catholic and she was the daughter of a wealthy Muslim from Senegal. The families of the two eventually overcame their opposition and accepted the interfaith union, the first ever celebrated in Ivory Coast. The couple had five children: Felix (who died in infancy), Augustine, Francis, Guillaume and Marie, all raised as Catholics.
Chef de canton and union leader
By becoming chef de canton, Houphouët assumed responsibility for the administration of Akouè, a canton which comprised 36 villages. He also took charge of the family plantation—at the time one of the most important in the country—and worked to diversify its rubber, cocoa and coffee crops. He soon became one of Africa's richest farmers. On 3 September 1944, he established, in cooperation with the colonial administration, the African Agricultural Union (Syndicat agricole africain, SAA). Under his presidency, the SAA brought together African farmers who were dissatisfied with their working conditions and worked to protect their interests against those of European planters. Anti-colonialist and anti-racist, the organisation demanded better working conditions, higher wages, and the abolition of the forced labour. The union quickly received the support of nearly 20,000 plantation workers, together with that of the left-wing French administrators placed in office by the Provisional Government. Its success irritated colonists to the extent that they took legal action against Houphouët, accusing him of being anti-French for never seeking French citizenship. However, Houphouët befriended the Inspector Minister of the Colonies, who ordered the charges dropped. They were more successful in obtaining the replacement of the sympathetic Governor André Latrille with the hostile Governor Henry de Mauduit.