Moktar Ould Daddah

{{Short description|President of Mauritania from 1960 to 1978}}{{hatnote|In this Mauritanian name, Ould Daddah is a patronymic surname.}}{{Infobox officeholder

| name = Moktar Ould Daddah

| image = Moktar Ould Daddah.jpg

| birth_date = 25 December 1924

| birth_place = Boutilimit, French Mauritania, French West Africa

| death_date = {{death date and age|2003|10|14|1924|12|24|df=yes}}

| death_place = Paris, France

| nationality = Mauritanian

| order = 1st President of Mauritania

| term_start = 28 November 1960

| term_end = 10 July 1978

| predecessor = Position established

| successor = Mustafa Ould Salek

| order2 = 1st Prime Minister of Mauritania

| term_start2 = 21 May 1957

| term_end2 = 20 August 1961

| president2 = Himself

| predecessor2 = Office established

| successor2 = Office abolished
(eventually Ahmed Ould Bouceif as Prime Minister in 1979)

| party = Mauritanian People's Party

| relations = Ahmed Ould Daddah
(half-brother)

| caption = Ould Daddah in 1960

| native_name_lang = ar

| native_name = {{nobold|مختار ولد داداه}}

}}

Moktar Ould Daddah ({{langx|ar|مختار ولد داداه|Mukhtār Wald Dāddāh}}; December 25, 1924 – October 14, 2003) was a Mauritanian politician who served as the country's first President after it gained its independence from France. Moktar served as the country's first Prime Minister from 1957 to 1961 and as its first President of Mauritania, a position he held for 18 years until he was deposed in a military coup d'etat in 1978.{{Cite news |last=Koven |first=Ronald |date=1978-07-11 |title=Mauritanian President Overthrown in Military Coup |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1978/07/11/mauritanian-president-overthrown-in-military-coup/ba4387a3-4583-4c92-9ad4-bbf9cce386b9/ |access-date=2024-01-31 |newspaper=Washington Post |language=en-US |issn=0190-8286}}

He established an authoritarian one-party state, with his Mauritanian People's Party being the sole legal political entity in the country, and followed a policy of "Islamic socialism" with many nationalizations of private businesses. In his memoirs, Moktar expressed concern that the issue of slavery in Mauritania could lead to armed conflict that would ultimately destroy the country.{{Cite web |date=2013-07-03 |title=Mauritania Struggles to Address Legacy of Slavery {{!}} علّية عباس |url=https://assafirarabi.com/en/2821/2013/07/03/mauritania-struggles-to-address-legacy-of-slavery/ |access-date=2022-09-03 |website=السفير العربي |language=en-US}}

In foreign affairs, he joined the Non-Aligned Movement and maintained strong links with Mao Zedong and the People's Republic of China, but he also accepted Western (especially French) foreign aid.Jeremy Friedman, Shadow Cold War: The Sino-Soviet Competition for the Third World, 2015, p. 166 During his presidency, Mauritania saw conflict with the Polisario Front in Western Sahara after working to broker a deal to divide the territory with Morocco.{{Cite news |agency=Agence France-Presse |date=2003-10-16 |title=Moktar Ould Daddah, 78; Led Mauritania to Independence in 1961 |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/16/world/moktar-ould-daddah-78-led-mauritania-to-independence-in-1961.html |access-date=2022-09-03 |issn=0362-4331}}{{Cite news |date=1975-11-17 |title=Aux termes de l'accord conclu entre Madrid, Rabat et Nouakchott La présence espagnole prendra fin le 28 février 1976 |url=https://www.lemonde.fr/archives/article/1975/11/17/aux-termes-de-l-accord-conclu-entre-madrid-rabat-et-nouakchott-la-presence-espagnole-prendra-fin-le-28-fevrier-1976_3101371_1819218.html |access-date=2024-01-31 |work=Le Monde.fr |language=fr}}

Background

Moktar was born to an important marabout family of the Ouled Birri tribe in Boutilimit, Mauritania, French West Africa. After attending elite Islamic academies, he worked for the French colonial administrators as a translator.{{cite book |last=Fredriksen |first=John C. |date=2005 |title=Biographical Dictionary of Modern World Leaders |publisher=Facts on File |page=112 |isbn=978-0816060368 }}

As a law student in Paris, he graduated as the first Mauritanian to hold a University Degree. He was later admitted to the bar at Dakar, Senegal in 1955. Upon his return to Mauritania in the late 1950s, Moktar joined the centre-left Mauritanian Progressive Union, and was elected President of its Executive Council. In 1959, however, he established a new political party, the Mauritanian Regroupment Party. In the last pre-independence legislative elections held later that year, his party won every seat in the National Assembly, and he was appointed Prime Minister.

He was known for his ability to establish a consensus among different political parties, as well as between the White Moors, Black Moors and Black Africans, Mauritania's three main ethnic groups.{{Cite web|url=http://www.worldstatesmen.org/Mauritania.htm|website=World Statesmen.org|title=Mauritania|first=Ben M.|last=Cahoon}} The balanced representation of different ethnic and political groups in his government won the confidence of the French authorities, who granted independence to Mauritania under his leadership in 1960. Moktar was named Acting President of the new Islamic Republic, and was confirmed in office in the first post-independence election in August 1961.

President of Mauritania (1960–1978)

As President, Moktar pursued policies that differed markedly from those he had professed prior to independence. In September 1961, he formed a "Government of National Unity" with the main opposition party, and in December, he arranged for the four largest parties to merge as the Mauritanian People's Party (PPM), which became the sole legal party. He formalized the one-party state in 1964 with a new Constitution, which set up an authoritarian presidential regime. Moktar justified this decision on the grounds that he considered Mauritania unready for western-style multi-party democracy.

Under this one-party constitution, Moktar was reelected in uncontested elections in 1966, 1971 and 1976.

In 1971, Moktar served as President of the Organization of African Unity (OAU). At home, however, his policies were criticized. The economy remained strongly dependent on Chinese and French foreign aid. Moreover, drought in the Sahel, principally in the period between 1969 and 1974, and a decline in export revenues due to fall in international prices of iron, had lowered living standards considerably. In 1975, he presented a charter which called for Mauritania to become an "Islamic, nationalist, centralist, and socialist democracy." This charter was initially popular, and the opposition, in general, welcomed it.

War in Western Sahara

What brought an end to Moktar's regime was Mauritania's war in Western Sahara against the Polisario Front, an indigenous movement fighting against the Moroccan-Mauritanian attempt to jointly annex the territory, starting in 1975. Moktar had claimed the territory as part of Greater Mauritania since 1957, three years before independence, but the idea had only limited support in the general population. The Mauritanian Moors are closely related to the Sahrawis, and virtually all northern tribes had members on both sides of the (former) frontier, many of whom sympathized with the Polisario's demands for independence.

File:Moktar Ould Daddah - 1977 cropped.jpg in 1977 ]]

In addition to the government's support for guerrillas in northern Mauritania, several thousand Mauritanians left the country to join the Polisario in its Tindouf camps. Further dissatisfaction arose in the South, from where Black troops were sent to fight what they regarded as an essentially inter-Arab conflict, and one which could, if successful, entrench Moktar's discriminatory rule even further by the addition of several thousand new Moorish citizens. But Moktar additionally sought the territory in order to prevent it from falling into Moroccan hands, still wary of the officially defunct Moroccan territorial demands on Mauritania.

Following the Madrid Accords with Spain, Mauritania annexed a southern portion of the territory, renaming it Tiris al-Gharbiya.{{Cite news |date=1976-04-16 |title=Le Maroc et la Mauritanie délimitent leur frontière au Sahara occidental |url=https://www.lemonde.fr/archives/article/1976/04/16/le-maroc-et-la-mauritanie-delimitent-leur-frontiere-au-sahara-occidental_2970185_1819218.html |access-date=2024-01-31 |work=Le Monde.fr |language=fr}} However, the small and poorly trained Mauritanian Army failed to stop the guerilla incursions, despite backing from the French Air Force. Polisario then turned to attacking the iron mines in Zouerate, at which point the country's economy started backsliding, and Moktar's public support tumbled. In 1976, the capital Nouakchott was attacked by the Polisario Front, and Moktar was forced to appoint a military officer to head the Ministry of defense.

Downfall and later life

On 10 July 1978, Lt. Col. Mustafa Ould Salek overthrew Moktar in a military coup, and installed a junta to rule the country in his place. His successors would surrender Mauritania's claims to Western Sahara and completely withdraw from the war the following year (August 1979).{{Cite news |last=Branigin |first=William |date=1979-08-07 |title=Mauritania Ends Role in Sahara War |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1979/08/07/mauritania-ends-role-in-sahara-war/bed5ff18-8e88-4d4c-b0dc-be9cc3232d27/ |access-date=2024-01-31 |newspaper=Washington Post |language=en-US |issn=0190-8286}}

After a period of imprisonment, Moktar was allowed to go into exile in France in August 1979, where he organized an opposition group, the Alliance pour une Mauritanie Democratique (AMD) in 1980. Attempts to overthrow the regime from abroad were unsuccessful.

Moktar was allowed to return to Mauritania on 17 July 2001,"Ousted Mauritanian president due home from 23 years in exile". Agence France Presse, 17 July 2001.{{Cite web |date=July 18, 2001 |title=- Mauritanie - Retour de l'ancien président - Ould Daddah après 23 ans d'exil |url=https://www.lorientlejour.com/article/343957/-_Mauritanie_-_Retour_de_l%2527ancien_president__-_Ould_Daddah_apres_23_ans_d%2527exil.html |website=L'Orient Le Jour |language=fr |publication-date=2001}} but died soon after at a military hospital, following a long illness, in Paris, France on 14 October 2003. His body was subsequently flown back to Mauritania, where it is buried.{{Cite web|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3203896.stm|title=Mauritania lays president to rest|website=BBC News|date=18 October 2003}}

Honours

=Foreign honours=

{{Flagcountry|YUG}}: Order of the Yugoslav Great Star (5 September 1968).{{Cite journal |date=6 September 1968 |title=Tito i Dadah počeli službene razgovore |url=https://arhiv.slobodnadalmacija.hr/pvpages/pvpages/viewPage/?pv_page_id=111947 |journal=Slobodna Dalmacija |issue=7315 |pages=1}}
{{Flagicon|Iran|1964}} Empire of Iran : Commemorative Medal of the 2500th Anniversary of the founding of the Persian Empire (14 October 1971).{{Cite web|url=http://badraie.com/guests.htm|title=Grand State Banquet|archive-date=March 2, 2004|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040302191209/http://badraie.com/guests.htm}}