Background
He was born in Nkolo, French Equatorial Africa, in 1921, and was a member of the Lari tribe.
He was born in Nkolo, French Equatorial Africa, in 1921, and was a member of the Lari tribe.
Educated locally, he went on to the civil service training school of the Equatorial African Federation in Brazzaville. He attended missionary school and by age 13 was a teacher in Chad. In 1947 he moved back to Congo and became the headmaster at a school in Brazzaville and joined the Congolese Progressive Party (PPC).
From 1945 to 1947 he was Secretary of the Association of Chad Evolues. In 1947 he returned to the Congo as a headmaster, first at Mossendjo, then in Brazzaville. At the same time he joined the Congolese Progressive Party (PPC) of Felix Tchicaya, the local RDA section, and in 1956 became a member of the Democratic Union for the Defence of African Interests (UDDIA) which the Abbe Fulbert Youlou had formed to succeed the PPC.
After UDDIA won the 1957 election, Massemba-Debat became secretary to Prosper Gandzion, Minister of Education, before being elected himself in the 1959 elections on the UDDIA ticket. The same year he was elected President of the Assembly. In 1961 he was appointed Minister of State and later in the same year became Minister of Planning and Equipment. He was, however, increasingly critical of Youlou’s wasteful style of government and his policies—his dependence on the French, his support for Tshombe and his reliance on undesirable business advisers. His quarrels with Youlou finally led to his resignation in May 1963, a piece of judicious timing on his part, for three months later Youlou’s plan for a one- party state brought all the opposition to him into the open in three days of demonstrations—“Les Trois Glorieuses”, which ended in his resignation.
Massemba-Debat, who had retired to Nkolo for three months, was brought back to head the provisional government set up after the revolution and in December he was elected President. His problems were manifold; on the one hand an unpromising economy and a serious financial deficit, on the other hand the demands of the students and the trade unionists who had brought him to power and expected the momentum of the revolution to be maintained. In foreign affairs this was seen in an “opening” to Communist countries and support for Congolese rebels and at home in the take-over of Church schools and the setting up of “jeunessc” with an armed wing. Membership of the franc zone and association with the EEC continued, despite their “neocolonial” aspects. This led to increased pressure from an increasingly militant left. Massemba-Debat tried to disarm them by sending the most vocal abroad as ambassadors and switching Premiers in 1966 to confront Noumazalay with the realities of office, but trouble was brewing on another side.
The army was upset by the arming of the militia and its northern members by alleged Bakongo tribalism. This was behind the mutiny of June 1966, while Massemba-Debat was at the inaugural Afro-Malagasy Joint Organisation (OCAM) meeting in Tananarive. The army trouble had focussed on a Captain Ngouabi, who re-emerged two years later as an even more potent threat to Massemba-Debat. In a power struggle lasting from July to September 1968 Ngouabi finally triumphed.
But not before “jeunesse” supporters of Massemba-Debat had fought a last- ditch stand against the army in the Meteorological Camp. With the fall of Massemba, the armed wing of the “jeunesse” was incorporated in the army. Massemba was put under house arrest in Nkolo. In December 1972 he profited from a measure providing for a pension for ex-Presidents.
In 1947 he moved back to Congo and joined the Congolese Progressive Party (PPC).
A respected, slightly paternal figure, he learnt the hard way that a revolution is not an easy phenomenon to control. Given the volatility of Brazzaville politics, it is to his credit that he mastered it for five years. His critics accused him of vacillation and lack of authority, but his training as a teacher gave him a firm belief that if you could educate people, you did not need to command them. It was the opposition of the military rather than unpopularity that caused his fall, and he still has a Bakongo power base.
Following the bloodless coup of 1968 Massamba-Débat was forced to leave politics and Massamba-Débat returned to his home town of placed under house arrest. When Ngouabi was murdered in 1977, many people were arrested and tried for plotting the assassination, including Massamba-Débat. Massamba-Débat was executed on March 25, 1977 in circumstances that remain cloudy.