Alexandre Banza

Alexandre Banza

Lieutenant Colonel Alexandre Banza was a military officer and politician in the Central African Republic. Banza served with the French Army during the First Indochina War. He helped Jean-Bédel Bokassa overthrow the government of President David Dacko in 1965. He was executed by firing squad on 9 April 1969 after a failed coup d’état.

About Alexandre Banza in brief

Summary Alexandre BanzaLieutenant Colonel Alexandre Banza was a military officer and politician in the Central African Republic. Banza served with the French Army during the First Indochina War. He helped Jean-Bédel Bokassa overthrow the government of President David Dacko in 1965. He was executed by firing squad on 9 April 1969 after a failed coup d’état. In the aftermath of the failed coup, Banza’s family, mistress and close associates were all arrested and either sent to jail or deported. He is buried in an unmarked grave in Gbaya, the capital of the Gbya region. He had a similar military record to his future colleague Jean-bédel. BokassA described Banza as an “intelligent, ambitious, and unscrupulous” military officer. He also said that Banza had been a “brilliant soldier” and a “wonderful soldier” who had served in Africa and Europe as a radio transmissions expert. He died of a gunshot wound to the head in an unknown location in the central African Republic in April 1969. He left behind a wife and two children. He never married. He has been remembered as a “great man” and an “exceptional soldier” by many people in Central Africa. He served in the French army in the FirstIndochina war and had been stationed in Gabon, Morocco, Tunisia and other locations in colonial Africa. Bokasa said that he had been “a great soldier and a great soldier” but that he never married or had a child.

He added that he was a “war hero” and that he would have been a great leader if he had lived to see the end of the Second World War. In 1965, he was appointed minister of state and minister of finance in the new government. In April 1968, he had a major argument with the president over the president’s extravagances. He made a number of remarks highly critical of the president’s handling of the government. The president responded by abolishing the minister ofState position and removing Banza from office. In December 1965, the president approved a budget increase for Izamo’s gendarmerie, but rejected the budget proposal for Bokasso’s army. At this point, DackO planned to replace Izamo with his personal military adviser, Jean Izamo, and promote army officers loyal to the government, while demoting Banza and demoting his close associates. After receiving word of the coup from the country’s military chief of staff in Paris, Albert Bongo-Bernard, Bongo’s chief of military staff, sent Banza to Paris to meet with Paris military officials. He realized he had to act against the president, and worried that the presidential guard would be no match for the gendarie and gendarmie and that the French would intervene to aid Dacka. He told his friends he was going to stage a coup d’état and was arrested and deported.