32 Facts About Ahmed Mahsas

Ahmed Mahsas was an Algerian Fighter in the nationalist movement against French Algeria.

Ahmed Mahsas was born on 17 November 1923 in Boudouaou, Kabylia.

Ahmed Mahsas grew up in the wooded and mountainous region of the Col des Beni Aicha.

Ahmed Mahsas's family is from the village of Mahsas near Tidjelabine and the Zawiyet Sidi Boumerdassi.

Ahmed Mahsas's parents settled in Boudouaou at the start of the 20th century.

Ahmed Mahsas was arrested by French authorities for the first time in 1941 with Mohamed Belouizdad for his actions within the PPA in the Belcourt district of Algiers.

Ahmed Mahsas became a militant in Algiers within organizations related to the PPA, such as the Central Youth Committee of Grand Paris and the Youth Committee of Belcourt.

Ahmed Mahsas was imprisoned several times for his militant activities and had important responsibilities within the PPA where he was a member of the Central Committee and the Organizing Committee.

Ahmed Mahsas participated in organizational work at the territorial and national levels.

Ahmed Mahsas was drafted during World War II to serve under France between 1944 and 1945, but he refused to join the colonial French army.

Ahmed Mahsas was appointed as the head of wilaya Constantine and member of the organizing committee of the PPA.

In 1947, Ahmed Mahsas was one of the founders of the Special Organization of which he was a national staff member with Belouizdad.

Ahmed Mahsas was arrested in 1950 when OS was dismantled, and was held in a prison in Blida along with other nationalist activists of the Movement for the Triumph of Democratic Liberties.

Ahmed Mahsas then left Algeria for France, where he joined members of the Revolutionary Committee of Unity and Action to prepare for the Algerian Revolution.

Ahmed Mahsas joined the city of Cairo in 1955 in order to join the FLN external delegation and become a member of the National Council of the Algerian Revolution in 1956 and 1957.

Ahmed Mahsas escaped with some help, left for Germany, and remained there until Algerian independence in 1962.

Issiakhem found Ahmed Mahsas and informed him about Ouamrane's plan before giving him 500 dollars and a recommendation to leave Germany.

Ahmed Mahsas was appointed on 18 September 1963 as Minister of Agriculture in Ben Bella's government, a post that he kept during the government reshuffle of 2 December 1964.

Ahmed Mahsas was elected to the People's National Assembly as deputy for the Algiers Province on 20 September 1964, and was then elected member of the political bureau and of the central committee of the FLN.

The day after Houari Boumediene organized the 1965 Algerian coup d'etat on 19 June against the power of Ben Bella, Ahmed Mahsas rallied the Revolutionary Council and was thus maintained in his post of Minister of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform in the new government formed on 10 July.

Ahmed Mahsas then was appointed member of the Revolutionary Council resulting from this coup, which led to Ben Bella's incarceration for 14 years.

In 1974 Ahmed Mahsas defended a thesis to obtain a graduation diploma at the Ecole pratique des hautes etudes, the theme of which was Notations on the establishment of agricultural self-management in Algeria.

Ahmed Mahsas obtained a degree in sociology, and in 1978 defended his thesis "The revolutionary movement in Algeria from World War I to 1954" under the direction of Jacques Berque.

Ahmed Mahsas published his thesis the same year at L'Harmattan, where he explained the theory of the Algerian Revolution and its achievements on the historical level, and described the context surrounding creation of the PPA and the OS.

Ahmed Mahsas returned to Algiers in 1981, a day after Boumediene's death.

Ahmed Mahsas was then appointed by the government of the new president, Chadli Bendjedid, as Advisor to the National Publishing and Distribution Company.

Ahmed Mahsas tried to reactivate the UFD in 2006, but failed.

Ahmed Mahsas died on 24 February 2013 in the Ain Naadja military hospital located in Djasr Kasentina at age 90.

Ahmed Mahsas was to have been honored at the Moufdi Zakaria Palace of Culture as a former nationalist activist and previous minister of agriculture, but was evacuated and transferred to the military hospital in Algiers after suffering from a health problem on the sidelines of the ceremony of honor.

Ahmed Mahsas was kept in the hospital's intensive care unit, and scans and tests revealed that he was bleeding internally.

Ahmed Mahsas was buried the next day in the El Alia Cemetery.

Ahmed Mahsas had written several books during a long political and academic career, including:.