The Central African Empire (French: Empire centrafricain) was a short-lived, self-declared autocratic monarchy that replaced the Central African Republic and was, in turn, replaced by the restoration of the Republic. The empire was formed when Jean-Bédel Bokassa, president of the Republic, declared himself Emperor Bokassa I on 4 December 1976. Bokassa spent the equivalent of over 20 million United States dollars, a quarter of the country’s government annual income, on his coronation ceremony. The monarchy was abolished and the name “Central African Republic” was restored on 21 September 1979, when Bokassa was ousted with French support.
Read more about Central African Empire: Proclamation of The Empire
Famous quotes containing the words central, african and/or empire:
“There has never been in history another such culture as the Western civilization M a culture which has practiced the belief that the physical and social environment of man is subject to rational manipulation and that history is subject to the will and action of man; whereas central to the traditional cultures of the rivals of Western civilization, those of Africa and Asia, is a belief that it is environment that dominates man.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)
“So in Jamaica it is the aim of everybody to talk English, act English and look English. And that last specification is where the greatest difficulties arise. It is not so difficult to put a coat of European culture over African culture, but it is next to impossible to lay a European face over an African face in the same generation.”
—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
“Our ancestors were savages. The story of Romulus and Remus being suckled by a wolf is not a meaningless fable. The founders of every state which has risen to eminence have drawn their nourishment and vigor from a similar wild source. It was because the children of the Empire were not suckled by the wolf that they were conquered and displaced by the children of the northern forests who were.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)