Previously, Mobutu served as the second president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo from to He also served as the fifth chairperson of the Organisation of African Unity from to During the Congo Crisis , Mobutu, serving as Chief of Staff of the Army and supported by Belgium and the United States, deposed the democratically elected government of left-wing nationalist Patrice Lumumba in Mobutu installed a government that arranged for Lumumba's execution in , and continued to lead the country's armed forces until he took power directly in a second coup in To consolidate his power, he established the Popular Movement of the Revolution as the sole legal political party in , changed the Congo's name to Zaire in , and his own name to Mobutu Sese Seko in Mobutu claimed that his political ideology was "neither left nor right, nor even centre", [ 1 ] though nevertheless he developed a regime that was intensely autocratic.
He attempted to purge the country of all colonial cultural influence through his program of " national authenticity ". Under his rule, the nation also suffered from uncontrolled inflation, a large debt, and massive currency devaluations. Mobutu received strong support military, diplomatic and economic from the United States, France, and Belgium, given his opposition to communism in Francophone Africa. He also built close ties with the governments of apartheid South Africa , Israel and the Greek junta.
By , economic deterioration and unrest forced Mobutu Sese Seko into a coalition with political opponents and to allow a multiparty system. Although he used his troops to thwart change, his antics did not last long. Already suffering from advanced prostate cancer , he died three months later in Morocco.
Mobutu, a member of the Ngbandi ethnic group, [ 12 ] was born in in Lisala , Belgian Congo. The name "Mobutu" was selected by an uncle.
Gbemani died when Mobutu was eight. The Belgian judge's wife took a liking to Mobutu and taught him to speak, read, and write fluently in the French language, [ 17 ] the official language of the country in the colonial period. His widowed mother Yemo relied on the help of relatives to support her four children, and the family moved often.
