Person:Abderrahmane Boushaki (1)

Abderrahmane Boushaki (1896 – 1985) was an Algerian military and politician who participated in World War I, the Algerian National Movement and the outbreak of the Algerian War of Independence.

Education

Boushaki was born in 1883 in the village of Soumâa south of the present city of Thenia, about 50 km east of the great city of Algiers, and his family is descended from the Malikite theologian Sidi Boushaki (1394-1453), who he founded the Zawiyet Sidi Boushaki in 1440 during the 15th century.

His father is Ali Boushaki (1855-1965), ​ Muqaddam of Tariqa Rahmaniyyah in Lower Kabylia, while his mother is Lallahoum Ishak Boushaki, a descendant like her husband of the theologian Sidi Boushaki in the Meraldene village branch.

His grandfather Mohamed Boushaki (1838-1893), known by the pseudonym Moh Ouali, was also Muqaddam of Tariqa himself and his paternal and maternal uncles were Muslim imams as were his cousins.

He then received a religious education according to the Algerian Islamic reference in the three mystical schools of Zawiyet Sidi Boushaki, Zawiyet Sidi Boumerdassi and Zawiyet Sidi Amar Cherif, as well as a political consciousness according to the ideology of Algerian independence nationalism under the patronage of his paternal uncle Mohamed Seghir Boushaki (1869-1959).

In addition to his academic activity in this Sufi environment, he worked in agriculture and animal husbandry near the surrounding villages of Meraldene, Tabrahimt, Gueddara, Azela and Mahrane.

World War I

Boushaki was requisitioned since the outbreak of the First World War to go immediately to the military front in France with thousands of young Algerians summoned to participate in the war effort against the Imperial German Army in exchange for the promise of civil and political rights that will be granted to the natives Algerians in case of victory.

These promises of the French occupation administration of Algeria to these young people were to reward them by giving Algeria independence, or at least equalizing Algerians with foreign settlers in the rights and duties of citizenship, despite the fatwas of some Algerian theologians forbidding them to enlist in the French troops.

Boushaki then enlisted and forcibly incorporated in 1914 with approximately 173,000 Muslim Algerians into the French Army (80,000 called up and 60,000 committed) under the compulsory military service introduced in 1912, which was initially partial and passed into military service compulsory generalized from 1916.

He was assigned to the soldiers of the 1st Algerian skirmishers regiment of which around 26,000 died or went missing at the end of the great war.

While he was fighting at the front, the colonial administration in Algeria promised his family benefits such as commitment bonuses, wages identical to those of the French, pensions and allowances.

He was later wounded in 1916 and his mutilation earned him promotion to the rank of corporal in the Algerian skirmishers troops until the end of hostilities in France.

Soldiers who died between 1914 and 1918

Several soldiers conscripted with Abderrahmane Boushaki in the region of Thénia (former Ménerville) perished in the battles of the Great War between 1914 and 1918, to note the following:

• Ahmed Boumachou, born on 23 November 1896, and died on 2 September 1918.
• Ahmed Mazouz, born on 24 October 1896, and died on 11 June 1918.
• Ali Amraoui, born on 31 January 1898, and died on 14 July 1918.
• Ali Bouhedi, presumed born in 1890, and died on 12 September 1916.
• Ali Mechem, born on 11 January 1897, and died on 16 April 1917.
• Ali Mezali, born on 13 May 1894, and died on 6 January 1916.
• Amer Takoucht, presumed born in 1897, and died on 31 August 1918.
• Ameur Belhabchia, presumed born in 1888, and died on 12 September 1916.
• Hamidah Tirsatine, presumed born in 1894, and died on 8 April 1919.
• Lounès Baki, born on 17 December 1894, and died on 11 March 1916.
• Mohamed Agha, born on 26 May 1897, and died on 13 May 1919.
• Mohamed Agourat, presumed born in 1872, and died on 7 November 1916.
• Mohamed Draoui, presumed born in 1897, and died on 20 March 1919.
• Mohamed Firas, presumed born in 1892, and died on 15 March 1916.
• Mohamed Razibaoune, born on 19 December 1897, and died on 11 March 1917.
• Mohamed Haddad, presumed born in 1890, and died on 22 October 1916.
• Mohamed Kordali, presumed born in 1892, and died on 20 July 1918.
• Mohamed Sida, born on 4 October 1897, and died on 29 August 1918.
• Mohamed Taghezoult, born on 20 June 1898, and died on 22 February 1919.
• Mohamed Talibi, born on 4 February 1898, and died on 14 February 1919.
• Rabah Amalou, presumed born in 1897, and died on 29 October 1918.
• Rabah Tariket, born on 1 February 1896, and died on 11 April 1918.
• Saïd Younès, born on 4 July 1897, and died on 14 August 1918.
• Slimane Mermat, presumed born in 1895, and died on 30 May 1918.

Association of Disabled and Veterans

Boushaki joined the association called Association of Disabled and Veterans (French : Amicale des Mutilés et Anciens Combattants du Département d'Alger) in order to preserve his moral and material rights as well as those of orphans and parents of other Algerian soldiers who participated in the First World War.

He then worked with his Mohamed Belhocine (1893-1972), former caïd of Béni-Zmenzer in Tizi Ouzou, reserve lieutenant, decorated with the Médaille militaire, the Croix de guerre 1914–1918 and Knight of the Legion of Honour, in order to preserve the interests of veterans who had come out alive from the horrors of war.

Political activism

Upon his return from the French front, Boushaki was mutilated and spent many years dealing with the scars of the terrible battles on his body.

He then married Khedaouedj Boumerdassi, whose ancestor Sidi Boumerdassi founded the Zawiyet Sidi Boumerdassi, and whose village of Ouled Boumerdès is a few kilometers from his village of Soumâa.

In 1935, his wife gave birth to the boy Yahia Boushaki, who brought him some happiness and whom he undertook to educate in the rectitude of Islamic Sufism and independentist military nationalism.

He then undertook with his cousin from Meraldene named Aliouat Ishak Boushaki, who was a soldier in the 6th Algerian skirmishers regiment, a political journey into Thenia, Boudouaou and Algiers in these two colonial cities through the transfer of their families from the villages of Soumâa and Meraldene to the towns of Thénia (Ménerville) and Boudouaou (Alma) respectively.

Like his other cousin Rabah Ishak Boushaki also from Meraldene, who was a soldier in the 1st African Field Artillery Group, the dividends of his involvement and his survival after the 1914-1918 world war would come through an active claim for human rights of their families and of the Algerian people.

Another friend who survived the German front was Rabah Benzerga, who was a sergeant in the 1st Algerian skirmishers regiment, and descended from the village of Azib-Merabtine near Si Mustapha (former Félix-Faure), received by the colonial administration a grocery store in Thénia after returning from the war.

Mosques

One of the main consequences of the participation of dozens of cousins and neighbors of Abderrahmane Boushaki in the blood tribute during the Great War, with nearly thirty of them dead as military martyrs in France, was the construction of a mosque for Muslim worship (ibadah) in the colonial town of Thénia.

Indeed, the arrival from Azeffoun of the entrepreneur Mohamed Naït Saïdi (1900-1981) in Thénia made it possible to build this mosque in 1934 and around it a whole Islamic complex composed of a well, a hammam, a bakery, a dormitory for passengers, shops and residential houses.

It was Corporal Boushaki's brother-in-law, Imam Ali Boumerdassi, who was then appointed as the first preacher imam in this mosque in the city center, and whose successors came from the two villages of Soumâa and Meraldene.

This religious integration of the surrounding villagers into the spiritual life of the colonial cities then enabled Abderrahmane Boushaki to participate in the appointment of his cousin Imam Hamidah Ishak Boushaki as Bash Hezzab in the Djamaa el Kebir in Algiers, and of his younger brother Imam Brahim Boushaki as Hezzab also in the Safir Mosque in the Casbah of Algiers.

Pacification of villages

The political preparation of the independence course could not be erected on a village social structure plagued by social ills, Boushaki worked with his uncle municipal councilor Mohamed Seghir Boushaki as well as with the Bachagha Mohamed Deriche to pacify the rural region of Thénia from break-ins and crimes.

This security operation guaranteed in the villages around Thénia a serenity of the inhabitants provided by the administrative and judicial authority of the city court, in addition to the traditional modalities of customary and village law.

But the heavy and stifling conditions of French colonization on the natives did not rule out the need and the imperative to maintain a clandestine structure for the settlement of village problems, and this is how Corporal Boushaki participated in keeping in the shade honor bandits and Algerian outlaws who fled French authority for nationalist reasons, like Mohamed Mechkarini.

Algeria Independance War

The commitment of former Corporal Boushaki in the Algerian revolution in 1954 was not long in coming, and was decisive as a result of his political and military preparation of his son Yahia Boushaki so that he would be an effective and efficient leader in the military combat against French soldiers in the Thénia region, and by extension in neighboring Kabylia and Mitidja.

Indeed, this military veteran having not left the residence of his home in Soumâa since his return from France in 1919, this enabled him to weave a whole political and insurrectional network with the young militants of the Movement for the Triumph of Democratic Liberties (MTLD) and the Special Organisation (OS) who were ready and trained to dismantle and uproot the colonial system in the Thénia region and Algeria in general.

This is how the village of Soumâa, in addition to its Muslim and theological reference, became the hub of the National Liberation Front (FLN) and National Liberation Army (ALN) warriors like Rabah Rahmoune, Ali Touzout, Mohamed Bouchatal, Saïd Baki and other Mujahideen.

This comfortable situation was reversed when the French military infantry troops bombarded the village of Soumâa going up from Thénia by the place of Tamsaout on April 23, 1957 and then destroyed the Zawiyet Sidi Boushaki and the mausoleum of the theologian Sidi Boushaki by burying mujahideen under the rubble.

Although Abderrahmane Boushaki had shown the soldiers his medals and trophies as a former veteran to dissuade them from destroying the village, all the inhabitants, made up of old people and children, were deported and sequestered in the Specialized Administrative Sections (SAS) camps of Tidjelabine after the destruction from the village, and this former corporal found himself in the isolation of the concentration camp far from the news of his son Yahia Boushaki and the other independence warriors.

As for the network of activists activating in the city of Thénia after the devastation of the surrounding villages, like Bouzid Boushaki who was arrested after planting a bomb in the Post office of this city, they were transferred to the Ferme Gauthier which is located in Souk El-Had to be tortured and often murdered.

Independent Algeria

The organization of the Algerian independence referendum on July 1, 1962 saw the participation of Abderrahmane with his father Ali Boushaki who was then 107 years old.

And this is how Cheikh Ali was the dean of the Algerians who saw the arrival of French settlers after the Mokrani Revolt settle in Mitidja and Kabylie in 1872 when he was only 17 years old after that he took part in the Battle of the Col des Beni Aïcha.

And here he is, as Muqaddam of the Tariqa Rahmaniyyah, seeing the thousands of French settlers leaving their homes, businesses and farms with only their suitcases, and this to return Algeria to its children and citizens who have been despoiled of their property since July 5, 1830.

The authorities of independent Algeria then rewarded Abderrahmane Boushaki by renaming Avenue Jean Colonna d'Ornano by the name of his son Captain Shahid Yahia Boushaki and by installing in this wide street the headquarters of the Kasma of the National Liberation Front (FLN) party.

The Algiers Province then renamed a large property in Bab Ezzouar with the name of the district also bearing the name of the political commissar Yahia Boushaki.

As for his residence, a large villa located at 5, Rue Slimane Ambar south of Thénia was awarded to him by the revolutionary authorities on the side of his native village of Soumâa.

He received in his residence the official and political leaders who visited the city of Thénia who did not miss the opportunity to visit the father of the shahid Yahia Boushaki and the older brother of the imam Brahim Boushaki in order to drink from the sources of the Arch of the Béni Aïcha which led to the writing of the Declaration of 1 November 1954 by the journalist Mohamed Aïchaoui after the group of 22 and the Revolutionary Committee of Unity and Action (CRUA) organized their illustrious meeting in the house of Lyès Deriche.

Death

Corporal Boushaki died in 1985 in his house located on Rua Slimane Ambar, next to the towns of Soumâa, Gueddara and Meraldene.

He was later buried next to his father, the Muqaddam Ali Boushaki, and his uncle Mohamed Seghir Boushaki in the Muslim cemetery of Thénia called Djebbana El Ghorba.