Henri-Francis Mazoyer

Henri-Francis Mazoyer (born May 16, 1906 in Autun , † September 27, 1979 in Dreux ) was a French ambassador . He was an officer in the Legion of Honor .

Life

Henri-Francis Mazoyer studied law and economics . In 1930 he was employed in the civil administration of the Protectorate of French Morocco . From 1930 to 1936 he was employed by the Service central du contrôle civil in Rabat . From 1936 to 1942 he was seconded to the office of Résident général Charles Noguès , who headed the military district. From 1942 to 1943 he was deputy head of the city administration of Casablanca . From 1944 to 1945 he headed the military districts of Beni-Amir and Beni Moussa. In 1946 he gave lectures at the Center des hautes études sur l'Afrique et l'Asie modern . From 1946 to 1949 he headed the government cabinet of René Hoffherr the Haut-Commissaire au Cameroun . In 1950 he gathered information in Egypt. From 1950 to 1951 he headed the intelligence service in French Morocco. From 1952 to 1953 he was the office manager of Defense Minister René Pleven . From 1954 to 1955 he headed the administration of the Protectorate of French Morocco in Paris. In 1956 he gave lectures at the Institut des Hautes Études de la Defense Nationale . In 1957 he replaced Paul Lorion as French consul general in Léopoldville and held the post until 1959.

On April 27, 1960, Togo became independent and Henri-Francis Mazoyer became the first French ambassador to Lomé . In 1961 Sylvanus Olympio was elected President. Olympio wanted to renegotiate the mining rights for phosphate with the French companies and strove for more independence in monetary policy . He put the revision of the cooperation between the Bank of Togo and the Bank of France on the agenda. A British company had been considered for printing the local currency .

The coup against Sylvanus Olympio

On the evening of January 12, 1963, the Olympio family's villa was guarded by two police officers. Dîna and Sylvanus Olympio slept on the first floor and were woken up shortly before midnight by gunfire at the entrance. Olympio jumped in khaki shorts, T-shirt and sandals over the wall onto the neighboring property of US Ambassador Leon B. Poullada and hid in a Buick parked there .

A group of former Foreign Legionnaires broke into the Olympio estate at around one o'clock. They shot around, threatened the residents and ransacked the library . Her leader asked Dîna Olympio where her husband was. Dîna Olympio asked back if they would look for her husband in the books? As the intruders obviously used their murder squad to plunder. The leader picked up the phone:

"" Allô! Monsieur Mazoyer? Nous sommes chez lui! Il a disparu ""

- Contract killer, January 13, 1963

Around 1:30 a.m., the intruders left the Olympios' property, packed with money and jewelry. Mazoyer then called Poulladaan, announcing an impending coup, and reporting that Olympio is likely on US embassy grounds.

The ministers of the Olympios government were held in the Tokoin military camp, about three miles from the president's residence. Emmanuel Bodjollé, a former Foreign Legionnaire who was demobilized after the Algerian War , had stationed his troops in the Tokoin military camp and sent a command under Robert Adewi to the US embassy.

The Togolese police were advised by Georges Maitrier, a French military advisor . Poullada, who wanted to see the incident for himself, went from his residence to the US embassy about three kilometers away, where he arrived at around five in the morning and found a detachment that had been posted in front of his embassy. He inspects the embassy premises with a torch from the night watchman. Olympio whispered to Poullada for asylum . Poullada told him about the coup . There were no employees in the embassy yet and Poullada did not have any keys for the embassy with him. Poullada returned to his residence, telephoned Henri Mazoyer and told him what he had seen and heard. Mazoyer advised him not to do anything, he would take care of the asylum of Olympio himself.

The coup plotters expected their enterprise to fail until an envoy from the French ambassador informed them of President Olympio's hiding place. Putschists Gnassingbé Eyadéma and Emmanuel Bodjollé had also gone to the US embassy. After a thorough search, they found Olympio hidden behind a Plymouth . Olympio was murdered by the coup plotters.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ [1]
2. ↑ Académie des sciences d'outre-mer, Hommes et destins: dictionnaire biographique d'outre-mer
3. ↑ L'Avènement du congo belge a l'independance p. 110 FN 1
4. ↑ German: Hello Mr. Mazoyer? We are with him! He disappeared.
5. ↑ Têtêvi G. Tété-Adjalogo, Histoire du Togo: le régime et l'assassinat de Sylvanus Olympio, 1960-1963, Volume 2

predecessor	Office	successor
	French ambassador in Lomé 1960–1963	Claude-François Rostain
François Charles-Roux	French ambassador to Damascus 1969–1971	André Nègre