CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC, FLAG OF THE

national flag with horizontal stripes of blue, white, green, and yellow, all overlapped by a central red vertical stripe; a yellow star is in the upper hoist corner. Its width-to-length ratio is approximately 3 to 5. Under the leadership of its dynamic first prime minister, Barthlemy Boganda, an autonomous republic was proclaimed on December 1, 1958. The nation was formerly the French colony of Ubangi-Shari (Oubangui-Chari), but Boganda renamed it the Central African Republic and designed its national flag. No changes were introduced in the flag design when complete independence was achieved on August 13, 1960, nor during the years 197679, when the military leader Jean-Bdel Bokassa took on the imperial mantle with his declaration of the Central African Empire. Boganda's flag design symbolically expressed his realization that France and Africa must march together. He combined the blue, white, and red of the French Tricolor with the pan-African red, yellow, and green to show the solidarity between those two civilizations. A yellow star appeared in the hoist corner as a guide for future progress and an emblem of unity. Blue was said to stand for liberty, grandeur, and the sky, while white was for purity, equality, and candour. Green represented the forests of the nation, yellow suggested its savannas, and red was for the common blood of all humankind. The link between Europeans and Africans was manifested in the red vertical stripe that traversed the other four colours. Whitney Smith History Early history This discussion focuses on the Central African Republic since the 19th century. For a treatment of earlier periods and of the country in its regional context, see Central Africa, history of. Diamond prospectors in the Central African Republic have found polished flint and quartz tools that are at least 8,000 years old. About 2,500 years ago local farmers set up megaliths weighing several tons each near Bouar. The cooperation necessary to make and position these monuments suggests that they were built by fairly large social units. By the 15th century AD different groups speaking languages related to those spoken by present-day Central Africans were living in the area. These peoples lived in relatively isolated, small settlements, where they hunted and cleared land for cultivation using the slash-and-burn method. Until the 17th century the region of the Central African Republic was not directly connected to external commercial routes. At that time, Arabic-speaking slave traders extended the trans-Saharan and Nile River trade routes into the region. Before the mid-19th century these slave traders captured people and sent them as slaves to North Africa or down the Ubangi and Congo rivers to the Atlantic coast. From these points, slave ships transported captives to the Americas. By the mid-19th century the Bobangi people from the Ubangi River area had become major slave traders themselves and raided for captives among the nearby Baya and Mandjia peoples. These raids continued until the end of the century. Many ethnic groups in Central Africa still harbour resentment against the ruling elite, who tend to come from riverine groups akin to the Bobangi. The disruption caused by the slave trade hampered the development of strong social organization among the region's ethnic groups. The colonial era Toward the end of the 19th century, faster ships, more-powerful weapons, and the use of quinine to treat malaria made it possible for Europeans to gain control of vast areas of Africa. The Industrial Revolution in Europe had created the need for more markets and for new sources of raw materials. During the last two decades of the 19th century, Belgium, Great Britain, Germany, and France competed for control of what became the Central African Republic. The French government leased large tracts of land to private European companies in order to avoid paying for the development of its Central African possessions; it also placed few controls on their activities. In exchange for an annual rent, these firms exploited the land and dominated the people. Company overseers forced Central African men and women to gather wild rubber, hunt for ivory and animal skins, and work on plantations. Central Africans were unable to cultivate their own fields because of the labour demands from European companies, and they experienced food shortages and famine. Because they were forced to work in new environments where they were exposed to sleeping sickness, new strains of malaria, and other diseases, the death rate among Central Africans substantially increased. By the beginning of the 20th century, frontiers had been established for the Ubangi-Shari (Oubangui-Chari) colony by the European powers. Many Africans resisted French control, and several military expeditions in the first decade of the century were needed to crush their opposition. The Kongo-Wara rebellion (192831) was a widespread, though unsuccessful, anticolonial uprising in the western and southwestern parts of the colony. After it was suppressed, its leaders were imprisoned and executed and populations of Central Africans were forcibly relocated to colonially designated roads and villages where they could be supervised. The French colonial administration created a network of roads and a mobile health system in Ubangi-Shari to fight disease, and Roman Catholic churches set up schools and medical clinics. However, the French also used the Central Africans for forced labour to increase the cultivation of cotton and coffee, as well as of food crops to supply French troops and labour crews. The French conscripted Central Africans and sent them to southern Congo to construct the Congo-Ocean Railway, which linked Congo to Pointe-Noire. During World War II, French General Charles de Gaulle called on the residents of the colonial territories to help fight the Germans, and 3,000 responded from Central Africa. After the war these troops returned to their homeland with a new sense of pride and national, rather than ethnic, identity. After the war de Gaulle organized the French Union and created new local assembliesconsisting of French colonists and a handful of Africanswith regional political representatives. In November 1946 Barthlemy Boganda became the first Central African elected to the French National Assembly. The economy Agriculture is the largest sector and the basis of the Central African economy, contributing half of the gross domestic product (GDP) and accounting for nearly four-fifths of the workforce. International (mostly French) capital dominates the economy, although since independence the Central African Republic has tried to attract capital and development monies from other countries, including Libya, Taiwan, China, Germany, and Japan. Nevertheless, French private and public investment has remained prominent. Under pressure from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund to reverse the growth of government spending, liberalize prices, encourage a more open investment code, and provide incentives to agriculture and forestry, the Central African Republic submitted to a structural adjustment program in 1986. As France has reduced its financial commitments to its former colonies in Africa, the Central African Republic's financial standing has also deteriorated. In the 1990s a decline in international prices for cash crops, the inflated cost of imports caused by poor transportation into the country, the continued smuggling of diamonds across the border, and domestic political unrest further strained the economy. In addition, looting during coup attempts in the late 1990s severely damaged many businesses in Bangui, the economic centre of the country. Resources Situated on a fertile plateau and abundant in water resources, the Central African Republic has considerable agricultural potential. It also has a wealth of mineral resources, including diamonds, which account for nearly half of the country's total export earnings. Gold, uranium, iron ore, copper, and manganese are mined in smaller quantities. The country's waterfalls are sources of hydroelectric power, and the dams, located on the Mbali Lim River northwest of Bangui, produce about four-fifths of the country's electricity. Tropical rainforest, mainly in the southwest, covers about three-fourths of the country, and timber exports are a vital source of foreign exchange. Heavy reliance on international commodities markets, however, has rendered the country's economy extremely vulnerable to price fluctuations. Though encouraged by multilateral aid agencies to increase its exports, the Central African Republic has also been under pressure to protect its natural resources. Both timber harvesting and diamond mining occur in locations that are also centres of high biodiversity. Conflicts erupted in the 1990s between various state agencies, multinational logging companies, artisanal diamond miners, international conservation organizations, and Central African villagers seeking employment with logging companies over how best to both protect these resources and boost exports. The land Relief, drainage, and soils The Central African Republic occupies an immense rolling plateau that rises to an elevation of about 2,000 to 2,500 feet (610 to 760 metres) above sea level and forms, along a crest that trends southwest to northeast, the major drainage divide between the Lake Chad and Congo River basins. Tributaries of the Chari River occupy the northern third of the country's territory. The remaining two-thirds of the terrain drain southward into the Ubangi River, which forms the Central African Republic's southern border with Congo (Kinshasa). The vast central plains rise gradually in the northeast to the Bongos (Bongo) Massif, extending to an elevation of 4,600 feet (1,400 metres) at Mount Toussoro, and to the Tondou Massif in the east. In the northwest they rise toward the Yade Massif, reaching nearly 4,700 feet (1,500 metres) at Mount Ngaoui, the country's highest point. In the west the 4,000-foot (1,200-metre) Karre Mountains form a high granite range, which declines eastward into sandstone plateaus. In the north the most significant mountains are those of the Dar Challa range, which rise to 4,423 feet (1,348 metres) at Mount Tinga on the border with The Sudan. In the southeast is a plain cut by a number of rivers. Climate The climate is tropical. The Central African Republic lies in a transitional climatic zone between the sub-Saharan zone to the north and the equatorial zone to the south. During the rainy season (from March to October or November) heavy rainstorms occur almost daily, and early morning fog is typical. Maximum annual precipitation is 71 inches (1,800 mm), occurring from August to September in the upper Ubangi region, and in the Karre Mountains annual precipitation averages 59 inches (1,500 mm). During this season of southwestern monsoon (rain-bearing) winds, the daily temperature ranges between 66 and 86 F (19 and 30 C). The dry seasonbrought by the northeastern trade winds, called the harmattangenerally begins in October and ends in February or March. The air is dry, and temperatures range between 64 and 104 F (18 and 40 C); it is warm during the day but considerably cooler at night. The skies are clear and seldom cloudy until the approach of the rainy season, when clouds accumulate, but there is no rainfall. Sandstorms and dust storms occur in the extreme north. The people Ethnic and linguistic composition The people of the Central African Republic compose a complex ethnic mosaic. They range from the hunting-and-gathering forest peoples, the Aka, to state-forming groups such as the Zande (formerly Azande) and Nzakara. Prior to the arrival of Europeans in the late 19th century, distinctions between different groups were highly fluid. Many thought of themselves as members of a clan rather than of a broader ethnic group. Interactions with those who spoke different languages and had different cultural practices ranged from peaceful trade and intermarriage to war and enslavement. The attempts by colonial administrators and ethnographers to divide Central Africans into defined ethnic groups has never been viable. However, French colonizers did promote ethnic and regional distinctions among their Central African subjects. Drawing from populations of such riverine people as the Mbaka, Yakoma, and Ubangi, the French helped to create an elite group, which emerged as an indigenous ruling group for the whole country and has held most political positions since independence. Regional affiliations have increased the complexity of this political terrain. Other, nonriverine Central Africans, who are far more numerous, have tended to resent this situation and have occasionally taken leadership roles themselves. Although people living in the country's northern regions have gained more political power since independence, southern peoples still remain an important presence in national politics. A minority of Greek, Portuguese, and Yemeni traders are scattered around the country, and a small French population lives in Bangui. Diamond traders from West Africa and Chad, merchants from various African countries, and political refugees from The Sudan, Chad, Rwanda, and Congo (Kinshasa) also reside in Bangui and the hinterlands. Central Africans currently speak a wide variety of languages, including Baya (Gbaya), Banda, and Mandjia. French is the official language, and Sango, a Bantu language and lingua franca spoken by nearly nine-tenths of the population, is the national language. Sango was originally a language of a people from the Ubangi River region, but Christian missionaries adopted, simplified, and disseminated it in the 1940s and '50s to their followers throughout the country. Religion About two-fifths of the population adheres to Roman Catholicism or various Protestant denominations. Some continue to practice traditional religions. There are a growing Sunnite Muslim minority and a growing but undetermined minority of Central Africans with no religious affiliation.