Togo - 1955-1967 Early Independence
By statute in 1955, French Togo became an autonomous republic within the French union, although it retained its UN trusteeship status. A legislative assembly elected by universal adult suffrage had considerable power over internal affairs, with an elected executive body headed by a prime minister responsible to the legislature. These changes were embodied in a constitution approved in a 1956 referendum. On September 10, 1956, Nicholas Grunitzky became prime minister of the Republic of Togo. However, due to irregularities in the plebiscite, an unsupervised general election was held in 1958 and won by Sylvanus Olympio.
Olympio (a southerner of the Ewe tribe) was a very able and nice person. Olympio had been a Director of the United Africa Company which was a well-known Trading Company in England. Olympio had been raised in England where he had attended the London School of Economics. He spoke still some German which he had learned in grammar school before 1914. He also spoke rather good French, but English was definitely his first language. He was to become Togo's first President.
On April 27, 1960, in a smooth transition, Togo severed its constitutional ties with France, shed its UN trusteeship status, and became fully independent under a provisional constitution with Olympio as president.
A new constitution in 1961 established an executive president, elected for 7 years by universal suffrage, and a weak National Assembly. The president was empowered to appoint ministers and dissolve the assembly, holding a monopoly of executive power. In elections that year, from which Grunitzky's party was disqualified, Olympio's party won 90% of the vote and all 51 National Assembly seats, and he became Togo's first elected president. Olympio was very much western-oriented, very pro-American and pro-West in general.
During this period, four principal political parties existed in Togo: the leftist Juvento (Togolese Youth Movement); the Union Democratique des Populations Togolaises (UDPT); the Parti Togolais Du Progres (PTP), founded by Grunitzky but having limited support; and the Comite Unite Togolaise (CUT), the party of President Olympio. Rivalries between elements of these parties had begun as early as the 1940s, and they came to a head with Olympio dissolving the opposition parties in January 1962, ostensibly because of plots against the majority party government. Many opposition members, including Grunitzky, fled to avoid arrest.
Olympio was the first African Chief of State to be assassinated. On January 13, 1963, President Olympio was assassinated as he was climbing over the wall between his house and the American Chancery. He died in the arms of the American Ambassador. Olympio was assassinated in an uprising of army non-commissioned officers dissatisfied with conditions following their discharge from the French army. Grunitzky returned from exile 2 days later to head a provisional government with the title of prime minister. On May 5, 1963, the Togolese adopted a new constitution which reinstated a multi-party system, chose deputies from all political parties for the National Assembly, and elected Grunitzky as president and Antoine Meatchi as vice president. Nine days later, President Grunitzky formed a government in which all parties were represented.
During the next several years, the Grunitzky government's power became insecure. On November 21, 1966, an attempt to overthrow Grunitzky, inspired principally by civilian political opponents in the CUT party, was unsuccessful. Grunitzky then tried to lessen his reliance on the army, but on January 13, 1967, Lt. Col. Etienne Eyadema (later Gen. Gnassingbe Eyadema) ousted President Grunitzky in a bloodless military coup. Political parties were banned, and all constitutional processes were suspended. The committee of national reconciliation ruled the country until April 14, when Eyadema assumed the presidency. In late 1969, a single national political party, the Rally of the Togolese People (RPT), was created, and President Eyadema was elected party president on November 29, 1969. In 1972, a national referendum, in which Eyadema ran unopposed, confirmed his role as the country's president.
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