![]() ![]() For his part, Franco was once again marginalized, with a new posting to the Canary Islands. When elections that were held in February 1936 led to a shift in power to the left, Spain slipped further into chaos. As a result, Franco returned to a position of power, which he wielded the following year in a ruthless suppression of a leftist revolt in northwestern Spain.īut like the Second Republic before it, the new government could do little to quell the growing divide between left- and right-leaning factions. However, the country was also wracked by a deepening, often violent social and political unrest, and when new elections were held in 1933, the Second Republic was replaced by a more right-leaning government. The moderate government of the Second Republic that replaced it led to a reduction in the power of the military, which resulted in the closing of Franco’s military academy. In April 1931, general elections led to the ousting of King Alfonso XIII, whose military dictatorship had been in place since the early 1920s. Two years later, he was also named director of the General Military Academy in Zaragoza, a position he would hold until three years later when political changes in Spain would temporarily halt Franco’s steady rise. In 1926, Franco’s role in suppressing the Moroccan rebellion earned him an appointment as general, which, at age 33, made him the youngest man in Europe to hold that post. During this period he also wed Carmen Polo y Martínez Valdéz. By 1920, he had been named second in command of the Spanish Foreign Legion, and three years later took full command. Stationed there from 1912 to 1926, Franco distinguished himself with his fearlessness, professionalism and ruthlessness, and was frequently promoted. Ruthless RiseĪfter an initial posting to El Ferrol, Franco volunteered to serve in Spain’s recently acquired protectorate Morocco, where the country’s native population was staging a resistance to occupation. He graduated three years later with below-average marks. However, the economic and territorial aftermath of the Spanish-American War led to a reduction in the navy, and after completing his primary education at a Catholic school, Franco was forced to enlist at the Infantry Academy at Toledo instead. The men in his family had served in the navy for generations, and the young Franco expected to follow in their footsteps. Early Life and Military Bloodlinesįranco was born on December 4, 1892, in Ferrol, Spain, a northwestern port city with a long history of shipbuilding. He then presided over a brutal military dictatorship in which tens of thousands were executed or imprisoned during the earlier years of his regime. He soon led an uprising against the leftist Republican government and took control of Spain following the Spanish Civil War. When the social and economic structure of Spain began to crumble, Franco joined the growing right-leaning rebel movement. What will remain in people's minds is the incredible legacy bequethed by Franco to both Zaire and to the world.Francisco Franco was a career soldier who rose through the ranks until the mid-1930s. His own death, the following year, fuelled rumors that he had himself died from AIDS-related complications, although these were never substantiated. In 1988, Franco released a dire musical warning to his fans to avoid contracting AIDS. The distillation of this philosophy can be heard on Mario & Response de Mario. ![]() Such brushes with the law only served to heighten the kudos that surrounded the man and his music.Ī dominant motif in his repertoire was the often uneasy relationship between the sexes, a friction that he deplored and worked hard to alleviate. Although Franco worked within and through the praise song tradition, he was not above preaching at times, for which he occasionally found himself in jail. A fruit of the government's drive to promote authentic Congolese culture, Franco's was categorically a music performed to be danced to. Franco's sound was an easy blend of Cuban rumba and Congolese rhythm. ![]() In 1956, Franco helped form OK Jazz (later TPOK Jazz), a band that was to define Congolese music for decades. Part of Franco's appeal lay in his winning looks and common man accessibility, but as much as this, he was known for his inventive guitar style. When Congolese jazz guitarist Franco Makiadi died in 1989, the whole of Zaire (formerly the Belgian Congo) went into mourning it was a fitting farewell for a musician who, over the course of 40 years, issued over 150 albums, containing more than 1000 songs, and who had a decisive influence on the shape of African music.įranco began his musical ventures with a homemade guitar, recorded his first single, "Bolingo Na Ngai Beatrice," at the age of 13, and by the age of 15 was a regularly contracted recording artist with the Loningisa Studio's house band. ![]()
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