Mauritania Info and other Mauritania General Tips

Favorite Thing: Mauritania, formerly part of French West Africa, achieved full independence on 28 November 1960 (having become a self-governing member of the French Community two years earlier).

Moktar Ould Daddah, leader of the Parti du regroupement mauritanien (PRM) and Prime Minister since June 1959 became Head of State at independence, and was elected President in August 1961.

After independence all parties merged with the PRM to form the Parti du peuple mauritanien (PPM), with Ould Daddah as Secretary-General, and Mauritania became a one-party state in 1964. The country moved away from the French sphere of influence and towards closer relations with Arab nations.

Under a tripartite agreement of November 1975, Spain ceded Spanish Sahara to Mauritania and Morocco, to be apportioned between them. The agreement took effect in February 1976, when Mauritania occupied the southern portion of the territory.

Guerrilla fighting ensued, with Moroccan and Mauritanian troops in action against the forces of the Polisario Front, which sought independence for Western Sahara.

Attacks within Mauritania by Polisario forces proved highly damaging to the economy. Diplomatic links with Algeria, which was supporting Polisario bases within its borders, were severed in March 1976.


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Favorite Thing: Maouya Ould Sidi Ahmed Taya became army chief of staff in 1980, and in 1981 he became prime minister. Taya lead a bloodless coup later that year. In 1992 he was elected president amidst protests of fraudulent election practices.

Economic reforms provoked violent protests, and ethnic clashes between those of sub-Saharan descent and those of North African descent have produced tension within Mauritania and with neighboring Senegal, where nearly 200,000 Mauritanian refugees reside.

Later this last year the some president won the election and before the election ended he put his oppositor in jail saying he was going to make a civil war inside the country after the elections were over. I think the guy come out from prision now.


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