Another reason for the irritation was that most of FACA consisted of soldiers from Kolingba’s ethnic group, the Yakoma.
Further, members of Kolingba's Yakoma tribe in the south posed a potential threat to Bozizé's government because of their widespread boycott of the second round of the legislative elections.
After the second army mutiny of 1996, he and Jean Serge Ouafio set up the 'Karako' militia forces, which Patassé then brought into the military to balance the predominance of southern Yakoma in the armed forces inherited from the Kolingba era.
He worked at the Faculty of Literature and Human Sciences in Bangui (1972–1982), where he was Dean from 1976 to 1979.
Yakoma people, an ethnic group mainly living in the Central African Republic
Yakoma | Yakoma people |
This gave rise to growing tension between so-called "southerners" (including the riverine Yakoma) and "northerners" (including the savanna Gbaya) in the CAR which led to violent confrontations between these groups during the Patassé era (1993–2003).