The French gave Bokassa millions to finance this absurd spectacle. The giant golden Napoleonic eagle is apparently still rotting somewhere in a stadium in Bangui.

Now here's another page of history I was ignorant of... Thanks Stopheles!

Contemptible sonofabitch who quickly grew into a monster, personally supervising massacres of schoolchildren who couldn't afford to buy the uniforms he'd designed for them. Ended up overthrown and did 6 years(!) in solitary before being released to live out his life in comfortable exile.

keep in mind this was all done in part to intimidate sesa seko in nearby zaire. To show that the french still have the central african republic's back. So like please don't invade us, cause we are desperately poor as a nation

African politics. Yeesh.