Ahmed Sékou Touré

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Ahmed Sékou Touré

1st President of Guinea
In office October 2, 1958 – March 26, 1984
Preceded by	None (position first established)
Succeeded by	Louis Lansana Beavogui

Born	January 9, 1922 Faranah, Guinea
Died	March 26, 1984 Cleveland, Ohio, United States
Political party	Democratic Party of Guinea
Religion	Muslim

Ahmed Sékou Touré (1922-1984) was an African political leader and president of the Republic of Guinea from 1958 to his death in 1984. Touré was one of the primary Guinean nationalists involved in the liberation of the country from France.

We prefer poverty in liberty to riches in slavery.
—Ahmed Sékou Touré

1 Origins
2 Early life
3 Politics
4 As President of Guinea
5 Controversy
6 Notes
7 External links

[edit] Origins

Sékou Touré was born on January 9, 1922 in the west African country of Guinea. His date of birth has never been formally established; there remains a contention that he was born in 1918 at Faranah. He was a member of the Malinké ethnic group^[1] and was the grandson of the famous Samory Touré, who had resisted French rule until his capture.

[edit] Early life

Sékou's early life was characterized by challenges of authority, including during his education. Sékou was obliged to work to take care of himself; thus, he came to be employed in the society of the PTT. During his youth and after becoming president, Sékou Touré showed some interest in the works of communist philosophers, especially those of Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin.

[edit] Politics

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Sékou's first work in a political group was in the PTT. In 1945, he was one of the founders of the syndicate of workers. Despite his youth, he became the general secretary of the PTT. In 1952, he became the leader of the Guinean Democratic Party which was local section of the RDA, a party agitating for the decolonization of Africa. He was a leader of this organization with Félix Houphouët-Boigny, who later became the president of the Côte d'Ivoire. Sékou was generally perceived as very charismatic in his country and in the wider African community, although as always exceptions existed. Sékou served for some time as a representative of African groups in France, where he worked to negotiate for the independence of France's African colonies.

Under Sekou Toure, in 1958 Guinea was the only one of France's African colonies, facing a stark choice offered by General de Gaulle who had just come to power, to vote for immediate independence rather than continued association with France. In the event the rest of Francophone Africa gained its independence only two years later in 1960, but the French were extremely vindictive against Guinea: withdrawing abruptly, taking files, and breaking political and economic ties.

[edit] As President of Guinea

In his home country, Sékou Touré was a strong president,^[2] to the point that some consider him to have been a dictator. The opposition was noted as saying that the government put pressure on them, mainly in the form of fear of detention camps and secret police. His detractors often had two choices--say nothing or go abroad. From 1965 to 1975 he ended all his relations with France, the former colonial power. Sékou Touré argued that Africa had lost a lot during colonization, and that Africa ought to retaliate by cutting off ties to former colonial nations. In 1978, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, the president of France at that time, came to visit Guinea as a sign of reconciliation.

Throughout his dispute with France, Guinea maintained good relations with several socialist countries. However, Sékou's attitude toward France was not generally well received, and some African countries ended diplomatic relations with Guinea over the incident. Despite this, Sékou's move won the support of several anti-colonialist groups.

One of Touré's main allies was President Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana. After Nkrumah was overthrown in a 1966 coup, he sought refuge in Guinea.

Relations with the United States fluctuated during the course of Touré's reign. While Touré was unimpressed with the Eisenhower administration's approach to Africa, he came to consider President John F. Kennedy a friend and an ally. He even came to state that Kennedy was his "only true friend in the outside world". He was impressed by Kennedy's interest in African development and commitment to civil rights in the United States. Touré blamed Guinean labor unrest in 1962 on Soviet interference and turned to the United States.

Relations with Washington soured, however, after Kennedy's death. When a Guinean delegation was imprisoned in Ghana, after the overthrow of Nkrumah, Touré blamed Washington. He feared that the CIA was plotting against his own regime.

Over time, Touré's increasing paranoia led him to arrest large numbers of suspected political opponents and imprison them in camps, such as the notorious Camp Boiro. A number of Guinean dissidents sought refuge in exile. [1]

Touré died in the city of Cleveland in the United States while undergoing heart surgery on March 26, 1984.

[edit] Controversy

During his presidency Sékou Touré was generally well respected among Guineans, although this is hard to tell given that during elections he did not have meaningful opposition since most of it, at any given point, was jailed. This has led to considerable criticism for failing to institute meaningful democracy. Touré's control extended to the media.^[3]