1971: Ousmane Balde, Barry III, Magassouba Moriba, Loffo Camara, Keita Kara Soufiana, and many others in Conakry
January 25th, 2012 Headsman
On this date in 1971, at least four former members of Guinea’s government were publicly hanged for supposed complicity in the previous year’s Portuguese invasion from neighboring Guinea-Bissau.*
The coup-threatened government of Sekou Toure was trying to send a message:
It did not scruple to make examples of men and women in very high places. Ousmane Balde (or Baldet) was Guinea’s former Finance Minister, Magassouba Moriba an Interior Minister, Barry III (also known as Ibrahima Barry; the link is French) the former Secretary of State. Keita Kara Soufiana had been Chief of Police. Loffo Camara was a National Assembly member.
Besides the quality of its reprisal victims, Conakry went in for quantity, too. Somewhere close to 100 death sentences were handed down with the barest of legal pretense, and the majority of them actually carried out on and around this date.
Personally arranging the grisly tableau for our hanged ex-ministers was a captain, Diarra Traore, who would one day help to overthrow the Guinean government, become Prime Minister … and wind up executed himself for his trouble.
* Guinea-Bissau was at that time still a Portuguese possession, known as Portuguese Guinea.
On this day..
- 1774: John Malcom, tarred and feathered - 2020
- 1358: Perrin Mace, de-sanctuaried - 2019
- 1830: Benito de Soto, a pirate hanged at Gibraltar - 2018
- 2017: Seven in Kuwait, including a sheikh - 2017
- c. 1560: Dominique Phinot, queer composer - 2016
- 1788: John Price Posey, "superlative villain" - 2015
- 1928: Ben “Two Gun” Fowler, cinema shooter - 2014
- 2010: Chemical Ali - 2013
- 1911: Sugako Kanno, radical feminist - 2011
- 1996: Billy Bailey, the last American hanged - 2010
- Daily Double: Throwback Executions - 2010
- 1795: Unspecified Robespierrists - 2009
- 1663: Nathaniel Greensmith, Rebecca Greensmith and possibly Mary Barnes, Connecticut "witches" - 2008
Entry Filed under: 20th Century,Capital Punishment,Death Penalty,Execution,Guinea,Hanged,History,Mass Executions,Mature Content,Notable Participants,Politicians,Power,Public Executions,Torture,Treason,Women,Wrongful Executions
Tags: 1970s, 1971, barry iii, conakry, diarra traore, january 25, keita kara soufiana, loffo camara, magassouba moriba, ousmane balde, ousmane baldet
