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GUINEA - GENERAL INFORMATION

Original name: Republic of Guinea

National flag:

Briefly:

Geography

The Guinea’s border is measured at about 3,399 km with an additional 320 km of coastline. The African nation is about the size of the United Kingdom and borders the Ivory Coast, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Senegal and Sierra Leone. The nation contains three, geographically and ethnically different regions. It boasts lowlands along the coast, a cooler mountainous region that runs north to south through the country, and a region in the southeast covered with forests and jungles.

Demographics

The country’s major ethnic groups, for the most part, reside in their own geographic regions. The country is made up of three main tribal groups: the Peuhl (40%), the Malinke (30%), and the Soussou (20%). The rest of the nation consists of smaller ethnic groups. 85% of the nation is Muslim, only 8% Christian, with another 7% holding indigenous beliefs.

Population: 9,947,814 (July 2007 est.)

Age structure:
0-14 years: 44.3% (male 2,226,414/female 2,183,153)
15-64 years: 52.5% (male 2,611,833/female 2,610,773)
65 years and over: 3.2% (male 138,392/female 177,249)
(2007 est.)

Population growth rate: 2.62% (2007 est.)

Total fertility rate: 5.75 children born/woman (2007 est.)

HIV/AIDS - adult prevalence rate: 3.2% (2003 est.)
HIV/AIDS - people living with HIV/AIDS: 140,000 (2003 est.)

Economy

Guinea contains the world’s second largest Bauxite reserves, as well as various mineral, hydropower and agricultural resources. Despite its wealth of natural resources, Guinea remains a highly underdeveloped and poverty-stricken nation. The country’s economy suffers major economic infrastructural problems that will need to be addressed if it is to pull itself from poverty.

Political instability has no doubt been to blame for many of Guinea’s economic woes. The World Bank and IMF in 2003 canceled most of its aid to the African nation. Refugee movements, triggered by military conflicts, many along the Sierra Leone-Liberian border has scared away investors and reduced foreign direct investment in the region. Internal government corruption has no doubt fueled this weariness as well.

Transparency International, a German NGO, found Guinea to be perceived as the most corrupt nation in Africa, and fourth most corrupt worldwide, behind Myanmar, Iraq and Haiti. The former Governor of Guinea’s central bank has been indicted on charges of corruption.

History

In September of 1958, Guinea became the first of France’s African colonies to gain independence when it decided in a national referendum to break with the European nation, an opportunity put forward by French President Charles de Gaulle.

Since that time, Guinea has had only two Presidents. After independence, power was immediately grabbed by dictator Ahmed Sékou Touré of the Democratic Party of Guinea (PDG), who began enacting many socialist economic policies while suppressing his oppositions by limiting freedom of expression.

His economic isolationism, combined with the removal of assistance from France, pushed the economy downward until 1978 when the dictator finally opened the economy back up to foreign trade.

Touré ruled until his death in 1984 when power was transferred to Lansana Conté who led a successful military coup d’état immediately after the death of the dictator. Conté, a former military general altered most of Touré’s economic policies but retained a tight grip on the nation’s political reigns and continued to suppress opposition movements.

He also abolished the PDG and replaced it with his own Military Committee for National Recovery (CMRN). Conté was elected President in 1993, again in 1998 and in 2003 when he promised much desired political reforms in Guinea. While the validity of his election victories is questionable, no formal contests have formed because of Conté’s suppression of political opposition.

A serious of turnovers of the nation’s Prime Ministers, including the resignation of PM Francois Fall while on vacation with his family in France in 2005 has rocked the nation’s political stability. Conté removed Fall’s successor, Cellou Dalein Diallo in the spring of the next year delaying the appointment of a new Prime Minister until January of 2007. During that time, the country endured mass demonstrations and economically devastating nationwide strikes.

Conté was capable of temporarily suppressing his oppositions by conceding more favorable wages and lowering the price of basic amenities like rice and oil. However, the 2007 protests, which drew the largest crowds of any protest during Conté’s tenure, eventually forced the President to appoint a new Prime Minister.

Strikes and demonstrations were temporarily suspended until February of 2007 when Conté nominated his close ally Eugene Camara to the office of Prime Minster. The appointment of Camara, far form the consensus Prime Minister desired by Conté’s political opposition, led to continued demonstrations. The severity of these renewed protests were unmatched in Gueina’s past and the nation reached the verge of civil war. However, under heavy pressure form the international community, Conté eventually appointed Lasana Kouyaté, former Guinean UN ambassador and consensus candidate as the country’s Prime Minster.

The appointment of Kouyaté as Guinean Prime Minster was no doubt a great success in the eyes of the nation’s political oppositions. However, the nearly two years of political protests had produced a death toll of around 100 civilians as military police dealt violently with protestors.