Guinea Republic.
Information.
GUINEA, officially Republic of Guinea , is a county in West Africa, formerly French Guinea. Area - 245,857 sq. km . Population - 9,402,000 (2005) Capital - Conakry. Cuinea borders Guinea-Bissau and Senegal to the north, and Mali to the north and north-east; the inland part borders Cote d'Ivoire to the south-east, Liberia to the south, and Sierra Leone to the west of the southern tip. The land today's Guinea occupies has been part of a series of empires, beginning with the "Ghana Empire" which came into being c. 900. This was followed by the Sosso kingdom in the 12th and 13th centuries. The Mali Empire came to power in the area after the Battle of Kirina in 1235, and prospered until internal problems weakened it, and its states seized power in the 15th century. One chief state was the Songhai state which became the Songhai Empire. It exceeded its predecessors in territory and wealth, but it too fell prey to internal wrangling and civil war and was eventually toppled at the Battle of Tondibi in 1591. Then the area fragmented until an Islamic state was founded in the 18th century, bringing some stability to the region. Another important event was the arrival of Fulani Muslims in the highland region of Fuuta Jalloo in the early 18th century. Europeans first came to the area during the Portuguese Discoveries, that started the slave trade, beginning in the 15th century. Present-day Guinea was created as a colony by France in 1890 with Noel Balley as the first governor. The capital Conakry was founded on Tombo Island in 1890. In 1895 the country was incorporated into French West Africa. On 28 September 1958, under the direction of Charles de Gaulle France held a referendum on a new constitution and the creation of the Fifth Republic. The colonies (Algeria was officially a part of France and not a colony) were given the choice between immediate independence and the new constitution. All colonies except Guinea voted for a new constitution. Thus Guinea became the first French African colony to gain independence, at the cost of the immediate ending of all French assistance. Денежная система : 1 Guinean franc (GNF) .
See also:
French West Africa
