Guinea

Guinea (formerly French Guinea, also known as Guinea-Conakry) is a small, mostly Muslim country in West Africa composed of four ecological regions alongside three distinct ethnic groups. The lowlands of Basse-Coté are populated mainly by the Susu ethnic group, composing 20% of the total population, while the Fouta Djallon mountain region is home to the Fula (previously Peul) group, the most ardently Islamic community of the nation and comprising approximately one third of its people. The Maninka (aka Malinké or Maninko) reside in the Sahelian Haute-Guinea northeastern region, making up 33% of the population, and the jungle regions of the southeast have several ethnic groups living together. As the majority religion of the country, Muslims constitute 85% of the population, mainly Sunnī, with Shi'a communities growing. Christians, mostly Roman Catholic, account for approximately 8% of the populace, and while 7% engage in exclusively indigenous religious practices, syncretism is widely evident in the use of amulets as well as kinship and life cycle rituals.

Islam is recorded to have been introduced in Guinea as early as the 17th century, when Muslim immigrants settled in the small city-state of Baté on the banks of the river Milo. It would attract Islamic scholars and traders from across Africa. While Islam did not make significant inroads into the southeastern region, the Fulas created a theocratic Muslim state in Fouta Djallon following the displacement of Susu ancestors in the 18th century. Roman Catholic missions were more successful in the coastal regions, where the Susu had gained dominance in the 17th and 20th centuries through trade with Europeans. Guinea was colonized by the French in the 1890s, and while it participated in the slave trade, it was never a significant contributor.

Guinea gained independence in 1958 under the presidency of Sekou Touré, who blended African institutions with a Marxist agenda and looked to the communist Soviet Union and China for aid while being a leading voice for Pan-Africanism. After the iron-fisted leader began losing popularity in the 1970s, Touré successfully looked to Islamic institutions to legitimate his rule. The cooperation between the nation and Muslim religion continues up to the present, and the imams of the principal mosque in the capital, Conakry, are government employees. There is a system of Islamic education in Guinea for children who cannot attend a government-run school, though despite ongoing [Page 489]efforts, Guinea's Ministry of Education has as yet been unable to integrate madrasas into the Franco-Arab education system funded by the government. With Lansana Conté seizing power after Touré died in 1984, and Moussa Dadis Camara similarly gaining leadership, Guinea's history is riddled with violence and struggle. Conté opened the country to Liberians and Sierra Leoneans in the 1990s, but later found them ready scapegoats for the border town attacks of the early 21st century. Though the European Union, International Monetary Fund, and World Bank have been active under Conté, privatizing utilities and improving infrastructure, Guinea's people remain among the poorest in the world, in spite of their vast mineral resources. The country held its first successful democratic elections in 2010, with Alpha Condé being declared the victor, but continued discontent between ethnic groups fuels continuing fears of Guinea becoming a failed state.

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