Ahmed Sékou Touré President

Ahmed Sékou Touré (var. Ahmed Sheku Turay) (January 9, 1922 – March 26, 1984) was a Guinean political leader; head of the PDG, he was elected as the first President of Guinea, serving from 1958 to his death in 1984. Touré was one of the primary Guinean nationalists involved in gaining independence of the country from France. In 1960, he declared his Parti démocratique de Guinée (PDG) to be the only legal party in the state and ruled from then on as a virtual dictator. He was nominally re-elected to numerous seven year terms but Guinea had no other political parties, and he imprisoned or exiled his strongest opposition leaders.