Kouroussa | |
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Sub-prefecture and town | |
 Kouroussa market square, seen in a French image from 1911 | |
  Kouroussa Location in Guinea | |
| Coordinates:10°39′00″N09°53′00″W / 10.65000°N 9.88333°W /10.65000; -9.88333 | |
| Country |  Guinea |
| Region | Kankan Region |
| Prefecture | Kouroussa Prefecture |
| Elevation | 362 m (1,188 ft) |
| Population (2014) | |
• Total | 39,611 |
| Time zone | UTC0 |
Kouroussa orKurussa (N’ko: ߞߙߎ߬ߛߊ߫) is a town located in northeasternGuinea, and is the capital ofKouroussa Prefecture. As of 2014 it had a population of 39,611 people.[1] A trade center and river port from at least the time of theMali Empire, Kouroussa has long relied upon its position near the upstream limit of navigation of theNiger River to make it an important crossroads for people and goods moving between the Guinea coast and the states of the western Soudan and Niger River valley. The town and surrounding area is a center ofMalinke culture, and is known for its Djembe drumming tradition.
Kouroussa represented the southern end of theManden: the Mandé heartland of theMali Empire. Kouroussa's position as a river port has made it a historic center for regional trade, much like its larger neighborKankan. Much of theJallonke population of the area migrated from the west when the Fula people conquered the Fouta Djallon in the 13th - 16th centuries. With the collapse of the empire, southern Manden confederations and states continued to exist, including in the area around Kouroussa. In the 17th century the Fama Da Monzon Diarra of theBambara Empire made Kouroussa the southern reach of his state. By the 18th century the Fula MuslimImamate of Futa Jallon led by the Alamay ofTimbo provided pressure from the south and west, while the growingKong state (in modernCôte d'Ivoire) became powerful to the south and east. The Mandé state around Kouroussa, called in some periodsHamana and in othersKoumara, continued as an important trade center and small regional power, squeezed between these forces.[2]
The first known European visitor to the town was the French explorerRené Caillié, who passed through the area in June 1827 on his journey toDjenné andTimbuktu.[3] In his bookTravels through Central Africa to Timbuctoo published in 1830, he wrote:
Courouassa [Kouroussa] is a neat village, surrounded by a mud wall, from ten to twelve feet high and from eight to ten inches thick. It contains between four and five hundred inhabitants. ... the inhabitants are called Dhialonkés [Dialonké], and are chiefly idolaters. They do not travel, but occupy themselves peaceably in the cultivation of their little fields, which are fertilised by the inundations of the river.[4]
By the arrival of Europeans, Kouroussa was a major trade stop between theNiger River valley and the coast, with the so-called "Leprince" overland route running from the coast viaKindia,Timbo, and Kouroussa.[5]
In the late 19th century French forces appeared in the region just to the north, establishing bases atKayes,Kita, Mali,Bafoulabé and eventually atBamako. Countering the French expansion was theFula Jihad state of which exploded out of neighboringDinguiray to conquer both the Mandé states surrounding Kouroussa to the northwest and the Bambara to the northeast. To the south, theWassoulou conquest state ofSamori Ture appeared, sending his well armed forces against Kouroussa, its neighbors, and the French alike, while the Futa Jallon state raided the area periodically. The French officerAimé Olivier, attempting to convince theImamate of Futa Jallon to sign a protectorate, passed through Kouroussa in the 1880s, and at the beginning of the 1890s, French military underLouis Archinard established garrison posts at Kankan and Kouroussa, commanded from a larger post just downstream atSiguiri.[6] In 1893–1894, Commandant Briquelot set up a post at Kouroussa, as it lay along the main line for French fighting with the forces ofSamori to the south. From here French forces raided areas controlled by Samori, even launching raids from here into the British territory ofSierra Leone.[7] By 1895, even while fighting with Samori continued, the French had set up a school to train local workers to identify, collect, and prepare wild rubber for French industrial purposes. Kouroussa became a regional center of rubber requisitions (often instituted as a tax in labour), which peaked in the second decade of the 20th century.[8] Kouroussa was administered as part of theSiguiri Cercle, which also included Kankan.[9]
The French, after annexing the Futa Jallon in the 1890s, added the region to the colony ofFrench Upper Guinea, later a part ofFrench West Africa, until Guinea's independence in 1959. During the colonial period the town was made a main trans-shipment point for commodities coming fromFrench Sudan (today's Mali) due to the construction of the Guinea-Niger railway, which met the river at Kouroussa in 1910, and from which rainy season ship transport could reachBamako.[10] As well as a collection center for wild rubber, the French encouraged the collection gold sifted from streams and dug by local small scale mines. The French also attempted to promote local farming ofgroundnuts andcotton. There remains a monument to René-Auguste Caillié in Kouroussa, erected by the French.
In 2001, Kouroussa was one of several places which was particularly hard hit by flooding, and became a center for thousands of internally displaced people from the surrounding area.[11] In 2005, Kouroussa was rocked by major protests against the government, particularly aimed at KouroussaPrefectCharles Andre Haba who was accused of embezzling local mining revenue. The town was reported at the time to be a center of the oppositionRally of the Guinean People (RPG)[12][13]
With an estimated population of just over 10,000, Kouroussa functions more as a services and transport center for the surrounding agricultural region than as a metropolitan center in its own right.
The majority of the surrounding population comes from theMalinke andDjallonke ethnic groups, who speak relatedMande languages and follow theMuslim religion. Kouroussa and the surrounding region is the centre of the Hamana-Malinke Mande sub-group -- "Hamana" being the name for the region, while the Malinke are the major Mande speaking ethnic group of the upper Niger valley. There are also sizable minority communities ofFula andDyula, the latter traditionally forming trade communities in towns like Kouroussa.
The writer and intellectualCamara Laye (1928–80) grew up in Kouroussa, and his memoir,L'Enfant noir (The Black Child), is in part about his youth in the town.[14]
Kouroussa and surrounding towns maintain the pre-colonial Mande ceremonial kingship of Hamana, with the most recent holder of the office King of Kouroussa King Sayon Keita I.[15]
Kouroussa is about 50 km SW of theMandingo cultural siteGberedou/Hamana.
Hamana-Malinke are especially known for their unique musical traditions, especially theirpolyphonicDjembé drumming traditions, with a number of well known drum masters—includingFamoudou Konate, Daouda Kourouma, and Sékou Konaté—coming from the town.[16][17] Djembé groups in Kouroussa are known for the inclusion of the bassdununba drum and the longkenken bell.[18]
With its position near the upstream limit of navigation on the Niger River, Kouroussa is an important center of transport and trade. The Guinea Railway crosses theNiger River at this town, where there is also a river port.[19] The town also lies at a junction in Guinea'sN1 highway, which is a major transport route betweenConakry,Kankan, and (via the N7 and N32) neighboringMali.[20] Themetre gauge Niger – Conakry rail line runs 588 km to the capital of Guinea, with a branch of 74 kilometers running from Kouroussa to Kankan. It was built by the French, using African labor, in the first two decades of the 20th century.[21]
The Savanna climate in the region around Kouroussa support a wide range of subsistence and cash crop farming, producing rice,[22]groundnuts, onions and millet for sale, as well as supporting larger scale cotton farming and cattle ranching by both locals and semi-nomadicFula people whose largest local center is in the nearbyFouta Djallon highlands.
Major mining companies are engaged in ongoing exploration drilling in a series[23] of government grantedGold mining concessions[24] near the town.[25] The Kouroussa area also has a long history as a center of small scale gold mining, which continues in so called "Artisanal Mining"[26] Recent criticism has surfaced around the working conditions, pay, and the widespread use of child labour in these small gold mines, and the method which middlemen, many based in Kouroussa, purchase and transport gold. Gold collected in Kouroussa is sold on—with almost no regulation or oversight—to larger merchant houses inBamako,Conakry, and eventually to smelters in Europe.[27] Large scaleTitanium mining has also been proposed in the Kouroussa area, with both Dredging of Heavy Mineral Sands from rivers and streams and dry pit mines proposed as of 2007.[28]
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Capital:Kouroussa | ||
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Authority control databases: National |
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