Ghana, 1979 — military coup attempt
Event Summary
On 15 May 1979 Flight Lieutenant Jerry John Rawlings led a first, failed coup attempt against the military government of Ghana, then ruled by the Supreme Military Council under General Fred Akuffo, just weeks before scheduled elections meant to return the country to civilian rule. Rawlings, a charismatic junior air force officer angered by corruption and the self-enrichment of the senior military brass amid economic collapse, was arrested when the uprising failed and put on public trial. But his defiant denunciations of corruption made him a hero to many junior soldiers and ordinary Ghanaians.
On 4 June 1979, sympathetic junior ranks broke Rawlings out of custody and this time succeeded, overthrowing Akuffo in a violent coup that brought Rawlings and his Armed Forces Revolutionary Council to power. That regime carried out a brutal house cleaning, executing three former heads of state, including Akuffo and Acheampong, before handing power to an elected government months later. Rawlings would return in a 1981 coup to rule Ghana for two decades.
Researched Details
Researched
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Sources
Editorial Note
Cross-Reference
Datasets agree. At least two of the three reference datasets we check against carry this event, and none of them disagrees about its date or its result.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
- Cline Center id
45205151979- Albrecht/Koehler/Schutz (CAM) id
CAM-452-1979-05-15
How the match is made is described in crossref-report.md.
Outcome and Target
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: The Akuffo government defeated Rawlings's May 1979 attempt, but he escaped and overthrew it weeks later on 4 June.
Baseline coding: Coup attempt failed to remove the incumbent. Recorded leader fate: remained in office; not physically harmed. The baseline file does not name individual targets; researched names are kept in a separate layer.
Baseline Dataset Citation
Baseline Source-Document Entries
CSP
Wikipedia
New York Times
This is the citation trail carried by the baseline dataset, grouped by outlet and rejoined from the line-wrapped original. Coup Atlas has not independently re-checked every document; read the original before citing a specific claim. URLs the import damaged beyond safe repair are shown as plain text and listed in citations-report.md. How this list is built →