Togo, 1991 — military coup attempt
Event Summary
The dataset records an event coded as an attempted military coup in Togo on 26 August 1991 during the fraught national conference that challenged the long rule of President Gnassingbe Eyadema. Swept up in the wave of democratization across Africa after the Cold War, Togo had convened a sovereign national conference in mid 1991 that stripped Eyadema of most of his powers, suspended his RPT party, and named a transitional government under an interim prime minister, Joseph Kokou Koffigoh, reducing the president to a figurehead. Eyadema, however, retained the loyalty of the army, and the transition was violently contested.
In late August 1991, around the culmination of the conference, elements of the military loyal to Eyadema mounted actions against the emerging transitional authority in a bid to reverse the erosion of his power. This and a series of subsequent army interventions, including a bloody assault on the prime minister's office later in 1991, ultimately allowed Eyadema to claw back control, crush the democratic transition, and cling to power. He went on to rule Togo until his death in 2005, after nearly thirty eight years in office.
Researched Details
Researched
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Sources
Editorial Note
Cross-Reference
Only one dataset carries it. One of the three reference datasets we check against carries this event; the others do not list it. That is not a contradiction — the datasets cover different periods and use different thresholds — but it means the record has had less outside corroboration.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
- Cline Center id
46108261991
How the match is made is described in crossref-report.md.
Outcome and Target
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: President Gnassingbe Eyadema used army loyalty in the August 1991 crisis to reverse the national conference and keep power.
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
Daily Telegraph
Wall Street Journal
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 →