Bokar Biro Barry

Bokar Biro Barry (also Boubacar Biro; died 13 November 1896) was the last independent Almami of the Imamate of Futa Jallon, the theocratic Fulani state in the highlands of present-day Guinea. Of the Soriya faction, based at Timbo, he seized power in 1890, lost it in 1892 and regained it in 1894, and spent his last years resisting both rival chiefs and the French, whose demands he refused. He died after the battle of Porédaka in November 1896, when French artillery destroyed his army; with him the independent imamate ended and the French protectorate began. ^{1 2}

No source read gives his birth date: both articles leave the year unknown, and the record therefore carries his death only. One detail of the death date is disputed within the French article itself: its lead and body give 13 November 1896, as does the English article, while its infobox gives 18 November at Botôre; the record follows 13 November and notes the variant. ^{1 2 3}

The Imamate of Futa Jallon had been established as a theocratic state in a jihad launched in 1725 by Karamokho Alfa and consolidated by his successor Ibrahim Sori. It was a loose federation of nine provinces, and two parties, the Alfaya and the Soriya — supporters of the descendants of the first two rulers — alternated in the office of Almami under a power-sharing arrangement. By the late nineteenth century the French were the dominant colonial power in the region and were angered by Futa Jallon's support for Samori Ture's Wassoulou Empire, which was also resisting them. ^{1 2}

Bokar Biro belonged to the Soriya faction and his base was Timbo, the capital of the federation. When the long reign of the Almami Ibrahima Sori Dongolfella ended with his death in 1890, the Council of Elders chose Bokar Biro's elder brother as ruler; Bokar Biro took power in a coup after assassinating his brother and began placing loyal men in positions of authority. He faced struggles between the Alfaya and Soriya factions, attempts by the rulers of Labé, Timbi and Fugumba to gain more autonomy, and an outflow of slaves and free people to the less oppressive French-controlled zones. ^{1 2}

In July 1892 he was forced to cede power to Amadu of the Alfaya faction, and he assumed power again in June 1894. Some chiefs asked the French for help to overthrow him, and Alfa Yaya of Labé manoeuvred for the full independence of his province. On 13 December 1895 the disgruntled chiefs under Modi Abdoullaye Dhokhiré defeated him at Bantignel and he barely escaped; weeks later, when most people thought him dead, he reappeared at Keebu, assembled a new army of 1,500 soldiers, and defeated his enemies on 2 February 1896. ^{1 2}

At the end of 1894 the French sent Raoul de Beeckman to negotiate a treaty. After nearly three months waiting on the border, de Beeckman crossed it without authorisation and attacked the village of Nanso, where one of the elders was killed; the incident fed Bokar Biro's hostility, and he accused the French of suppressing the slave trade with the Sudan and refusing to return runaway slaves, and suspected their trading and surveying visits of preparing a military intervention. ^{1 2}

De Beeckman returned on 18 March 1896 with a detachment of troops and demanded the right to build roads through Futa Jallon, install a representative in Timbo, vet all appointments of provincial chiefs and take a trade monopoly. Bokar Biro resisted, then pretended to sign the treaty to get the French out of the way while he dealt with his opponents; when the document was examined at Saint-Louis, it turned out that in place of his signature he had written "Bismillah" — "in the name of God". The French withdrew temporarily, and he treated the withdrawal as a victory and pursued an aggressively anti-French policy. When his term as Almami ended in April 1896 he refused to hand over office, and the power struggle came close to civil war. ^{1 2}

French troops from Senegal, Guinea and the Sudan converged on Futa Jallon, and a French column captured Timbo on 3 November 1896. Unable to enlist the chiefs' support, Bokar Biro fought a pitched battle on the plain of Porédaka on 13 November 1896; French artillery destroyed his army. A poet who described the battle said Bokar Biro kept his word: he did not flee from the French, but was killed by the blast of the cannon. In fact he escaped the battle, but was soon captured by soldiers of his enemy Sori Illili and decapitated; his son died with him. With his death the French assumed a protectorate over Futa Jallon. ^{1 2}

In this museum his faith is recorded as unknown. The sources present him as the head of a theocratic imamate, which is an office and not a personal attestation; neither article names a school, order or affiliation for him personally, and Wikidata records no religion value for him. ^{1 2 3}

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