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Sékou Touré, the charismatic leader of Guinea between 1958 and 1984, fostered a political myth in which he occupied the position of hero of the independence and father of the nation. The common phrase "Guinea-Sékou Touré" thus illustrated the imagined similarity between his own personal fate and the country’s destiny. However, Sékou Touré has never been universally commemorated in complimentary terms: alongside the official ideology promoted under his rule and after his death, other actors propagated representations which challenged this image of the leader and questioned the national and political myth he embodied. As a result of these contradictory memories Sékou Touré has become a deeply ambiguous figure found somewhere between hero and tyrant.