Guinea-Bissau Coins 1977

@slerk, these are great pick-ups. Are these part of a OFEC collection for you?

Interesting a former Portuguese colony using a Peso denomination. Do you happen to know why?

I wonder if the dearth of examples of the coinage in particular in the US is due simply to the Marxist orientation of the country and it's treatment of local soldiers who fought with Portugal against the revolutionaries. I personally find it reprehensible that the winners slaughtered over 7,700 former soldiers after peace was proclaimed. It is not a country I would want to be associated with.

I still don't understand why these coins are so expensive. The mintage don't look too small. For my coins, these are: 6,000,000; 7,000,000; 2,500,000. Does anyone know why their cost is so high and why they are rare?
@Sap,Thank you for the story.
UPD: As soon as I receive my coins, I will display them here again.

We Guys

I paid about $ 19 for all 3 coins

Excellent!

Very nice!

Very interesting, Guine Bissau was previously Portuguese and unlike the rest of African colonies in the era, Portugal had the near fascist Caetano controlling it and its empire, he aggressively pushed for further dependence and sending more white Portuguese people to these places (Especially Angola - I have several stamps and a settling tax called Povamento was charged and funds were used to lure "blancas" to Angola and Mocambique).

There was less emphasis to lure blancas to Guine Bissau, Sao Tome or Cabo Verde though.

The civil wars and fighting in all of these places started around 1965 and continued through to 1974. Sadly all of these movements were basically COMMUNIST at a time when the USA could not care about Communism and the fighters got limited support from the USSR and Cuba. South Africa also helped the Portuguese troops as their hyper racist system just hated 1. Africans and 2. Communists.

In 1973/74 the Carnation Revolution happened in Portugal and Caetano fell (His fall ended 50 years of state fascism a la Franco style that had started with Salazar in 1925). The result was a democratic style government which ended all the wars with the African colonies and the beginning of independence. In 1974/75 all 5 places became independent and communist states ruled by one party. In Bissau and Cabo Verde it was the PAIGC ruled by Amilcar and Pedro Cabral.

Mocambique, Angola and Bissau instantly lapsed into civil wars that lasted until 1990s as groups of American funded democratic (But still brutal) revolutionaries fought the COMMUNIST governments (Some of the currencies are hilarious with their communist stars and African idealised communism). The result was mass deaths, famines, crop failures, failed social experiments, epidemics, deaths and as one expert said, a battlefield of failed People's republics.

It also saw crazy inflation with the 1000 Guinean Peso note being worth 5 cents by 1980. Mozambique and Angola were much worse. By the 2000s Communism had been abandoned the states moved on - Cape Verde became well off and stable, Mozambique is heading that way but held back by no infrastructure, damaging weather events and crop failures along now with Islamists in the extreme north of the country.

Angola is a kelptomaniacs paradise with the blessing of oil making many in Luanda rich but the rest poor and shut out. Sao Tome is about as stable as an impoverished African state can be, but Bissau is still a basket case on its knees, surrounded by Senegal and Guinea (The French one known for the Yeke Yeke song).

When Independence came, all the states were essentially part of the Lusiaphone community (Portuguese speaking) as many were diverse African tribes and many language groups, so hence the government lingua franca was Portuguese, and they did not have minting facilities so currency was made in Portugal or in eastern bloc countries like East Germany, the USSR and even Cuba.

The set of coins is rare as most were hoarded or melted down, as far as I know its scarce and the 50 cents was aluminum, the 1 and 2½ were brass and 2 hi coins were cupro nickel.

Metal currencies for these places did not last long as inflation dug in Bnaknotes took over. Mozambique and Angola also started with metal currencies (African names were used Kwanzas and Meticals) and by 1980 these were worthless and notes were used.