Guinea: Over Bienvenu Lamah’s promotion to general

13 August 2026. Complicity in murder, rape, and assault occasioning actual bodily harm; abductions; unlawful detention; obstruction of assistance to victims. The charges against Bienvenu Lamah paint a chilling picture of a man who has been promoted to the rank of brigadier general of the national gendarmerie by decree of President Mamadi Doumbouya, only a few days after his acquittal. This promotion comes as the civil parties have appealed against this ruling by the Dixinn Criminal Court.

The Kaléyah military training centre, where Bienvenu Lamah was serving at the time, is said to have been the starting point for groups of “recruits in training” involved in the violations committed on 28 September 2009 at the stadium of the same name, which left 156 people dead, over a thousand injured, and saw more than 100 women raped. The prosecution had argued for the defendant’s responsibility and sought a ten-year prison sentence, calling for the acts to be reclassified as crimes against humanity.

“Given the charges that still stand against Bienvenu Lamah, since we have appealed the ruling acquitting him, his promotion to the rank of brigadier general of the Guinean national gendarmerie is an affront to the civil parties and amounts to normalising the violence of 28 September 2009“, said Drissa Traoré, Secretary-General of FIDH and lawyer for the civil parties in the Conakry trial.

“By promoting one of those allegedly responsible for the massacres of 28 September 2009, President Mamadi Doumbouya has chosen to reward, even before the judicial process has concluded, a person accused of acts classified as crimes against humanity. This sends a bad signal to all victims, and indeed to all Guineans, and runs counter to the rule of law and human dignity“, said Alpha Amadou DS Bah, President of the Guinean Organisation for the Defence of Human and Civil Rights (OGDH) and coordinating lawyer for the group of lawyers representing the civil parties.

“We observe that at Bienvenu Lamah’s trial, the victims were listened to without being heard. Their harrowing accounts left no doubt as to the defendant’s direct involvement in the worst violations committed on 28 September and in the days that followed. His promotion, after his acquittal, is felt as a deep wound and a further injustice for all those still waiting for recognition and justice“, said Asmaou Diallo, founder and President of the Association of Victims, Relatives and Friends of 28 September 2009 (AVIPA).

The appeal concerning Bienvenu Lamah is one of three appeals currently under way, lodged by the civil parties, to which the judicial authorities have yet to give any concrete response.