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500 Ekuele
| Issuer | Banco Popular |
|---|---|
| Year | 1975 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Ekwele (1975-1985) |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
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| Protection type | Watermark |
| Protection description | Portrait watermark of President M. N. Biyogo |
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| Comments |
Equatorial Guinea's brief experiment with the Ekuele — introduced in 1975 after the country abandoned the Peseta Guineana — coincided almost exactly with the most brutal phase of Francisco Macías Nguema's dictatorship. The currency reform was largely cosmetic, a nationalist gesture while the economy was collapsing from mass forced labor, the expulsion of foreign workers, and the near-total destruction of the cocoa sector that had previously made the territory one of Africa's wealthier colonial economies.
Thomas De La Rue produced the series to a competent technical standard, but the issuing authority, Banco Popular, was itself a political instrument with no meaningful independence. The Ekuele series was short-lived; after Macías was overthrown and executed in 1979, the country adopted the CFA Franc.