AT A GLANCE
Why go?
Place du Souvenir is a small but historically loaded public square in Cotonou, set at the corner of Rue 390 and the Route de l’Aéroport in the Haie Vive district. It is best known as the monument site remembering the Beninese soldiers and civilian who died during the failed 1977 mercenary attack on the city, an event that remains one of the defining moments in the country’s modern political history.↗↗↗
The visual centerpiece is a powerful concrete monument of three fighters—two men and a woman—moving with weapons and the Beninese flag, inaugurated in January 1979. Once called Place des Martyrs, the square has been reinvented as a civic landmark that combines memory, urban circulation, public art and occasional commemorative ceremonies.↗↗
Why this square matters
The story begins on 16 January 1977, when an aircraft landed unexpectedly at Cotonou airport and a group of mercenaries, associated in Beninese accounts with the French adventurer Bob Denard, launched an armed attempt to seize key sites in the city, including military and presidential locations. The attackers did not reach their objective. After several hours of fighting, they withdrew toward the airport and left the attempt in failure.