On this day: May 27 in African history

The Somali National Movement launched a major offensive against government forces in Hargeisa and Burao, escalating the Somaliland War of Independence.

Sources: U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) ; Human Rights Watch

Reda Kerbush, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

Ibn Khaldun, the Tunisian-born historian and scholar regarded as a father of sociology and historiography, was born.

Sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica ; Internet Archive (Muhammad Abdullah Enan, Ibn Khaldun: His Life and Work)

Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons

Faten Hamama, the celebrated Egyptian film actress often called the 'Lady of the Arabic Screen', was born.

Sources: EgyptToday ; BBC News

Cecil Layne / The Crisis, Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons

Fodeba Keita, the Guinean playwright and choreographer who founded Les Ballets Africains, died in the Camp Boiro prison under Sekou Toure's government.

Sources: Maitron (Dictionnaire biographique du mouvement ouvrier et du mouvement social) ; Numeridanse (Centre national de la danse) ; Internet Broadway Database (The Broadway League)

Abdoulaye Sekou Sow, who served as Prime Minister of Mali, died.

Sources: Malijet (Journal du Mali) ; World Statesmen

Britain's Judicial Committee of the Privy Council ruled that a Nigerian regional governor could remove a premier who no longer appeared to command a majority, reversing Nigeria's Supreme Court and, in effect, making Alhaji Adegbenro the rightful premier of the Western Region in place of Samuel Akintola. The same day Akintola's government amended the region's constitution, backdated to October 1960.

Sources: C. Hurst ; UCLA Library Digital Collections, Nnamdi Azikiwe Papers (Nigeria)

Read the full article: Regions, Census and Elections: Nigeria's Road to Crisis, 1945-1965