Button from Sahrawi. The text on the button reads:" Heroes of freedom and dignity".
El-Ouali Mustapha Sayedwas (1949-1976) was a Sahrawi nationalist leader, co-founder and second Secretary-General of the Polisario Front.
El-Ouali grew increasingly disturbed by the oppressive Spanish colonial rule over what was then known as Spanish Sahara. After a Sahrawi demonstration in Tan-Tan in June 1972, a group of 20 participants including Ouali were detained and tortured by the Moroccan police; then he met with other groups of Sahrawis from inside Western Sahara, Algeria & Mauritania, and in 1973 founded with them the Polisario Front.
On 9 June 1976 El-Ouali was killed by a shrapnel piece through the head returning from a major Polisario raid on the Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott, in which they bombarded the Presidential palace. El-Ouali is revered as a Father of the Nation by the Sahrawi refugee population, and there is a simple stone memorial built to his honor in the desert. The day of his death, 9 June, has been declared The Day of the Martyrs, a holiday of the republic that honors all Sahrawi victims in the war for independence.