5000 Francs CFA John Paul II

Togo has no meaningful historical connection to John Paul II — he never visited the country, and the Catholic population there, while present, was never a particular focus of his pontificate. This is a bullion-adjacent commemorative produced squarely for the collector market, one of dozens of similar issues bearing his likeness that flooded the market following his 2014 canonization. The West African CFA franc zone nations, Togo among them, have issued a large volume of these face-value-nominal silver pieces under licensing arrangements that effectively outsource their coin programs to European minting and marketing intermediaries.

The 155.5g specification corresponds to a standard 5 troy ounce planchet.