africa

An image of outgoing Liberian President George Weah pointing stands out from a backdrop of african leaders

Weah’s New Jersey for A Troubled Continent

Africa /

Weah was determined to launch an earlier presidential bid that may have disrupted Johnson’s presidency. Regional leaders fearing Liberia’s fragile state prevailed on him to wait. After watching bands of mostly jobless and potentially vulnerable rural youths fall under the spell of Weah’s star power, Nigeria’s president at the time, Olusegun Obasanjo, advised the former World Footballer of the Year to suspend his ambition and return to school

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Image of Africa's map showing countries where there have been coup, edited from an infographic by Daily Trust

Again, A Bizarre Joke in Niger Speaks French

Africa, politics /

The other important part was Tanja’s confrontation with French state-owned atomic energy group, Areva, which had enjoyed a de facto monopoly of the country’s rich uranium, a strategic resource for France’s nuclear power. Areva’s profit from uranium is twice Niger’s GDP. In a multi-million-dollar deal with China in which Tanja did not mind cutting Niger’s nose to spite the face of France, he pulled the plug on Francophone Africa’s most significant player, making the French play second fiddle to the new Chinese bride. When the tables turned following Tanja’s ouster, Paris was more than happy to dance on his political grave. But the story did not end there. According to Tom Burgis in his no-holds-barred book, _The Looting Machine_ , Niger spent $47 million from the proceeds of the uranium deal on arms to suppress the Tuareg rebels; and when a further $300 million came later from signature payment by China National Petroleum Corporation, to develop an oil block, the question was no longer whether Tanja could afford to make trouble, but how much

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photo merge of burna boy and the INEC ballot box

A British Example in Our Rascally Times

politics /

I took particular interest in four anglophone countries with a fairly vibrant and robust tradition of press freedom and randomly browsed coverage, just before, during and after the polls, to see if I would be disappointed. I wasn’t. Not by Ghana, Nigeria’s western neighbour, which has its own district and local elections later this year…The Editor of a major Ghanaian newspaper, The Chronicle , Emmanuel Akli, explained why: ‘The Ghanaian economy is in a very bad shape,’ he said. ‘The press is struggling. Readership is very low. Advertising is even worse. We are all struggling, and that includes Daily Graphic the biggest daily. We can’t even cover internal issues well, never mind sending reporters to cover elections in Nigeria!

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