Vol 59 No 4 | NIGERIA 'Feigned lawsuit' bid to foil US 23rd February 2018 US authorities say bogus litigation is being used to try to prevent the seizure of Nigerian oil traders' assets A string of unusual lawsuits is frustrating law-enforcement agencies' attempts to seize assets belonging to oil traders accused of becoming extraordinarily wealthy because they were cronies of Diezani...
Vol 59 No 4 | SIERRA LEONE 'Usual suspects' face challenge 23rd February 2018 With two weeks to polling day, the field is surprisingly open among those wooing voters for the chance to succeed Koroma To many, the scandal surrounding the government's misuse of IMF funds to prime the electoral pump for the benefit of the ruling All People's Congress typifies the country's...
Vol 59 No 4 | MALI Fertilising dialogue 23rd February 2018 By choosing Mopti for his first provincial trip since becoming Prime Minister on 30 December, Soumeylou Boubèye Maïga signalled the urgency of the crisis in the central region....
Vol 59 No 4 | NIGERIA The Tinubu test 23rd February 2018 If aspiring candidates want to know which way the political wind is blowing, they watch Bola Tinubu, the former governor of Lagos State. After several months of froideur...
Vol 59 No 3 | NIGERIA Rumblings in the regions 9th February 2018 Veteran soldier-politicians, agitated by the clashes between farmers and herdsmen and a poor economy, urge Buhari not to run again Do not adjust your almanacs. The succession of statements from retired generals and civil war veterans, most of whom held power in the 1980s, may make it look...
Vol 59 No 3 | NIGERIA Flying blind 9th February 2018 The US sale of ground-attack aircraft is hugely expensive and is of doubtful strategic value in the fight against Boko Haram President Donald Trump's decision to unfreeze export approval for weapons for Nigeria, mainly combat aircraft, is under fire. Not only does the Nigerian air force (NAF) have a...
Vol 59 No 3 | MALISAHEL Strains on the front line 9th February 2018 Opération Pagnali signals a cross-national resolve to fight jihadists, but gaps in command and control may unsettle the G5's future Important organisational and financial matters may remain unresolved, but the G5 Sahel countries' new joint military force is preparing to launch Opération Pagnali regardless. It will be the...
Vol 59 No 3 | CÔTE D'IVOIRE Jockeying for position 9th February 2018 With presidential elections two years away, ambitious politicians in the ruling party are manoeuvring to inherit Ouattara's mantle 'You can't be in government and in opposition at the same time. You must choose.' Joël N'Guessan, one of the ruling Rassemblement des républicains (RDR) Vice-Presidents, thus...
Vol 59 No 3 | SIERRA LEONE Drilling down 9th February 2018 Sierra Leone's biggest mining company, Tonkolili Iron Ore, has been accused of complicity in rape, assault and the false imprisonment of a protester in a landmark case being...
Vol 59 No 3 | SIERRA LEONE IMF stops funds over 'election' budget 30th January 2018 The government is spending IMF money on trying to win the election, not on agreed measures for economic recovery. The Fund has suspended payments A confidential despatch by United States diplomats in Freetown has laid bare the cause of strained relations between President Ernest Bai Koroma's government and the International Monetary Fund;...