Jean-Yves Le Drian and Florence Parly so familiar to West African capitals for the past five years as the ministers of foreign affairs and the armed forces have departed office in President Emmanuel Macron's post-re-election reshuffle. Le Drian who as
26th May 2022

After being put on hold during the pandemic plans to reform the CFA franc zone are back on the agenda in West Africa. These plans are unfolding as criticism of France's economic and political role in the region is mounting. In December 2019 a meeting in
26th May 2022

DOWNLOAD A PDF OF THIS SPECIAL REPORT Billionaire Vincent Bolloré who has built up monopoly control over some of the biggest container terminals in Africa is heading back to the French courts with two of his top executives to face charges of bribery. Th
5th May 2022

Emmanuel Macron who has been called France's 'first post-colonial president' is bidding for re-election after a first term in which colonial history cast a long shadow on policies ranging from climate change job creation and migration to regional secu
8th Apr 2022

Three weeks after President Félix Tshisekedi ordered the arrest of his senior security advisor François Beya for plotting a coup a shroud of silence still surrounds the affair. Beya had managed relations with former President Joseph Kabila and his family
24th Feb 2022

Amid suspicions that Russia is trying to engineer an alliance between its friends in Bangui and leaders of the military junta in Sudan the problems in President Faustin Archange Touadéra's government are converging. The resignation of Prime Minister Henr
15th Feb 2022

The military takeover in Ouagadougou the third in West Africa in a year is a challenge to neighbouring governments especially Niger and the region's wider security strategy. In different ways jihadist insurgents linked to Al Qaida and Da'ish (Islamic
26th Jan 2022

Prominent Congolese journalist Sosthène Kambidi was conditionally freed on 12 October after three weeks in custody with earlier charges from a military prosecutor of conspiracy rebellion and association with terrorists dropped and replaced with a
21st Oct 2021

If President Emmanuel Macron needed a reminder of his country's reputation in Africa it came with the fury on the streets of Ndjamena to his ill-phrased remarks at the funeral of President Idriss Déby Itno last month. Macron called Déby a 'courageous fri
13th May 2021

Within a week of the killing of President Idriss Déby Itno on the front line in the early hours of 20 April his international allies had twice changed their policy stance. Until then thanks to the late President Chad was stable nearly free of any terr
29th Apr 2021