Vol 53 No 5 | GHANA Diplomatic challenge 2nd March 2012 Calling for African Union membership to be limited strictly to democratic states, Ghanaian presidential candidate Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said in London on 29 February that the AU...
Vol 5 (AAC) No 5 | GUINEA BISSAUCHINABRIEFING Containers of corruption 28th February 2012 The government of West Africa’s leading narco-state remains tight-lipped about a corruption case involving three officials of the Energy and Natural Resources Ministry who were arrested in November 2011...
Vol 5 (AAC) No 5 | LIBERIAJAPANBRIEFING Boardroom row over Tokyo’s oil grant 28th February 2012 A war of words has broken out between Negbalee Warner, Chairman of the Liberia Petroleum Refining Company, and his Managing Director, T. Nelson Williams. At issue is a US$25 million...
Vol 53 No 4 | SIERRA LEONE Early exit for UN envoy 17th February 2012 President Koroma falls out with a top diplomat over allegations of political interference United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon closed the door on a bitter dispute with the government of President Ernest Bai Koroma by recalling his Executive Representative for the...
Vol 53 No 4 | GUINEAMININGANALYSIS The gamble for Simandou 17th February 2012 Brazilian mining conglomerate Vale is keeping its operations under close review, after threatening to sell its investments in Guinea last month. After tough talks with its minority partner and President Alpha Condé’s government, Vale has for now pulled back from the brink. Yet it still has grave misgivings about the terms and conditions of a project in which it may have to invest as much as US$10 billion for a stake in one of the world’s richest iron-ore mines. The financial firm JP Morgan estimates that Simandou’s Vale-controlled blocks can produce 50 mn. tonnes of ore annually by 2020. That compares favourably with the output of...
Vol 53 No 4 | GUINEA Condé takes on the army and opposition 17th February 2012 Hard choices confront President Alpha Condé as he comes under pressure to set a date for parliamentary elections this year. Polling was postponed from November 2011, after Condé...
Vol 53 No 4 | GHANA Who paid whom for what? 17th February 2012 Ministers have lost their jobs, the President’s anti-corruption halo is tarnished and the scandals are running out of control The deepening row over Alfred Agbesi Woyome’s financing of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) is a nightmare for President John Atta Mills’s re-election campaign. The scandal has...
Vol 53 No 4 | GHANA The Woyome scandal and its casualties 17th February 2012 The Woyome scandal has so far claimed two cabinet ministers. The Education Minister and former Attorney General, Betty Mould-Iddrisu, resigned on 23 January, after her successor as AG,...
Vol 53 No 4 | MALI Libyan arms fuel Tuareg revolt 17th February 2012 Mali has rapidly moved from peaceful political campaigning to bloody military confrontation and inter-communal strife Battle-hardened fighters of the Mouvement national pour la libération de l’Azawad – equipped with heavy weapons they brought back from Libya – are confronting the Malian army in...
Vol 53 No 4 | MALI MNLA’s deadly mobility 17th February 2012 Attacks by the Mouvement national pour la libération de l’Azawad (MNLA) have been not only fierce but well planned. The late January assault on Ménaka, in the far...