Vol 50 No 18 | NIGERIA After the bank purge, back to the politics 11th September 2009 Taken aback by the seriousness of the Central Bank’s efforts to reform the financial sector, some politicians and debtors are plotting their revenge The targets of Central Bank of Nigeria Governor Lamido Sanusi's banking purge are beginning to fight back. Four bank chief executives have been arraigned on criminal charges and...
Vol 50 No 18 | CÔTE D'IVOIRE Trafigura and the toxic waste 11th September 2009 The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Toxic Waste, Okechukwu Ibeanu, is challenging claims by oil-trader Trafigura and its Ivorian subcontractor Tommy that the waste they dumped in Abidjan...
Vol 50 No 17 | NIGERIA After the boom, a purge 28th August 2009 A Central Bank audit has uncovered evidence of fraud and mismanagement which implicates some leading politicians and their business partners Like a family of latter day Medicis, Nigeria's top bankers have been prospering thanks to their acute political instincts and abilities to exploit their dominance in a tightly...
Vol 50 No 17 | NIGERIA Theatre, peace and votes in the Delta 28th August 2009 The surrender of about 1,000 militants in the Niger Delta was superbly choreographed. With hundreds of guns behind him, Ebikabowei Victor Ben - better known as 'General Boyloaf...
Vol 50 No 17 | GHANA A new economic team emerges 28th August 2009 Facing a downturn and needing an oil strategy, President Mills picks his own experts For his Council of Economic Advisors, President John Atta Mills has picked a team with wide experience of Western financial and academic institutions. They are academics, more used...
Vol 50 No 17 | CÔTE D'IVOIRE Trafigura in court 28th August 2009 Swiss-based oil trader Trafigura will have an eventful September before it goes on trial on 6 October in Britain's largest class action lawsuit. At the centre of this...
Vol 2 (AAC) No 10 | SENEGAL Wade's monumental error 27th August 2009 A secret deal involving the sale of public land is financing an ugly statue and tourist centre, built under contract by a North Korean company The latest grand projet from President Abdoulaye Wade - the US$30 million Monument de la Renaissance Africaine - has quickly become an extreme parody of bad government in the eyes of...
Vol 2 (AAC) No 10 | NIGERIASOUTH KOREABRIEFING KNOC, KNOC, who is there? 27th August 2009 In mid-August, Nigeria's Federal High Court overturned President Umaru Yar'Adua's revoking, in January, of Seoul-based Korea National Oil Company's rights to 60% of Oil Prospecting Licences 321 and 323 in a...
Vol 50 No 16 | NIGERIA Islamists raise the stakes as they take on Yar'Adua 7th August 2009 A militant leader lies dead after his sect fought the faltering government Within days of a truce being declared between militants in the Niger Delta and the government, serious fighting broke out in Nigeria's poverty-ridden north (AC Vol 50 No...
Vol 50 No 16 | NIGERIA Inside Boko Haram 7th August 2009 The late Ustaz Mohammed Yusuf's Boko Haram group had about 2,000 members, some of whom had first attacked police stations in 2003. The group's rhetoric grew increasingly violent,...