Benin

Chairing the Economic Community of West African States has pushed the reclusive General Sani Abacha into the limelight with Nigeria's neighbours. None, perhaps, is more important to Nigeria...

Mathieu Kérékou is back in power. Benin's electors preferred the strongman they once rejected to Nicéphore Soglo, the economic reformer whose policies brought them scant rewards. Benin's...

The prospect of former dictator Mathieu Kérékou returning to power as elected President worries those who argue that economic liberalisation must go hand-in-hand with democratisation. In the first...

Next month's presidential election is important not just for the Beninese, who will give their verdict on five years of economic reform, but more widely as a test...