Cocaine has been, after oil, West Africa's highest value export to Europe in recent months, according to regional police reports. The coca which forms the basis of the drug is not ...

Praised for their peaceful and credible conduct at first, the elections turned violent when rivals clashed a week before the presidential runoff on 8 September.

President Mamadou Tandja has declared a state of alert in the north, the base of Niger's fast growing uranium industry, after attacks on key targets killed some 50 government soldi...

A decade ago, President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah was driven from power and Sierra Leone was gripped by a military junta. The entire region faced destabilisation. Troops were sent by Nige...

The presidential and parliamentary elections on 11 August have turned out to be closer and more credible than expected. Now they will be decided in a run-off vote between the two f...

Horse-trading aside, front running presidential candidate Ernest Bai Koroma and the People's Movement for Democratic Change's (PMDC) Charles Margai say their alliance will produce ...

Solomon Berewa wants a first-round victory on 11 August. As more than 2.6 million Sierra Leoneans prepare to elect a new president and 112 members of parliament, the grip of his go...

In these elections, the proportional representation system is replaced by voting in first-past-the-post constituencies. This makes personalities more important and increases the sw...

Essentially, the new presidency started last week. President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua appointed his cabinet on 26 July and followed this four days later with a sweeping shake-up of the ...

Murky reports of coup plots and corruption are tarnishing President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf’s government. Local political scheming undermines her high international credibility and t...