West Africa

The Union of African States: Ghana, Guinea, and Mali's Attempt at Federation (Article)
The End of the Nigerian Civil War and Gowon's 'No Victor, No Vanquished' Policy (Article)
The Death of Fela Kuti, Father of Afrobeat (Article)
Nina Simone's Ashes and Her Years of Exile in Liberia (Article)
Ghana's Right of Abode and the Year of Return (Article)
Maya Angelou's Years in Ghana, 1962-1965 (Article)
Mali's Independence and the Collapse of the Mali Federation (Article)
The Disputed Legend of a Pre-Columbian Malian Voyage to the Americas (Article)
Timbuktu's Golden Age as a Center of Islamic Scholarship (Article)
Nigeria's Independence Day, October 1, 1960 (Article)
Sankara Confronts Mitterrand Over Apartheid, Ouagadougou 1986 (Article)
How the CIA Watched Nigeria's 1966 Crisis Unfold in Real Time (Article)
France Returns 26 Looted Treasures to Benin, 129 Years Later (Article)
W.E.B. Du Bois's Move to Ghana and Final Years (Article)
Muhammad Ali's 1971 Goodwill Visit to Nigeria (Article)
Nigeria's First Coup: The January 1966 Uprising Led by Kaduna Nzeogwu (Article)
Jerry Rawlings' Two Coups: 1979 and 1981 in Ghana (Article)
The 1975 Coup That Overthrew Nigeria's Yakubu Gowon in Kampala (Article)
MKO Abiola: The 1993 Election He Won, and His Death in Custody in 1998 (Article)
Kofi Busia's Government Overthrown in Ghana's 1972 Coup (Article)
Chief Obafemi Awolowo's Release From Prison, August 1966 (Article)
Samuel Doe's 1980 Coup and the Killing of William Tolbert (Article)
The 2012–2013 Rescue of Timbuktu's Ancient Manuscripts (Article)
The CIA's 1986 Warning and the Coup That Killed Thomas Sankara (Article)
Portugal's Founding Role in the Transatlantic Slave Trade (Article)
Thomas Sankara's Final Months, Isolation, and October 15, 1987 (Article)
The 1966 Coup That Overthrew Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah (Article)
The University of Aberdeen's Return of a Benin Bronze (Article)
The Third Anglo-Ashanti War and the Burning of Kumasi, 1873–1874 (Article)
The Church of England's Benin Bronzes Pledge: What It Actually Covers (Article)
Yaa Asantewaa and the War of the Golden Stool (Article)
Mansa Musa's 1324 Pilgrimage to Mecca (Article)
From Gold Coast to Ghana: The 1957 Independence and the Name Nkrumah Chose (Article)
Sani Abacha: Nigeria's Strongman and His Sudden Death in 1998 (Article)
The 1963 Togo Coup: Africa's First and the Killing of Sylvanus Olympio (Article)
Cheikh Anta Diop and the Contested Question of Ancient Egypt's Race (Article)
The Ancient Empire of Ghana, and Why It Isn't the Modern Country (Article)
Freetown and the Founding of the Sierra Leone Creole People (Article)
Britain's Transatlantic Slave Trade, by the Numbers (Article)
Charles Taylor: Warlord, President, and Convicted War Criminal (Article)
Sékou Touré: Guinea's Independence Hero and Authoritarian Ruler (Article)
Where Africa's Millionaires Lived in 2012: Johannesburg, Cairo, and Lagos (Article)
Aliko Dangote and Folorunsho Alakija: Nigeria's Billionaire Firsts (Article)
How DNA Testing Traced Isaiah Washington and Coretta Scott King to Sierra Leone's Mende People (Article)
Mansa Musa: How Rich Was History's Wealthiest Man? (Article)
How Lincoln University Shaped Africa's First Presidents (Article)
The Slave Dungeons of Elmina Castle (Article)
Why Ghana's Flag and Football Team Both Bear a Black Star (Article)
Béhanzin: The Last Independent King of Dahomey (Article)
Sankara's Debt Speech to the OAU and His Assassination Three Months Later (Article)
The CFA Franc: France's Colonial-Era Currency Arrangement and Its Contested Legacy (Article)
The 1997 'Phantom Coup': Abacha's Arrest of His Own Deputy, Oladipo Diya (Article)
Murtala Muhammed's 1975 Coup Against Yakubu Gowon (Article)
The American Colonization Society and the Founding of Liberia (Article)
The 1966 Coup Against Nkrumah and the Disputed Question of US Involvement (Article)
The 1947 NCNC Delegation to London and the Fight Against the Richards Constitution (Article)
Thomas Sankara's Case for Women's Liberation as Revolution (Article)
Kwame Nkrumah's Death in Exile and His Return to Ghana (Article)
The Battle of Nsamankow: How the Asante Killed a British Governor (Article)
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Africa's First Elected Female President (Article)
Senegal's Unmatched Record of Coup-Free Governance in West Africa (Article)
Buhari's 1983 Coup Ends Nigeria's Second Republic (Article)
MLK's 1957 Trip to Ghana, and the Sermon That Coined "Free at Last" (Article)
From Ballon d'Or to Ballot Box: George Weah's Election as Liberia's President (Article)
The Dahomey Amazons: The Kingdom's All-Female Army (Article)
The Anglo-Ashanti Wars: A Century of Resistance in the Gold Coast (Article)
The Ife Bronzes: A German Explorer Couldn't Believe Africans Made Them, So He Blamed Atlantis (Article)
Sungbo's Eredo: A 100-Mile Wall in Nigeria That Took a Century to Rediscover (Article)
The Nok Civilisation: Central Nigeria's Terracotta Culture, and What Its Dates Actually Show (Article)
Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart: The Novel That Launched African Literature in English (Article)
The Dogon and Sirius B: A 'Lost Ancient Knowledge' Story That Later Fieldwork Couldn't Confirm (Article)
Gorée Island's 'Door of No Return': What Historians Actually Dispute (Article)
The Chibok Schoolgirls: What Actually Happened After Boko Haram's 2014 Abduction (Article)
Why Virginia Has More Igbo Descendants Than Almost Anywhere Else in the Diaspora (Article)
Mauritania Banned Slavery in 1981. It Didn't Become a Crime There Until 2007. (Article)
Nigeria's 1914 Amalgamation: A Budget Fix That Created a Country (Article)
The 1897 Sack of Benin City and the Looting of the Benin Bronzes (Article)
Gordon Laing Won the Race to Timbuktu, and Was Murdered Two Days Later (Article)
Philip Emeagwali's Real Gordon Bell Prize, and the 'Father of the Internet' Claim He Added Later (Article)
Bunostegos: The 260-Million-Year-Old, Impossibly Bumpy Reptile Found in Niger (Article)
Nigeria's Population Explosion, From 16 Million to a Projected Global Top Three (Article)
The Knife Attack on Mali's Assimi Goita During Eid Prayers (Article)
The Lekki Toll Gate Shooting and the Nigerian Government's Denial (Article)
Trump's July 2025 White House Summit With Five West African Leaders (Article)
The Death of Tony Allen, the Drummer Who Built Afrobeat's Sound (Article)
Why Femi Otedola Kept Falling Off, and Back Onto, Forbes's Billionaire List (Article)
Air Peace's Free Flights Home During South Africa's 2019 Xenophobic Attacks (Article)
Majek Fashek's 1992 Letterman Performance and His Reggae Legacy (Article)
How a Web-Popularity Ranking Became Africa's Go-To University List (Article)
David Oyedepo, Forbes's Pick for the World's Richest Pastor (Article)
Agbani Darego, the First Black African to Win Miss World (Article)
Michael Jackson's 1992 Coronation as 'King of Sani' in Ivory Coast (Article)
Mali Gave Away Its .ML Domain for Free. It Became a Spam Haven. (Article)
Nnewi, the Nigerian Town That Bred the Country's First Billionaire (Article)
Senegal Becomes the First African Team to Beat England (Article)
Fela Kuti's 'Zombie' Enters the Grammy Hall of Fame (Article)
Mamoudou Gassama, the 'Spider-Man of Paris' Who Scaled a Building to Save a Child (Article)
Muhammad Ali's 1964 Homecoming to Ghana (Article)
Saint-Louis: The Island City That Ruled Three French Colonies (Article)
The CIA's Classified 1970 Verdict on 'Nigeria After the War' (Article)
George Weah Becomes Africa's Only World and European Footballer of the Year (Article)
A 2017 Study Found More Than 10,000 Chinese Firms Operating in Africa (Article)
More Than a Million Africans Fought for Britain in World War II (Article)
Fourah Bay College: The School That Made Freetown 'the Athens of West Africa' (Article)
Nigeria Recalculated Its Way to 'Africa's Largest Economy' in 2014 (Article)
The Asante Empire: How a Confederation of Akan Chiefdoms Built West Africa's Toughest Military Power (Article)
The Ghana Empire: West Africa's First Great Trading State, and How Its Fall Got Rewritten (Article)
Ivory Coast's First Coup: Robert Guéï Overthrows Henri Konan Bédié, 1999 (Article)
The Mali Empire: Sundiata's Kingdom, Mansa Musa's Wealth, and a Century-Long Fade (Article)
The Sokoto Caliphate: West Africa's Most Populous 19th-Century State (Article)
The Songhai Empire: West Africa's Last Great Sahelian Power (Article)