Yakubu Gowon inherited a nation soaked in the blood of two coups. He then presided over a civil war that killed up to two million people. His government oversaw an incredible oil boom that turned Nigeria from a groundnut exporter into a petro-state. Yet he watched as the system around him became the most corrupt government Nigeria had ever seen.This is the story of how trust built a presidency — and destroyed it.This is Episode 3 of Power & Plunder — a 16-part series covering every head of state Nigeria has had since independence. Built on declassified British and American archives, court records, and primary sources.My Sources:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1L_bgWkzUOq6hQre9wVoEEt7qdYFcRk9D9euVevmaF48/edit?usp=sharing

On January 15, 1966, a group of young Nigerian officers launched a coordinated assassination plot that killed the Prime Minister, the Northern Premier, and nearly every senior political and military figure in the country. The one man they were supposed to kill but missed — Major General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi — ended up ruling the nation by the next morning.He didn't plan the coup. He didn't want the job. But for the next 194 days, everything he did was used against him.This is Episode 2 of Power & Plunder — a 16-part series covering every head of state Nigeria has had since independence. Built on declassified British and American archives, court records, and primary sources.My Sources:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1whhmgEzvbeRnW42HtWYjJJtItMaMbA35o3ZqwLCHsUk/edit?usp=sharing

In 1914, Britain smashed two completely different territories into one colony — because it was cheaper. They rigged the constitution, found oil, changed the rules, and handed it all to a man who knew the whole thing was broken.His name was Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. The Golden Voice of Africa. He was Nigeria's Unlucky prime minister who was set up to fail.This is Episode 1 of Power & Plunder — a 16-part series covering every head of state Nigeria has had since independence. Built on declassified British and American archives, court records, and primary sources.My Sources:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qTavbF3rpMKse122oEeGXygHtaVqM8J9msvW3ElZbdI/edit?usp=sharing

The Bush administration classified Somalia as part of the "Global War on Terror." They saw a failed state, an Islamist movement taking power, and they saw a potential al-Qaeda haven. What they did next was something straight out of thrilling spy movies. A secret operation aimed at preventing terrorism in East Africa. However, things went South pretty fast and that covert action instead created the very monster now hunting them.This is the story of how the United States 'accidentally' made Al-Shabaab.

My Sources:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1G86txCYx548Sf_LTftx-rgUstLOP4qlOUwdZUELkhxw/edit?usp=sharing

The IMF was created many years ago with the intention of providing loans to countries in financial need, but the conditions attached to these loans seem to be causing more harm than good for poor African countries. This is the story of one of the world's biggest financial scams, where one of the most respected financial institutions in the world keeps paying African countries to stay poor.

On one remote hillside in northern Tanzania lies the only source of tanzanite on Earth — a gem a thousand times rarer than diamonds. This documentary follows how that single mountain became the centre of a global criminal economy, where foreign corporations, corrupt officials, and international smugglers stole billions in blue stone while the people living on the mountain were left in poverty or buried in its tunnels.

Beneath the dry, red soil stretching from Zamfara through Kaduna and into Niger State lies one of West Africa's most lucrative gold deposits. For generations, villagers dug these pits by hand, crude tools, modest yields, enough to sustain a family. But sometime around 2011, something shifted. What had been a humble artisanal livelihood began transforming into a criminally engineered enterprise. One that now sits at the heart of Nigeria's worst security crisis.

This is the story of Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo.My Sources:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MXH-etGZ13klSj2QaUTPboh5O04n58VKIGC3ujCrlf8/edit?usp=drivesdk