The unified opposition against incumbent President Abdoulaye Wade has produced a new leader for the West African country in Macky Sall.

The ICC confirmed the charges against William Ruto and Uhuru Kenyatta, but they are rallying their ethnic bases in order to fight the charges and prepare for August 2012 elections.

Senegalese opposition leaders have asked former Nigerian president, Olusegun Obasanjo, on an election observation mission in Senegal, to dissuade 85-year-old leader, Abdoulaye Wade from seeking a third term.

The electoral registration frenzy among Senegalese youth in districts across the country is a result of "Y'en a marre's" awareness campaign. But Y'en a Marre...

Those who doubted the near-86 year-old Senegalese leader, Abdoulaye Wade's capacity of campaigning will have to eat their words.

Angola: People to watch in 2012 - Maria Idalina de Oliveira Valente Commerce minister

Appointed commerce minister in 2008, Idalina Valente is a respected technocrat. Joining parliament with the MPLA in 1992, she served as deputy planning minister from 1996 to 2000.

In 2010, she survived the cull following the new constitution that reordered the country's economic governance. An economist by education, with two post-graduate qualifications, Valente is one of only a handful of female ministers in the cabinet.

She has published a number of academic papers on poverty, post-conflict social rehabilitation and the role of women in both phenomena.

Also a member of the MPLA central committee, Valente is faced with the task of overhauling Angola's complex commercial system, which is mired in corruption and in desperate need of post-war modernisation.

This article was first published in the November edition of The Africa Report, on sale at newsstands, via our print subscription or our digital edition.