Last week local newspapers were full of criticism of President George W Bush during his whistle-stop tour of Africa when allegations of contact with Iraq again became headline news.

Calls were made in Niger for President Bush to visit in person to apologise for raising the uranium issue during his State of the Union address last year.

The private weekly Le Democrate posed that very question in a headline: Should Niger make the US apologise?

Some radicals in the country even suggested that Niger should complain to the International Court of Justice over President Bush's comments.

Niger is the world's third largest exporter of uranium after Canada and Australia and it is vital to the country's economy. In 1997, Uranium accounted for 70% of export revenues.

 . . .

The poor and sparsely populated nation is unused to Western attention and the government will be keen not to jeopardise the significant help it receives from the United States.

There are three times as many American as French aid workers in the former French colony, says the BBC's Idy Barou in the capital, Niamey.

Conveniently the mines minister has been out of contact in the United States during the past two weeks and is not expected back in Niger until the end of this week.

Whether he could add anything to what is already known about the source of the uranium reports is unclear.

There have already been several denials that the Iraqis had been seeking to buy uranium from Niger in the past few years.

Just two months ago the mines minister said the allegations were "pure invention" and "not true".

In December 2002, Prime Minister Hama Hamadou told the nation: "Iraq has never bought uranium from Niger, and the Niger Government has never discussed selling uranium to Iraq." [end of quotation]

Too bad the elite media, as they are termed, in D.C. did not get around to sounding out the Nigeriens. Regrettably, they were too busy interviewing each other.