Africa’s surprising new age of rail

“Every inhabitant of Thiès”, wrote a Senegalese novelist, Ousmane Sembène, in 1960, “depended on the railway.” Like many African cities, Thiès was a product of the continent’s first, colonial-era rail revolution. The French-built railway that ran through it stretched from the Senegalese port of Dakar to Mali, deep in the Sahel, ferrying peanuts, gold and other raw materials to the coast for export. But in recent decades the line has atrophied. A succession of foreign firms took over its management after it was privatised in 2003. Each failed to maintain or expand it. In 2018 the leg from Senegal to Mali halted operations entirely. Its rusting remains in Thiès lie under rubbish and weeds.