ABSTRACT
Consequent upon the nature of their origin, African capital cities often occupy sites and locations in relation to the rest of the country which are inappropriate for national capitals, as opposed to colonial capitals. At independence twenty-three of the thirty-two capital cities of continental seaboard states in Africa were ports. The following capital cities, for example, are at least ten times larger than the next highest-ranking town in terms of population: Luanda, Bujumbura, Bangui, Djibouti, Conakry, Bissau, Maseru, Bamako, Maputo, Kigali, Victoria and Mogadishu. In some cases the high growth rate of capital cities is partly explained by changes affecting statistics, for example, boundary adjustment or more reliable enumeration. But the major part of growth of capital cities derives from the singular attractiveness of these cities as places of paid employment, modernity and, perhaps above all, political power.
