Before you invest,
know the ground.
What the reports won't tell you.
A project can look sound on paper and collapse because its ownership is contested, or because the rules change once you've signed. We tell you where the authorities actually stand — before you commit your capital.
A report written from London or Washington reads the same sources as everyone else.
Our work begins where the databases end: on the ground, with the people concerned, in a country we know from the inside.
Two areas of expertise, one knowledge of the ground
Understand the risk before you commit
You are about to invest, to sign with a local partner, to bid for a contract. You need to know what the public documents do not say.
Reading the position of the authorities
Where the State actually stands on a project, a sector or a transaction — and how that position is likely to shift.
On-the-ground due diligence
Verification of partners, counterparties and track records, through fieldwork conducted directly in Senegal and West Africa.
Political & regulatory risk
A reading of the dynamics at play, scenarios for how they may evolve, and your project's specific exposure — over a horizon that matters to your decision.
Enter African markets knowing the rules
The African Continental Free Trade Area has changed the rules of African trade. What still matters is knowing how they apply, in practice, country by country.
Market-entry strategy
Identifying entry routes, applicable regimes and points of friction, for a plan to establish or export across West Africa.
AfCFTA advisory
Understanding and using the continental framework: rules of origin, tariff regimes, opportunities and obligations — beyond the text.
Regional integration & trade
Insight into how continental trade actually works, drawn from seventeen years spent building and negotiating it.
For seventeen years, I helped build and negotiate the rules of African trade.
Director of Foreign Trade of Senegal, then the country's Chief Negotiator for the African Continental Free Trade Area, and finally President of the Council of Ministers that launched the continental market. I spent those years on the other side of the table — where the rules, the investment frameworks and the trade-offs are actually decided.
Time and again, I watched important decisions being made on the strength of reports that missed what mattered most: how things are really decided, and by whom.
That is why I founded Assomembodja & Associates. To put that knowledge — of the rules, and of the ground — at the service of those who must decide whether to invest in West Africa.
Assome Aminata Diatta
Confidentiality
Every engagement is covered by a mutual non-disclosure agreement. Intelligence gathered for one client is never gathered for another.
Protected sources
We never disclose our sources. It is the condition of our work, and of the trust of those who speak to us.
Bespoke
We do not sell off-the-shelf reports. Each engagement is scoped around your question, and yours alone.
A decision to make on Senegal or West Africa?
If you need to know what the reports won't tell you, write to us. The first conversation is confidential and without obligation.
info@assomembodja.com