The newspaper suggests that the term "Tropical Africa" might be a better description for Africa's poorest countries. It would have the advantage of taking in states between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn and excluding many Mediterranean and southern African states.

Not content with questioning Al Gore's choice of words, the paper also takes a side swipe at his policies, describing the US proposal for more money to fight the Aids virus as "more in the nature of a penny tossed to a beggar by a detached tycoon".

The Clinton administration's pledge in 1997 to spend $325m on the worldwide fight against Aids represents about $10, or the price of a `Puff Daddy' CD, to each of the 33m people now living with HIV/Aids, the paper remarks.

The writer points to the light sentence handed down to a preacher convicted of child rape as an example of what it sees as this hypocrisy. The defence of the pastor involved had reportedly argued in his bail application that he "owned property valued at around $100 million".

For a real piece of Sodom and Gomorrah in Zimbabwe, the paper advises readers to look among preachers whose religious principles are apparently flexible enough to have personal wealth of this magnitude.

The ex-leader should be asking for forgiveness, not votes.

The only support he can count on is from people who let "tribal and regional sentiments... hijack their thinking faculties".

Each voter should ask if the candidate they supported might not have "killed my Papa, ... killed my Mama, my sister, ... amputated my brother and rendered me homeless".

The paper concludes that Sierra Leone is a "very funny country where any jack wants to occupy the seat of power".