The Documentary Podcast

In 2010, a UK-listed company began developing a mining concession in Sierra Leone it said could transform the economic fortunes of the local population. But instead of benefiting the most immediate communities, hundreds found their homes destroyed, their livelihoods uprooted. And among the people who protested, many found themselves violently beaten and detained, and in one or two cases shot at and killed. Ed Butler investigates some of the untold stories of one of west Africa’s most dramatic recent abuses of corporate power. We hear from those who suffered, investigate allegations of police brutality, and look at the supposedly well-regulated system of corporate governance which was supposed to prevent abuses taking place.

Presenter: Ed Butler

Lyse Doucet meets the redoubtable Shukria Barakzai, Afghanistan's ambassador to Norway. Shukria was appointed a member of the 2003 loya jirga, a body of representatives from all over Afghanistan that was nominated to discuss and pass the new constitution after the fall of the Taliban. In the October 2004 elections she was elected as a member of the House of the People or Wolesi Jirga, the lower house of the National Assembly of Afghanistan. She was one of only a handful of female MPs to speak up for women's rights, and faced death threats for her views.

Could living in a home designed to deliberately demand more effort from you each day help you stay fitter and more alert in your later years? And could people living with dementia be better integrated in the community through work? Aki Maruyama Leggett examines some of the novel ideas for senior housing and social care emerging in Japan.

In the 1970s, historian Sir Brian Harrison embarked on a huge project to record the experiences of women who had been part of the UK suffrage movement in the early part of the 20th Century. Now in the 100th anniversary year of women in Britain finally being granted the vote, journalist Jane Garvey listens through some of the 205 tapes to get an idea of their lives as well as the risks and sacrifices the women made in their fight for equality.

A well-known blogger and activist jailed for a peaceful protest, a young man imprisoned and tortured for wearing the wrong T- shirt, a young woman abducted by masked police, and now among more than a thousand people who have been forcibly disappeared – these are just some of the alarming stories from the new Egypt.

Orla Guerin has spent the last four years reporting from Cairo where she has witnessed a systematic assault on freedoms and human rights. The country's ruler, former army chief, President Abdel Fatah al Sisi is standing for re-election (next month) in a climate of fear and intimidation. Seven years after the euphoria in Tahrir Square, Orla asks what happened to the hope born during the revolution, and reports on the abuses which campaigners say are at the heart of the Sisi regime.

In 1980, the tiny country of Iceland did something no other nation had done. They elected a female head of state. BBC chief international correspondent Lyse Doucet travels to Reykjavik to meet Vigdis Finnbogadottir. Now 87, she was president for exactly 16 years and remains the longest-serving elected female head of state of any country to date. "That’s what I have given to the girls of this country," she says: “If she can, I can.”

Japan has the fastest ageing society in the world with more than a quarter of its population over the age of 65. It currently has 66,000 centenarians, more than any other country. Toshiko Katayose and Aki Maruyama Leggett explore some of the innovative ways in which Japanese people are adapting to living longer.

For over 20 years Toshiko Katayose edited Japan’s most popular magazine for senior readers. Now 67 and facing retirement, she reveals how her generation of baby-boomers born after World War Two, are overturning stereotypes about old age and how businesses are responding to these more demanding silver consumers. She visits Japan’s first supermarket built specifically to serve older shoppers which offers everything from crystal-studded walking sticks to try-before-you-buy coffin experiences.

(Photo: A cornucopia of stylish walking sticks at Japan’s first supermarket for older consumers. Credit: Mukti Jain Campion)

Chinese reporter Haining Liu was born into the ‘one-child generation’ in the early 1980s. She explores how these political, social and economic changes have affected the relationship between old and young in China. Haining looks at family life, marriage, divorce, dating, opportunities for women, and how being from the one-child generation has affected her and her peers.

Becky Milligan looks back at the extraordinary life of South Africa’s new president. From humble beginnings, he became a lawyer, established the country’s most powerful trade union organisation and was a key player in negotiating the end of apartheid. After losing out at an earlier attempt to become president, he turned to business and rapidly became one of South Africa’s richest men – while also attracting controversy over allegations about his role during the Marikana massacre of striking miners. As he takes power, what really makes him tick?

The Parkovy Conference and Exhibition Centre, a huge modernist structure of concrete and glass, stands boldly on the banks of the Dnieper River in central Kiev, a helipad on the roof. It hosted the official after party for last year’s Eurovision Song Contest and was meant to be a symbol of Ukraine’s economic development. Instead, four years after President Yanukovych was overthrown by a people sick of corruption, it has become a focus of efforts to reclaim the billions of dollars said to have been stolen by the ex-president’s regime. In this edition of Assignment, Tim Whewell attempts to unpick the tangled global web of companies behind the building’s ownership. Who does the helipad actually belong to and what does it tell us about Ukraine’s attempts to bring its corrupt politicians to account?