Togo

Togo is one of West Africa's most undervisited countries — which is partly a function of its small size, partly its Francophone status (which makes it less accessible to English-speaking travelers), and partly the legacy of international isolation under the Eyadéma dictatorship that left its infrastructure underdeveloped. None of these are reasons not to go. They are reasons to find it authentic and uncrowded.

The country runs north-south in a narrow corridor: the Gulf of Guinea coast with Lomé and lagoons and beaches; the Plateaux region of the center-south with hills, forests, waterfalls, and the highland town of Kpalimé; the Centrale region around Sokodé; the Kara region in the north-center with the Batammariba and their extraordinary Koutammakou tower-houses; and the Savanes region in the far north — fascinating, but currently inaccessible due to jihadist spillover from Burkina Faso. The accessible northern circuit ends at Kara and Koutammakou; everything north of Kandé requires professional judgment about conditions.

Togo's most distinctive characteristic is Vodun — a spiritual system that practitioners rarely call "voodoo" (the colonial-era diminutive). Roughly 50% of Togolese practice Vodun alongside or instead of Christianity (44%) and Islam (14%). This is not tourist performance. The Akodessawa Fetish Market in Lomé is a working marketplace for Vodun practitioners. Togoville on Lac Togo is a genuine center of Vodun tradition. The shrines, fetishes, and sacred sites scattered throughout the country are active places of worship. Treating them as curiosities is wrong; treating them with the same respect you'd give any religious site is right.

The coastal strip of what is now Togo was part of the "Slave Coast" — the stretch of Atlantic-facing West Africa from which millions of enslaved people were shipped to the Americas between the 15th and 19th centuries. The Ewe and Mina peoples of the coast, along with the Fon of neighboring Dahomey (now Benin), were both victims and occasionally participants in the trade — a complexity that the country's coastal heritage sites at Agbodrafo (Porto Seguro) and Aného acknowledge. The German colonial period began in 1884 when the German Empire signed a "protection treaty" with Mlapa III, the chief of Togoville on Lac Togo, annexing the territory as Togoland. German colonial rule was relatively brief (1884–1914) but left distinct marks: the colonial architecture of Lomé and the railway that once connected coast to interior.

At the start of World War I, British and French forces invaded Togoland in August 1914. Germany surrendered within weeks — one of the first Allied victories of the war. Togoland was partitioned between France (the east, which became Togo) and Britain (the west, which eventually merged with Ghana). French Togoland became a League of Nations mandate and then a UN trust territory before independence on 27 April 1960.

Togo's first president was Sylvanus Olympio — a Ewe from the south, educated in England and at the London School of Economics, a skilled economist, and by all accounts a genuinely capable administrator trying to build a functioning post-colonial state. He was assassinated on 13 January 1963 — in the first military coup in independent Africa. A group of about 30 soldiers, mostly recently discharged from service in the French army, stormed the presidential palace in the early hours of the morning. Olympio ran to the grounds of the US Embassy seeking asylum. He was shot on the embassy steps. The coup leader was Sergeant Étienne Eyadéma of the Kabiyé ethnic group from the north. It is widely believed that Eyadéma personally fired the shot that killed Olympio, though this has never been fully established.

A nominal civilian government followed for four years. In January 1967, Eyadéma staged a second coup and declared himself president. He would rule for 38 years — one of Africa's longest dictatorships. His regime was characterized by a personality cult of extraordinary dimensions (he commissioned a watch that played his image every hour), the suppression of political opposition, and the alignment of the army almost entirely with his own Kabiyé ethnic group (which today still constitutes approximately 70% of the military despite being only 13% of the population). International sanctions were imposed in the 1990s over human rights abuses; Togo became one of the most isolated states in West Africa.

Eyadéma died in office on 5 February 2005. His son Faure Gnassingbé was immediately installed as president by the military, in what the African Union condemned as a coup. Under international pressure, elections were held — and Faure won, in elections that the opposition and international observers considered fraudulent. At least 500 people were killed in post-election violence. Faure has governed since, through a series of constitutional maneuvers designed to extend and consolidate his power. In March 2024, the UNIR-controlled National Assembly voted to eliminate direct presidential elections and create a new "President of the Council of Ministers" position with no term limits. In May 2025, Faure was sworn into this new role, effectively becoming prime minister for life while a ceremonial president was installed. In June 2025, massive protests broke out in Lomé — demonstrations are legally banned in Togo since 2022, making the protests extraordinary — and were dispersed with tear gas and arrests. Bodies were later found in lagoons around Lomé; the government attributed the deaths to drowning.

The Gnassingbé family has now ruled Togo for 58 years: father from 1967 to 2005, son from 2005 to the present and indefinitely into the future. This is the political context for a visit to Togo. It is not a reason not to go — travel in most of southern and central Togo is entirely manageable — but it is worth understanding before you arrive.

Vodun (the word means "spirit" or "divine" in the Fon language) is one of Africa's most widespread and most misunderstood religious traditions. It originated in the coastal kingdoms of what is now Togo, Benin, and Ghana, traveled to the Americas with enslaved West Africans, and became Haitian Vodou, Louisiana Voodoo, and Candomblé in Brazil. The distorted Western image — of pins in dolls, zombies, and dark magic — is largely a colonial invention designed to demonize a coherent and sophisticated spiritual system that Togo's people practice with the same seriousness that Catholics practice Catholicism or Muslims practice Islam.

In Togo, Vodun is practiced by approximately half the population as a primary religion and influences the spiritual life of many who identify as Christian or Muslim. It centers on the worship of vodun spirits (deities) who mediate between the creator god (Mawu) and human beings, and on the veneration of ancestors. Every social group, village, family, and individual has their own protective vodun. The bokonon (priests/healers) diagnose illness, misfortune, and spiritual imbalance through divination and prescribe remedies using the animal, mineral, and plant materials sold at the Akodessawa market. The kanda — public possession ceremonies in which individuals are entered by vodun spirits — are among the most visually powerful religious experiences in West Africa.

For travelers, the key is approach: Vodun is a religion, not an attraction. The Akodessawa market is a religious supply market, not a haunted house. Togoville is a sacred town, not a curiosity. If you want to witness ceremonies, ask your guide to arrange an appropriate introduction to a community that accepts visitors. Never enter a vodun shrine uninvited. Never photograph sacred sites or ceremonies without explicit permission. Respectful curiosity is welcome; rubbernecking is not.

Togolese cuisine is built on fermented and pounded starches with intensely flavored sauces — palm oil, groundnut (peanut), tomato, dried and smoked fish, and fresh pepper. It is serious food: complex, nourishing, and the kind of cooking that rewards regular eating. French colonial influence shows in the presence of baguettes, café au lait culture, and some restaurant cuisine in Lomé. The overlap with neighboring Ghanaian (to the west) and Beninese (to the east) cooking creates a regional food culture worth exploring seriously.

French is essential in Togo — outside Lomé's tourist hotels and some upmarket restaurants, English is rarely spoken. Basic French (greetings, numbers, simple questions) will vastly improve your experience. A week allows Lomé, Kpalimé, and Lac Togo. Ten days to two weeks lets you add Sokodé, Kara, and Koutammakou. The accessible circuit from Lomé to Koutammakou follows the main N1 north-south highway, which is the country's only reliable sealed road.

Togo is inexpensive by most international standards. Street food and local transport are very cheap; accommodation ranges from basic local guesthouses (5,000–10,000 CFA) to mid-range Lomé hotels (25,000–50,000 CFA) to the few quality options (50,000–100,000 CFA). The CFA's peg to the Euro makes it easy for European visitors to estimate costs.

The US rates Togo Level 2 overall (Exercise Increased Caution), with a Do Not Travel sub-advisory for the Savanes region. The north of the country — particularly anywhere near the Burkina Faso border — carries genuine jihadist risk that has escalated since 2021. Do not push the boundaries of the accessible north beyond Kara and Koutammakou without current security intelligence. The accessible south and center of Togo, including Lomé, Kpalimé, Atakpamé, and the coast, are manageable with standard precautions.