AllMovie

With a setting that could serve as a background for several African nations, this story is about an African president (in a one-party country) in league with French entrepreneurs to do as well as he can for himself and the foreigners, until their worlds are shaken up by the publication of a doctoral dissertation on the "Political Structures of Traditional Power." The president gets the book and reads it in a sweat, the French read it, foreign journalists read it -- and finally, worried about the effect its contents will have on his nation, the president decides to move a few inches to the political left. Meanwhile, the ever-present military reacts with the swiftness of a bullfrog catching the slight movement of a bug on a leaf, and the president is put under house arrest. So much for the power of the press.