Welcome to the first edition of The Economist Weekend. Every Sunday we’ll deliver a long-read worth savouring, a hand-picked mix of stories, videos and our weekend podcast, plus some puzzles to flex your mental muscles.

Jos Leijdekkers, a 35-year-old Dutch gangster, runs a vast drug- trafficking network spanning Latin America, Europe and the Middle East. He is one of the world’s most wanted men. He also looks to have taken over a country. By funnelling money to Sierra Leone’s political elite and funding large parts of the state itself, Leijdekkers has amassed perks that would be the envy of a Bond villain. The police and military establishment bow to him and he is escorted in a motorcade by the presidential guard, beneath a cloud of drones. For 1843, Alexander Clapp went to west Africa in search of “Chubby Jos”.

How did people come to see Britain—and Islam—through the eyes of a fringe football hooligan? In “Shire Folk”, a new three-part podcast series, our correspondent traces the rise of Tommy Robinson. The first episode covered his upbringing in Luton; the second instalment, released this weekend, tracks how he moved from the margins and into mainstream media.

According to the rumour, the man was a Turkish investor called Omar Sheriff. He looked young, with the flabby cheeks of a teenager, but was soon asserting his authority around Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone. From the tiers of slums south of the city his black G-Wagon was seen cruising up and down the Atlantic coast. At weekends he could be spotted ordering bottles of Jack Daniel’s at Sky Bar, rubbing shoulders with the Chinese card-sharks at the Grand Leone Casino across the street, or receiving government ministers in his waterfront suite at the 2 Seasons Resort, where they were sometimes observed by road-workers departing with flowers or envelopes tucked under their arms.