HN has a giant global user base. Wouldn't be surprised to find more than a few west Africans here. As for myself, here in northern Europe I'm a lead developer in finance/banking, but for a few weeks a year I'm a farmer in Nigeria. Just because someone is a geek for technical stuff, doesn't mean they have to have such a limited perspective on the rest of the world.

I'm not quite sure why you picked west africans. I'd hope there's africans from all over the continent on here. Personally I'm east african

For sure. I'm not American myself, and I also grew up as an ex-pat in a 3rd world country. While it certainly gave me some perspective, I wouldn't say for a moment that I really understand what it's like to be them.

If things got really bad, my family was always in the position to escape.

My bet is that HN traffic is power-law skewed toward the USA with Europe as a runner-up and then a long tail of everywhere else.