How many countries does Africa have?

How many countries does Africa have?

A. 52
B. 53
C. 54

It depends on what source you are looking at, I guess.  Rather than ask this question directly to the almighty Google, I typed "list of African countries" to see what would come up.  When I did, the wikipedia article showed what it called a "List of sovereign states and dependent territories in Africa."  According to wikipedia then, the answer would be "A."  I then looked at another website and when I clicked on the list of African countries under buzzle , it showed me 54 countries.  According to this website then, the answer would be "C."  If you try to learn African geography using a website like sheppardsoftware you will find that the website has listed 53 countries to be practiced, thus making "B" the correct answer.   Looking into the history of the continent of Africa would probably provide more answers to why the number of countries is so spotty.  Interestingly enough, after I printed a blank outline map from another website to practice my geography, I noticed that the outline map was missing the country of Eritrea.  Either way, below is a table with 54 African countries listed for your viewing pleasure.

Countries	Capitals
1. Algeria	Algiers
2. Angola	Luanda
3. Benin	Porto-Novo
4. Botswana	Gaborone
5. Burkina Faso	Ouagadougou
6. Burundi	Bujumbura
7. Cameroon	Yaounde
8. Cape Verde	Praia
9. Central African Republic	Bangui
10. Chad	N'Djamena
11. Comoros	Moroni
12. Congo, Democratic Republic of (Congo-Kinshasa)	Kinshasa
13. Congo, Republic of (Congo-Brazzaville)	Brazzaville
14. Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast)	Yamoussoukr
15. Djibouti	Djibouti
16. Egypt	Cairo
17. Equatorial Guinea	Malabo
18. Eritrea	Asmara
19. Ethiopia	Addis Ababa
20. Gabon	Libreville
21. Gambia	Banjul
22. Ghana	Accra
23. Guinea	Conakry
24. Guinea-Bissau	Bissau
25. Kenya	Nairobi
26. Lesotho	Maseru
27. Liberia	Monrovia
28. Libya	Tripoli
29. Madagascar	Antananarivo
30. Malawi	Lilongwe
31. Mali	Bamako
32. Mauritania	Nouakchott
33. Mauritius	Port Louis
34. Morocco	Rabat
35. Mozambique	Maputo
36. Namibia	Windhoek
37. Niger	Niamey
38. Nigeria	Abuja
39. Rwanda	Kigali
40. Sao Tome and Principe	São Tomé
41. Senegal	Dakar
42. Seychelles	Victoria
43. Sierra Leone	Freetown
44. Somalia	Mogadishu
45. South Africa	Pretoria
46. Sudan	Khartoum
47. Swaziland	Mbabane
48. Tanzania	Dodoma
49. Togo	Lomé
50. Tunisia	Tunis
51. Western Sahara	El-Aaiún
52. Uganda	Kampala
53. Zambia	Lusaka
54. Zimbabwe	Harare