At https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2020/02/ghost-of-mysterious-… … Another ghost population indicated by genetics. This time it is in Africa – and concerns the ancestors of West African Bantu (or that is how I took it). Archaic hominins added variety to African genes it would seem, in a carbon copy of European and Asian genes. However, these are different – and peculiar to Africa (although ultimately we are all connected at some point or the other). It is an interesting discovery as there is a lack of human fossils in Africa that have been subject to genetic research. All the action has been in Europe and Asia. Africa has been outside the main theatre of genetic research. What does this mean. Although West Africans do not have Neanderthal or Denisovan ancestors they do have an equivalent (so far described as a ghost population as fossils so far are lacking). It is said this occurred fairly recently in the past. Dies that mean that Neanderthal extinction has its equivalent in Africa? Time will tell …
… in other words, just as Europeans and western Asians are genetically mixed with Neanderthals, and Denisovan ancestry occurs in SE Asia etc., so too do West Africans have ancestors of an equally pre-modern human hue.