VOTERS have gone to the polls in Niger in an election that is expected to lead to the West African nation's first transfer of power between two democratically elected presidents. A smooth handover would be a rare bright spot for a country that has experienced four coups since gaining independence from France in 1960, and is blighted by poverty and Islamist violence that has killed hundred of civilians and soldiers in the last year alone. It would also contrast with Ivory Coast and Guinea, whose presidents this year used constitutional changes to extend their tenures to three terms, raising fears…