There were at least two confirmed shoot downs in Angola - one in the early 80s and one in the late 90s, which was, I think, TransAfrik...and another suspected shoot down. Africa isn't always a nice place. Look up GSPC and AQIM...along with state dept notifications for the countries LAC is flying to. I think it's a bit riskier than the stuff they're doing elsewhere...
Not many operators of L100s left. TransAfrik has pretty much gotten out of the business. Maximus is out. SAFAIR is mainly "sitting" their planes on oil spill alert contracts, as is IAR (A-models) and I think First Air just sold their plane to Lynden. That leaves Prescott (one plane), Tepper, and Lynden - for the most part. Good luck getting on with Prescott or Tepper. A few foreign countries have L100 vs C130, but not many. I hear rumors Tepper may switch to J-models, but we'll see. Lynden would like to, I hear, but it's a lot of money.
Of note, only Lynden has been changing center wing boxes to my knowledge. The rest are running out of hours (why Transafrik quit flying them and why SAFAIR is mostly sitting theirs).