Gabon’s new strongman, General Brice Oligui Nguema, will be enthroned on Monday as president of a “transitional” power for an as yet indefinite period, but the opposition urges the putschists to recognize the “victory” of its presidential candidate instead. .
General Oligui, at the head of the soldiers who overthrew President Ali Bongo Ondimba on Wednesday, barely proclaimed re-elected, promised the “gradual establishment of the institutions of the transition” and the respect of all the “commitments” of Gabon, ” exterior and interior”.
On Wednesday, officers of the Republican Guard (GR), the praetorian guard of the Bongo family in power for 55 years, proclaimed “the end of the regime”, less than an hour after the announcement of the re-election of the head of state. in the presidential election on Saturday which they considered to be rigged.
Placed under house arrest by the military, Ali Bongo, 64, was elected in 2009 on the death of his father Omar Bongo Ondimba, who had ruled unchallenged for more than 41 years this country very rich in oil and pillar of the ” Françafrique”.
The coup, perpetrated without apparent bloodshed, gave rise to scenes of jubilation in working-class neighborhoods of Libreville, where small crowds copiously applauded each military or police vehicle and shouted “Gabon is liberated!” or “Down with the Bongos!”
“Independence Day is no longer August 17, now it’s August 30,” exclaimed a man on Thursday in a small bar in the popular Plein Ciel district in front of customers who were completely won over to the putschists.
The mutineers maintained the curfew decreed on Saturday by the ousted government but, on Thursday, life had resumed its normal course in Libreville, apart from endless queues in front of bakeries, according to AFP journalists.
And in the upscale district of Sablière, the two access roads to the Bongo residence were blocked by two armored vehicles of the GR and traveled by its heavily armed “green berets”, their faces often covered with a black mask.
The Gabonese live to the rhythm of the press releases of the putschists read on the antennas of the two television channels – Gabon 24 and Gabon 1st – the only communication channels of the new power.
Thursday, they announced that General Oligui will be sworn in on Monday, September 4, before the Constitutional Court, of which they announced the “temporary reinstatement”.
The new strongman also asked “all heads of state services” to ensure “the continuity of the operation of all public services”.
And he insisted “to reassure all the donors (…) and the creditors of the State that all the measures will be taken in order to guarantee the respect of the commitments” of Gabon “both on the external level and ‘interior’.
At the announcement of their putsch, the military had castigated rigged elections but above all “irresponsible and unpredictable governance”.
Gabon, one of the richest countries in Africa per capita thanks in particular to its oil, has been plagued for decades by endemic corruption, especially at the top of the state.
The opposition came out of its silence on Thursday to ask the putschists to recognize the “victory” of their candidate, Albert Ondo Ossa, in the presidential election.
After warmly thanking the army, in the name of the “grateful fatherland”, for “standing up against an electoral coup”, the spokesman for the opposition platform Mike Jocktane invited it to resume the compilation of the results which “will see the victory of Mr. Ondo Ossa at the polls made official”.
The latter, questioned by TV5 Monde, described the current events as a “palace revolution”, pointing the finger at Ali Bongo’s sister, Pascaline Bongo, as being potentially at the maneuver of the coup d’etat to keep in place ” the Bongo system”.
“What would reassure me is that we hand over power to Ondo Ossa who won the vote because the military cannot lead a country, the transition must be done quickly”, hopes Jasmine Assala Biyogo, 35 years, owner of a small bar in the center of Libreville. “We are happy and we have some fears, it’s the two feelings”, abounds Josée Anguiley, 36, between two sips of beer.
Faithful to its doctrine on unconstitutional changes of power, the African Union suspended Gabon from its ranks on Thursday. For his part, the head of EU diplomacy Josep Borrell stressed that the military putsch followed elections “full of irregularities”.
Ali Bongo, the main heir to the immense fortune of Omar, owner of numerous luxury residences, particularly in Great Britain and France, has so far been spared, as Head of State, by the legal procedure known as the “ill-gotten gains” in France, in which nine other children of the “patriarch” who died in 2009 are charged.
For now, the putschists also seem to spare him these accusations. They call Ali Bongo a “normal Gabonese,” “retired.” But they arrested, in particular for “massive embezzlement of public funds” and “falsification of the signature” of the president, his son Noureddin Bongo Valentin and six other so-called members of the “young guard” within the presidency.
08/31/2023 21:27:57 – Libreville (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
