2023-09-01 23:09:49
General Brice Oligui Nguema decorated by Gabonese Prime Minister Alain Claude Bilie Bie Nze, in Libreville, August 16, 2023. AFP
The general who overthrew President Ali Bongo Ondimba in Gabon two days ago promised, Friday, September 1, institutions “more democratic” and respectful of ” human rights “but without “precipitation”. General Brice Oligui Nguema must be sworn in as “Transitional President” Monday.
During frantic meetings with “the living forces of the nation”parties, the diplomatic corps, international organizations and donors, he insisted that he wanted to reassure inside and outside the country.
The soldier also targeted « la corruption » of the former power of Mr. Bongo, whose family had ruled this small oil-rich Central African state for more than fifty-five years.
But by promising a new constitution and a new electoral code, Gabon’s new strongman also closed the door to the main parties of the old opposition who were urging him to return power to civilians. They asked him to entrust it to Albert Ondo Ossa, officially second in the presidential election of August 26, but who claims victory, accusing the old regime of fraud.
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Sébastien Lecornu differentiates between coups in Gabon and Niger
The army also says that it carried out its putsch on Wednesday because the results proclaiming Mr. Bongo re-elected had been rigged. The junta castigated the “irresponsible and unpredictable governance” of the ousted president. The general had invited the diplomatic corps and international organizations on Friday, but the countries, Western and African in particular, which had condemned the coup, did not send their ambassadors but lower-ranking diplomats, testified for the Agence France-Presse (AFP) of the participants.
The activities of some 400 French soldiers, permanently stationed in Gabon, as part of bilateral military cooperation, have been suspended “waiting for the political situation to become clearer”declared the French Minister of the Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu, in an interview with the Figaro published Friday evening.
Mr. Lecornu made a point of differentiating between the coups in Gabon and in Niger. “France condemns all acts of force (…) However, we cannot put on the same level the situation in Niger, where illegitimate soldiers dismissed a legitimately elected president, and that of Gabon, where the motive put forward by the military is precisely the failure to respect the electoral law and the Constitution. Because in fact, and, I weigh my words, there are doubts about the sincerity of the elections in this country “underlined the French minister.
New Constitution promised
The leader of the putsch claimed that the dissolution of the institutions was ” temporary “assuring that it was a question of making “more democratic tools”especially in “in matters of respect for human rights, fundamental freedoms, democracy and the rule of law, but also the fight against corruption which has become commonplace in our country”.
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Before civil society, General Oligui, head of the all-powerful praetorian guard of the Bongo family, then promised a new Constitution and a new electoral code, but without “confusing speed and precipitation”. “Who goes slowly, goes surely”he asserted.
Mr. Bongo has been under house arrest in Libreville since the coup. Sylvia Bongo, his wife, Franco-Gabonese, is being held incommunicado, his lawyers said on Friday, announcing that they had filed a complaint in France for arbitrary detention. During a speech on Thursday, but broadcast on Friday by state television, General Oligui lectured more than two hundred Gabonese business leaders, accusing some of having fueled corruption at the top of power.
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The dark look, the soldier reproached them for a lack of “patriotism”summoned them to ” putting oneself in question “ and of « stopper » the widespread practice of “overbilling” in contracts with the State, giving rise to kickbacks to senior officials. He waved the threat of prosecution.
“Billions of CFA francs”
At the same time, public television broadcast images of one of the sons of the deposed president, Noureddin Bongo Valentin, and other young people close to him “and the First Lady”, senior officials of Mr. Bongo’s cabinet, all arrested on the day of the putsch. They were shown in front of trunks, boxes and bags overflowing with wads of banknotes for “billions of CFA francs” (millions of euros).
The putschists accuse them – Noureddin Bongo included – of ” high treason “, “massive embezzlement of public funds” et « falsification de la signature » of the head of state. In Paris, on Friday, the lawyers of the former first lady Sylvia Bongo filed a complaint for “arbitrary detention” with another of his sons, Jalil. “She is being held in an undetermined location in Gabon”, assured AFP in Paris Me François Zimeray. The lawyers « exigent » permission to “visits” of members of the Consulate General of France in Libreville.
Sylvia Bongo and her son Noureddin have been the targets in recent years of accusations from the opposition, civil society and the media claiming that, since a serious stroke in 2018, Ali Bongo has been weakened and “manipulated” by some of his ” relatives “.
Ali Bongo had been elected in 2009 on the death of his father, Omar Bongo Ondimba, who had ruled the country for more than forty-one years and was one of the pillars of “Françafrique”, then re-elected with difficulty in 2016, in a election that the opposition already denounced as rigged.
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