Internet cut and curfew introduced after the fraud denounced by the opposition

2023-08-26 20:03:23
Assessors transport electoral material while Gabonese wait for the opening of their electoral office, in Libreville, Saturday August 26, 2023. STRINGER / REUTERS

The electoral climate is turning stormy in Gabon. While Gabonese are being called to the polls on Saturday August 26, to decide whether or not to entrust President Ali Bongo Ondimba with a third term, the Minister of Communication ordered the internet to be cut off and the establishment of curfew.

In order to avoid “the spread of calls for violence (…) and false information”, “The government has taken the decision to suspend until further notice access to the internet throughout the territory. A curfew throughout the territory has been decreed and will be applied from this Sunday, August 27. It will be in force every day, from 7 p.m. until 6 a.m.Minister Rodrigue Mboumba Bissawou told the public television channel.

In the middle of the afternoon, Albert Ondo Ossa, Ali Bongo’s most serious rival, behind whom most of the opposition lately lined up, had denounced “orchestrated fraud” by the Bongo camp, and another tenor of the opposition the « chaos » in the organization of the ballot.

Late opening of many polling stations

Mr. Ondo, whose vote was announced for mid-morning in the center of Libreville, was only able to slip his ballot into the ballot box in the middle of the afternoon, his office remaining closed eight hours after planned opening, assured Agence France-Presse its communications adviser, Guy-Pamphile Mba. Due to late delivery of voting materials, according to Alternance 2023.

Read also: In Gabon, a presidential election tailor-made for Ali Bongo

Many other offices in the capital and throughout the country also opened very late or remained closed, François Ndong Obiang, president of Alternance 2023, told AFP. Likewise, ballots in the name of Mr. Ondo Ossa were missing in “many offices” and those of the candidates who had officially withdrawn in his favor remained present in others, he accused, denouncing a “organization of the poll prepared to create chaos”.

These elections are taking place in the absence of foreign media, which have been refused accreditation or entry into the country, Reporter sans Frontières (RSF) denounced on Friday, and without international observers, African or European. Fourteen contenders compete, a little less than 850,000 registered voters out of some 2.3 million inhabitants also being called upon to vote for the legislative and municipal elections, all in one ballot.

The World with AFP