According to commentators, the soldiers who overthrew the president of Gabon appear to have been well-organized and used the populace’s complaints about the administration as justification to seize control.
President Ali Bongo Ondimba, whose family has dominated the oil-rich nation of Central Africa for more than 50 years, was overthrown by soldiers on Wednesday. The coup leaders said they put Bongo under house arrest and imprisoned many Cabinet officials because of his allegedly reckless leadership that put the nation at risk of anarchy.
As of right now, Gabon has been suspended from “all activities of the AU, its organs, and institutions” until the nation returns to constitutional order, according to a statement from the African Union Peace and Security Council, which met on Thursday.
Several hours after Bongo was declared the victor of a weekend presidential election that observers claimed was marred by irregularities and a lack of transparency, Gen. Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema, the head of Gabon’s elite republican guard, was named the next president of the country on state television.
While there were real complaints about the poll and Bongo’s governance, experts on Gabon think that the junta’s attempt to usurp him is only a pretext.
According to Joseph Siegle, head of research at the Africa Centre for Strategic Studies, “the timing of the coup, following the announcement of the improbable electoral results, and the speed with which the junta is moving suggests this was planned in advance.” “Although there are many legitimate complaints about the election and Bongo’s leadership, these issues are not directly related to the coup attempt in Gabon. Bringing up those complaints is only a pretext.
A junta official said Oligui would take the oath of office before the constitutional court on Monday in a statement broadcast on state TV on Thursday. It urged people to return to their jobs and promised to resume domestic flights.
Also on Thursday, the leading opposition candidate, Albert Ondo Ossa, asked for the resumption of polls “under the supervision” of the armed forces,” according to Mike Jocktane, the campaign manager for Ossa.
The military overthrow in Gabon, the seventh in Central and West Africa in three years, occurs around a month after the overthrow of the democratically elected government in Niger. Gabon was considered to be more stable than its neighbours Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, which have all experienced two coups since 2020 and are now under the control of violent extremists.
However, Bongo’s family has been charged with widespread corruption and with failing to distribute the country’s oil wealth to its 2 million inhabitants.
There has been significant discontent with Bongo’s tenure, which has lasted two terms since he took office in 2009 following the death of his father, who controlled the nation for 41 years. Bongo is 64 years old. In 2019, a different gang of rebellious troops attempted a coup but were promptly defeated.
The former French colony is a member of OPEC, but its oil wealth is concentrated in the hands of a few number of people, and in 2020, the World Bank reported that about 40% of Gabonese between the ages of 15 and 24 were unemployed. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, its oil export earnings were $6 billion in 2022.
The overthrow of a dynastic leader like Bongo in Gabon and the revolution that followed seemed to touch a chord in the continent that coups in more distant, unstable West Africa hadn’t.
A few hours after Gabonese soldiers announced their new leader, Paul Biya, the 40-year-old president of neighbouring Cameroon, reshuffled his military, and Paul Kagame, the president of Rwanda, “accepted the resignation” of 12 generals and more than 80 other senior military officers. Even Ismail Omar Guelleh of Djibouti, who has been in charge of the tiny former French colony in the Horn of Africa since 1999, decried the Gabon coup and the current trend of military takeovers.
But on Wednesday, John Kirby, a spokesperson for the White House National Security Council, said it was too early to declare the failed coup in Gabon a trend.
It’s just too early to slap a table here and declare, “Yes, we have a trend here going” or “Yes, we have a domino effect,” he added.
The Economic Community of Central African States Commission, a Central African regional bloc, issued a statement in which it declared that it “firmly condemns” the use of force to settle political disputes and seize control. It demanded the restoration of the rule of law.
The streets of Libreville, the capital of Gabon, have been crowded with revellers since Bongo was overthrown.
John Nze, a local, declared, “Today, we can only be happy.” Everyone was hampered by the nation’s historical circumstances. No jobs were available. The reason the Gabonese are glad is that they suffered under the Bongos.
