When you are a chosen one of the West, democracy is just a word. You can win with numbers similar to those of a banana republic, and you will get applauded. You can trade your military fatigues for a suit, so long as you keep your friendship with the metropolis, you will be loved, cherished, and praised, and your intelligence will be lauded above all else. After all, you are there to serve the external masters, and they have given you carte blanche. This past Saturday, Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema won the presidential elections in Gabon with an overwhelming 90.35% of the vote (only in our tropical banana republics can we see this). It reminds us of a time when another ‘great democrat’ (who, mind you, has been in power for over 30 years) of Rwanda won by 99%! My goodness! And the West will give us great lessons of democracy! When Traoré got his country and parliament to give him 5 years of confidence (Burkina Faso’s Transition Government Gets a 5-year Confidence Vote by the People)… there was an outcry in the MSM. Even when Maduro in Venezuela got 51+%, the mighty international community called him a dictator. What of Kagame? Double Standards is all! Honestly, the problem is not Oligui Nguema, but rather the double standards, and that concept which has been drilled into our heads called democracy, but which in reality is a tool used by the West to praise those who serve well or to destroy the ‘bad’ students who refuse to bow down (Africans and the Trap of Democracy, and Africans, let us not Fall in the Trap of Democracy!). By the way, did you notice that since we published our article on Friday, the MSM have now taken to calling him ‘coup leader’ when before it was not the case?
Oligui Nguema told Al Jazeera that he ‘will restore dignity to the Gabonese people‘. We can only hope for the best for the people of Gabon.
You can check out Le Monde, BBC, RFI, AP, The Print, and Al Jazeera… there is such a discrepancy compared to the treatment of the leaders of the AES in the media.
This Saturday April 12, 2025, Gabon will go to the presidential elections to elect its next president. There are honestly just a few candidates, more like 2 real ones, and one of them is General Brice Oligui Nguema, a military leader who orchestrated a coup that removed Ali Bongo almost 2 years ago [Is the Wind of Change blowing in Gabon too?], while the other candidate is just there for show. Oligui Nguema is the only military leader who made a coup on the continent in the past few years, and has been applauded by the West and the mainstream media. While Colonel Assimi Goita, Captain Ibrahim Traore, or General Abdourahamane Tchiani have been insulted and called all sorts of names, like junta leaders, little captains, illiterates, etc, for wanting the freedom of their people and leading coups that have kicked out the West’s puppets, colonial powers and external forces that were leeching onto their lands and resources, Oligui Nguema on the other hand has been applauded, saluted, and lauded. Why? because he represents the status quo in the relationship between Gabon and the West, particularly France; after all Gabon is known as the cash cow of France. Now, he has traded his military uniform to take part in the presidential elections, and every single Western news outlets has been applauding him, calling him, like BBC, the “coup-mastermind-turned-transitional leader … highly articulate ….” The double standard of the west is appalling!
Excerpts below are from the BBC, but the same praises are sung by France24, RFI, Reuters, and others.
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President Ali Bongo
Little more than 19 months after the bloodless coup that brought an end to more than five decades of rule by the Bongo family [Oligui Nguema is a nephew of Ali Bongo, thus still a part of the Bongo Family], the people of Gabon are about to head to the polls to choose a new head of state – bucking a trend that has seen military leaders elsewhere in Africa cling on to power.
The overwhelming [western] favourite in the race on Saturday is the man who led that peaceful putsch and has dominated the political scene ever since, Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema.
Having abandoned his soldier’s fatigues and military status in favour of a politician’s suit, this highly articulate former commander of the elite Republican Guard [since he is the one they like, he is articulate, while those of the AES are illiterates] faces seven other candidates.
Basking in popularity among a population relieved to be rid of dynastic rule [the leaders in the AES also bask in popularity among their people, but that doesn’t count since they are not going in the directionwanted by the west] – and assisted by electoral regulations that disqualified some key challengers [that is not questionable?] – the 50-year-old appears almost certain to secure an outright majority in the first ballot.
… His chances of avoiding a second round run-off are bolstered by the fact that his main challenger – one of the rare senior political or civil society figures not to have rallied to his cause – is the old regime’s last prime minister, Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze, known by his initials ACBBN.
Victory will bring a seven-year mandate and the resources to implement development and modernising reform at a pace that the rulers of crisis-beset African countries could not even dream of.
With only 2.5 million people, Gabon is an established oil producer [yet, given that it is France’s cash cow, it looks nothing like the Gulf countries] and the world’s second-largest exporter of manganese.
Map of Gabon
… Oligui Nguema took shrewd advantage, reaching out to build a broad base of support for his transitional regime. He brought former government figures, opponents and prominent hitherto critical civil society voices into the power structure or institutions such as the appointed senate. Political detainees were freed, though Ali Bongo’s wife and son remain in detention awaiting trial on corruption charges [There is no problem with the west if Nguema keeps Bongo’s wife and son in detention, but Tchiani cannot hold Bazoum – double standards].
He did not resort to the sort of crackdowns on dissent or media freedom that have become a routine tool of Francophone Africa’s other military leaders, in Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso and Niger [Nguema is good for the West, not bad like those of the AES – double standards].
… On the diplomatic front, in marked contrast to the assertively anti-Western posture adopted by the regimes in West Africa, Oligui Nguema despatched senior figures to cultivate international goodwill and reassure Gabon’s traditional partners of his determination to restore civilian constitutional government within a tightly limited timeframe [nice puppy].
Relations with France, the former colonial power and previously a close ally of the Bongo regime, are warm [of course].
… When Oligui Nguema brushed off some parliamentarians’ concern about the concentration of executive power in the presidency by abolishing the post of prime minister, there was little fuss [Just imagine the ruckus the MSM will make if Goita or Tchiani eliminated the prime minister office].
On August 30, 2023, we all woke up to a coup d’etat in Gabon by the army. The military took over, and cancelled the results of Saturday’s election in which Mr. Ali Bongo was declared winner the night before on August 29, but the opposition led by Albert Ondo Ossa claimed it was a fraudulent election. In an announcement on Gabon’s state TV on Wednesday, the coup leaders said their republican guard chief, General Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema, had been “unanimously” designated president of a transitional committee to lead the country. Note that Oligui is a cousin of Bongo and used to be the bodyguard of Bongo’s father, the late President Omar Bongo. He was also head of the secret service in 2019 before becoming head of the republican guard.
President Ali Bongo
This coup puts an end to 56 years of the Bongo dynasty. Ali Bongo came to power at the end of his father Omar Bongo‘s 42 years in power from 1967 to 2009. Bongo son, Ali, ruled the country for 14 years, and although he had suffered a stroke in 2018, he was vying for a third term in office during these past elections. After his stroke, television appearances had shown him leaning heavily on a silver-topped cane. He had appeared healthier during the latest election when he was again declared victor – until military officers stepped in. Oil-rich Gabon has been known as the piece de resistance of France in the entire central African region.
Map of Gabon
Many who have heard news of the coup in Gabon, which puts an end to 56 years of one family treacherous rule, popped bottles of champagne, and rightfully so. This coup comes on the heels of the one in Niger last month on 26 July 2023, and we cannot help but rejoice and long for genuine change.Is the wind of change really blowing in Gabon as well? or is it simply France understanding that given the current anti-French climate in Africa, and in order to keep control over their biggest cow in the Francafrique’s chessboard, understanding that the people of Gabon had had enough of Ali Bongo, and not trusting that they could control the opposition guy who had been voted by the people, chose to place their very own puppet instead? After all, the day after controversial elections, if the military is there to defend the democracy of the country as they claimed in their speech, why not have votes recounted? Why not have the election results reversed since the people selected Ossa to lead them? Why hold Bongo and son under house arrest, but release the first lady (who is French), Sylvia Bongo Ondimba, who, as everybody knows has been the one leading the country since her husband’s stroke in 2018? Lastly, the new leader is a cousin of Bongo: are we going to have a similar scenario to David Dacko-Jean-Bedel Bokassa of Central African Republic (CAR)?
Upcoming days will tell us which way this wind is blowing.
To read more, check out this article “A ‘Coup’ in Gabon: Who, What, and Why?” on Al Jazeera.
African Heritage 