LIBREVILLE (Reuters) - Gabon’s President Ali Bongo, who has been out of the country for two months recovering from a stroke, named a new prime minister on Saturday in an apparent effort to shore up his political base days after a failed coup attempt.

FILE PHOTO: Gabonese President Ali Bongo Ondimba arrives for a group picture at the BRICS summit meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa, July 27, 2018. REUTERS/Mike Hutchings/File Photo

The plotters of Monday’s coup attempt were arrested or killed within hours of seizing the national radio station, but the move reflected growing frustration with a government weakened by Bongo’s secretive medical leave in Morocco.

In a decree read by the secretary-general of the presidency on national television early on Saturday morning, Bongo named Julien Nkoghe Bekale as prime minister, replacing Emmanuel Issoze-Ngondet, who has served since 2016.

Issoze-Ngondet’s tenure was marked by a sharp drop in oil output and prices that has squeezed revenues, raised debt and stoked discontent in the OPEC member state.

Oil workers’ strikes have become more common, and economic growth was 2 percent last year, down from over 7 percent in 2011.

The nomination of Nkoghe Bekale, 56, who has held several ministerial posts since 2009, represents a return to a tradition begun by Bongo’s father, Omar, of choosing prime ministers from the Fang, Gabon’s largest ethnic group.

Omar Bongo ruled Gabon from 1967 until his death in 2009, establishing the country as a pillar of “Francafrique”, a web of influence that gave companies from former colonial power France favored access to African autocrats.

The Bongos come from a smaller ethnic group, and the appointments were a way of broadening the president’s base. But Ali Bongo, who succeeded his father when he died, bucked tradition in 2016 by choosing Issoze-Ngondet, who comes from a different ethnic group.

Bongo’s absence from Gabon since his Oct. 24 stroke in Saudi Arabia has raised questions about his ability to continue carrying out his official functions, although the government has insisted he is recovering well.

A Dec. 31 address from Morocco in which the 59-year-old president slurred his speech and appeared unable to move his right arm failed to reassure many Gabonese and was cited as one of the coup plotters’ reasons for acting.

Bongo won re-election in 2016 by fewer than 6,000 votes amid widespread accusations of fraud, sparking deadly clashes between protesters and police during which the parliament was torched.</s>Gabon's Bongo names new prime minister after thwarted coup attempt (Reuters) - Gabon’s President Ali Bongo, who...</s>Gabon President Ali Bongo has appointed a new prime Minister after a thwarted attempted coup by Military officers last week.

The planners of the coup were arrested hours after seizing the National radio station trying to overthrow the President who has been away in Morocco for the past two months after suffering a stroke.

Ondo Obiang the leader of the coup said the coup was being carried out “to restore democracy” and to oust “those who, in a cowardly way, assassinated our young compatriots on the night of August 31 2016” – a reference to deadly violence that erupted after Bongo was declared the winner of a disputed election.

Bongo appointed Julien Nkoghe Bekale as prime minister, replacing Emmanuel Issoze-Ngondet, who has served since 2016. He hails from the Fang tribe which is the largest ethnic community in Gabon. Bongo has followed the roots of his father by this appointment broadening the president’s base.

His absence in the country since he suffered his stroke has led many to believe that He was unfit for the presidency although the government has insisted he is recovering well.

Do you have a story you want told? Do you know of a sensitive story you would like us to get our hands on? Email your news TIPS to [email protected] Also WhatsApp 0708677607 with your news tips</s>Gabon's President Ali Bongo, who has been out of the country for two months recovering from a stroke, named a new prime minister on Saturday in an apparent effort to shore up his political base days after a failed coup attempt.

The plotters of Monday's coup attempt were arrested or killed within hours of seizing the national radio station, but the move reflected growing frustration with a government weakened by Bongo's secretive medical leave in Morocco.

In a decree read by the secretary-general of the presidency on national television early on Saturday morning, Bongo named Julien Nkoghe Bekale as prime minister, replacing Emmanuel Issoze-Ngondet, who has served since 2016.

Issoze-Ngondet's tenure was marked by a sharp drop in oil output and prices that has squeezed revenues, raised debt and stoked discontent in the OPEC member state.</s>Gabonese President Ali Bongo on Friday appointed Julien Nkoghe Bekale as his new Prime Minister.

“By decree of the President of the Republic, Mr. Julien Nkoghe Bekale is appointed Head of Government ,” announced the Secretary General of the Gabonese Presidency, Jean-Yves Teale, in a video broadcast on state media on Friday night.

Former Prime Minister Emmanuel Issoze-Ngondet becomes “Mediator of the Republic”, added Mr. Teale.

The two appointments came a few minutes after the establishment of the new parliament in Gabon.

At the age of 60, Nkoghe Bekale has held several ministerial dockets under Ali Bongo’s government, but also under his father, Omar Bongo, who died in 2009.

In its 2018 report, the Gabonese Court of Auditors noted “irregularities” in the management of public funds at the time when Nkoghe Bekale was head of the Ministry of Oil and Gas from 2009-2011.

In particular, the auditors pointed out “the irregular appropriation of political funds” derived from oil revenues and masked as “state security funds”.

A new government is expected soon with a smaller number of ministers.

The government says it wants to control the wage bill of its civil servants as it battles a cash crisis stemming from low oil revenues.

The ministers will have to take an oath before President Ali Bongo, currently recuperating in Morocco following a stroke last October.

Bongo’s state of health has been the subject of speculation in Gabon. Reports say this has triggered a power play among the president’s relatives who hold senior position in government, public service, military and intelligence agencies.

Nkoghe Bekale’s appointment comes just days after loyalist forces beat off a coup attempt by junior officers of Gabon’s Republican army. He’s widely seen as an attempt to shore up the Bongo family rule over oil-rich Gabon, now thought to be at its weakest in over 50 years.</s>Military coup drums continue to beat on the African continent in 2019. At 4:30am on January 7, Lieutenant Kelly Odong Obiang, leader of the Patriotic Youth Movement of the Gabonese Defence and Security Forces, and a handful of soldiers stormed the TV and radio station in Libreville, Gabon, to announce the seizure of power “for the restoration of democracy”.

The event has similarities to the February 18 coup in 1967 against then-president Léon M’Ba, also perceived to be pro-French by the rebelling soldiers at the time.

Obiang’s address cited “the national shame of the illegitimate government” while also disparaging the ailing President Ali Bongo’s New Year’s address, delivered from his convalescence residence in Rabat, Morocco, and called on the people to rise up.

Obiang’s understanding as to who is behind the crisis in Gabon is instructive when he asserted that: “Once again, one time too many, the wielders of power deceptively continue to instrumentalise the person of Ali Bongo Ondimba, a patient devoid of many of his physical and mental faculties.”

In the last disputed election in 2016, the frustrated opposition leader — former African Union commissioner and Bongo’s brother-in-law, Jean Ping — called for the security forces “to defect and join the people” against “an unrepresentative family dynastic regime”.

Jean Ping observed in a speech after Ali Bongo collapsed in October last year that Gabon has “been on autopilot” during Bongo’s convalescence.

Perhaps Obiang and his comrades in arms were listening. Fast forward to the post-October crisis: on December 23 last year, 44 opposition political parties called for an interim government for two years, during which time the country’s Constitution and institutions are reformed to overcome the regressive Bongo dynastic legacy.

On learning of the recent coup d’état, AU commissioner Moussa Faki Mahamat and France issued statements, unreservedly condemning the unconstitutional removal of government in the Republic of Gabon.

France, the former colonial power, maintains a special partnership with Gabon, the contradictory characteristics of which have intensified in the post-colonial era.

About three hours later, reports indicated that four of the five soldiers who accompanied Obiang in his coup attempt lay dead.

One was being pursued by the elite, rapid-reaction Presidential Guard force, which is equipped with modern weaponry, tanks and helicopters.

But what explains this valiant attempt by the young soldiers that was so quickly expunged by the resident French and Moroccan expeditionary force of nearly 900, including ethnic Beteke troops, carefully selected from the Bongo clan in the Haut-Ogooué area of Gabon?

Before delving into the reasons that partially explain the failure of the coup, we need to reflect briefly on the context and historical parallels to the coup attempt.

The constitutional legitimacy of the Gabonese government became questionable after Bongo collapsed in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on October 24 last year.

He underwent heart surgery before his public reappearance in Rabat on December 4.

At the time, government officials in Libreville refused to invoke the constitutional provisions of articles 13 and 16 that would have allowed the speaker of the National Assembly to become the interim leader, with a limited mandate to call elections within 45 days.

The officials remained silent on Bongo’s health condition and, at the behest of Prime Minister Emmanuel Issoze-Ngondet, in a submission to the Bongos’ mother-in-law and president of the Constitutional Court, Marie-Madeleine Mborantsuo, the officials introduced a new amendment to the Constitution, providing for the open-ended “temporary unavailability” of the Head of State.

This allowed Vice-President Pierre-Claver Maganga Moussavou to assume limited control of the public sector and of service delivery.

The fear to go down the constitutional and electoral route was informed by an August 2016 dispute, which Bongo only survived by producing a wafer-thin victory in his home province of Haut-Ogooué where, ostensibly, 99,9% of voters turned up for the poll, 95,9% of whom voted in his favour.

The second historical parallel is the 1964 coup against M’Ba by soldiers who supported Jean-Hilaire Aubame.

They seized power by opposing M’Ba’s perceived “serving as a conduit to French interests in Gabon” and were intent on adopting a single party-State system.

During the bloodless coup, soldiers accosted and incarcerated M’ba and his aides, including Cabinet secretary Albert Bongo, before coercing the president to announce on public radio that he had handed over power to the provisional government headed by Aubame.

Significantly, “without invitation” the Élysée Palace, the official residence of the president of France, instructed General Louis Kergaravat and General René Cogny, leading 600 troops drawn from Dakar, Senegal and Congo-Brazzaville, to fly into Libreville to support the 500 resident French marine and Moroccan soldiers and reverse the coup. Barely three days after the coup attempt, M’ba’s administration was restored to power.

M’ba then appointed Albert Bongo to work directly with the French expeditionary contingent, which also protected the 2 000 French nationals working for uranium mining, timber, iron and oil companies.

M’ba was in ill health, so in February 1967, the Gabonese Constitution was amended so that the vice-president would automatically assume the presidency.

M’ba died on November 27 in a French hospital and the next day, Omar Bongo became president.

When Omar died on June 8, 2009, he was succeeded by his son, Alain Bernard Bongo.

Successive coup attempts have failed because Gabon has remained a quasi-state with little or no domestic control.

Gabon is important to France because it has a pliant political elite, whose primary role is to facilitate the exploitation of natural and mineral resources.

Because of this, the country allowed Paris’s strategic objective to develop an independent nuclear capacity, relying on the local uranium, iron and manganese and other lucrative deposits.

Since the 1970s, Gabon has become the fourth-largest African oil producer, and it has vast timber reserves, sourced from the world’s “second Amazon” forest.

Michael Reed and Tony Charter state in their 1987 article, Gabon: A Neo-colonial Enclave of Enduring French Interests, that the country has remained a pseudo state “representing an extreme case, verging on caricature of a neo-colonial entity”.

The mandate of the resident military expeditionary force is to enforce the political control of the State and the protection of the 8 900 French nationals who have registered with the embassy and who work in Gabon.

The Presidential Guard falls under the head of intelligence in the ministry of defence, headed by Bongo’s brother Frederico, and is led by his cousin, Grégoire Kouna.

Caught napping by the January 7 capture of the TV and radio station, its swift response soon swatted off the minor challenge.

When Omar Bongo died in 2009, he left behind him 53 “officially recognised” children, according to the African Intelligence Special Report of January 16, 2015.

This comprador class continues to run the state while feeding off it, state-owned companies and associated commercial entities.

Obiang and the rest of the 44 opposition political parties have reason to believe that “the whole system has to be reformed” to restore democracy in Gabon.

If the substantive issues of the failed January 7 coup are not addressed, more brave attempts to change the ailing system will doubtless be made.

Martin Revayi Rupiya is the executive director of the African Public Policy and Research Institute. This is an edited extract from a chapter in his forthcoming book: African Presidents: Sons of Thy Fathers — L’Enfant Terrible & My Brother’s Keeper (Cambridge Scholars Publishing). This article first appeared in the Mail&Guardian.</s>Libreville, Gabon | AFP | Gabon’s prime minister announced a new government in a video message recorded thousands of miles away in Morocco, where ailing Gabonese President Ali Bongo is recovering from a stroke.

Recently appointed PM Julien Nkoghe Bekale gave details of the reshuffle in footage broadcast late Saturday on state television, less than a week after the country foiled an attempted coup.

Gabon has been without effective government for months since Bongo suffered the stroke in October during a visit to Saudi Arabia.

A new cabinet was also announced on Saturday evening by presidential secretary Jean-Yves Teale in another video missive recorded in Morocco. No significant changes were made to either the cabinet or the government.

Gabon’s constitution states that ministers must take their vows before the president — but in Bongo’s lengthening absence it is unclear how, when and where the ceremony will take place.

On Monday renegade soldiers stormed a state radio station to call for an uprising while Bongo was abroad.

Security forces captured the rebel chief and killed two of his men at the broadcasting offices in the capital Libreville, restoring calm to the city after hours of upheaval.

However questions remain over the balance of power in the West African nation where political change has been negligible for more than half a century.

Brice Laccruche Alihanga, head of the cabinet since 2017 who is reportedly close to first lady Sylvia Bongo, retained his post in the new line-up.

Ali Bongo, 59, is the son of Omar Bongo, who became head of state in 1967 and died in June 2009, leaving a legacy of corruption allegations.</s>DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — A look at Gabon, the Central West African country where the government has retained power after putting down an attempted coup on Monday.

LARGE OIL PRODUCER: Gabon is the third largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa, behind Nigeria and Angola. More than 90 percent of Gabon’s oil production is exported, mainly to the United States, according to the World Energy Council. Gabon’s wealth is far from evenly distributed. About a third of the population, estimated to be below 2 million people, live below the poverty line, according to the World Bank.

FAMILY DYNASTY: Former leader Omar Bongo, who ruled the nation from 1967 until his 2009 death, was viewed by many as the father of the nation. His time in power, though, was dogged by allegations of corruption and the use of oil profits for personal luxuries, including properties in several European and American cities, and lavish trips abroad. His son, Ali Bongo Ondimba, 59, won a special presidential election that was held a few months after his father’s death. The opposition claimed it was rigged. Bongo’s daughter, Malika Bongo Ondimba is a politician active in her father’s ruling party, fueling speculation that she may try to succeed her father as president when his term ends in 2022.

PROTESTS: In 2016, protesters took to the streets of the capital, Libreville, and the Parliament building was burned after Bongo’s opponent, Jean Ping, accused Bongo of vote-rigging. The European Union, the United States, and France also expressed concerns about some of the results. Gabon’s constitutional court later upheld Bongo’s victory. The central African nation, located on the Atlantic Ocean, became independent from France in 1960. The country is rich in natural resources with forests covering 85 percent of its territory.

POOR POPULATION: Despite its rich resources, much of Gabon’s population is relatively poor. It is ranked 110 out of 189 countries on the Human Development Index, according to the United Nations Development Program. Much of the population lives in the capital, Libreville, and economic capital Port Gentil, with a life expectancy of 66 years, according to the World Bank. One in two Gabonese citizens is under the age of 20, according to the World Bank.

Copyright © 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.</s>LIBREVILLE, Gabon (AP) — Gabon's prosecutor general says the arrested coup plotters face life imprisonment under Gabon's penal code.

Olivier N'Zahou said late Wednesday that six individuals staged the coup attempt, including a gendarme who was on duty at the station and was convinced to join the movement at the time of the attempt. Another Republican Guard member joined them as well. He said two were killed and the other four arrested.

This amends earlier statements this week saying that eight were arrested.

N'Zahou said despite attempts for a peaceful surrender, the military officers who tried to take power fired on security forces. The officers on Monday had encouraged youths to help them "restore democracy" in the oil-rich country.

Gabon's ruling party said ailing President Ali Bongo Ondimba will return to the country soon.</s>LIBREVILLE, Gabon (AP) — Gabon’s government has retained control of the West African country after an attempted military coup early Monday in which two plotters were killed, the government said.

Five army officers who took over state radio in the coup attempt have been arrested, government spokesman Guy-Betrand Mapangou, told Radio France International.

Authorities regained control of state broadcasting offices and a major thoroughfare in the capital, Libreville, which were the only areas taken over by the officers, the spokesman said.

Two of the coup participants were killed when security forces took over and freed some hostages, according to a presidential statement reported by RFI.

Earlier Monday a soldier who identified himself as Lt. Obiang Ondo Kelly, commander of the Republican Guard, read out a statement saying the military had seized control of Gabon’s government in order to “restore democracy.” He was flanked by two other soldiers holding weapons; all were dressed in camouflage uniforms and green berets.

Those soldiers have been taken into custody and President Ali Bongo’s government remains in control, the government spokesman said.

A curfew has been imposed over the capital, Libreville, and the internet was cut. The city on the Atlantic Ocean coast was being patrolled by military tanks and armed vehicles.

The African Union affirmed its support for the Bongo government.

“The African Union strongly condemns the coup attempt this morning in Gabon,” the head of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, said on Twitter. “I reaffirm the AU’s rejection of all anti-constitutional change.”

Bongo, in power since 2009, has been out of the country since October amid reports that he had a stroke. He recently addressed the country in a New Year’s message that was filmed in Morocco, where he has been receiving medical treatment.

Gabon, which is sub-Saharan Africa’s third-largest oil producer, has been ruled for more than half a century by Bongo and his father, Omar, who died in 2009. Critics have accused the family of profiting from the country’s natural resources while not investing enough in basic services for the population of more than 2 million. About one-third of the population lives below the poverty line, according to the World Bank.

In his brief New Year’s address, the 59-year-old Bongo declared that the country was “indivisible” and acknowledged his health problems without giving details. “A difficult period,” he called it, and a challenge that he surmounted “thanks to God.” He promised to put all of his efforts into improving the daily quality of life for Gabon’s people.

The French-educated Bongo, who was the country’s defense minister before becoming president, narrowly won re-election in 2016 in a vote opposition rival Jean Ping claimed was plagued by irregularities, and he continues to call himself the country’s real president.

This story has been corrected to show that Bongo’s New Year’s address was not from a hospital bed.

Copyright © 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.
Gabon's president Ali Bongo Ondimba names Julien Nkoghe Bekale as the country's new prime minister after a failed coup that happened five days ago.