After violence broke out on Wednesday following announcement of the results, the elite Republican Guard forces bombarded the election campaign headquarters of Jean Ping, the opposition leader who disputed the poll outcome. According to Ping, two people were killed in the attack.
The election pitted two politicians who were once close friends. Ping served in various ministerial portfolios, ending with the Foreign Affairs minister in the late Omar Bongo’s cabinet, from 1998 to 2008. He even had two children with Ali’s elder sister Pascaline Bongo Ondimba, whom they later divorced in the early 1990s. Ping was already married at the time of the affair.
The election featured two major rivals with controversial behind their nationalities. The incumbent Ali Bongo is alleged to be an Igbo orphan from the Biafran war in Nigeria, who was adopted by his late father in the 1960s. Jean Ping’s mother is a Gabonese but his father, Cheng Zhiping, was a Chinese businessman.
This is the second time in succession that Gabon has been thrown into violence after disputed polls. In 2009, after Ali Bongo’s election to succeed his late father, opposition rejected the polls and its supporters burnt the French Consulate in Port-Gentil, the nation’s economic hub. Saturday’s re-election of Ali Bongo has thrown the nation into violence once again, Ping’s campaign headquarters was bombed, several people killed, hundreds of protesters arrested and the National Assembly building set ablaze.
The recently-concluded presidential election was considered the sternest challenge to the Bongo-dynasty rule of 49 years. Jean Ping, once a confidant of the late Omar Bongo challenged Ali Ondimba, but lost by a close margin of 5,594 votes, results that were alleged to have been doctored.
There are no term limits to the presidency and each term has seven years. Ali Bongo’s re-election earned him the second term at the helm of the West African nation.
Ali Bongo’s controversial re-election extended the Partie Democratique Gabonais (ruling party’s) grip on power to 49 years. It has been at the helm of the nation’s political leadership since 1960, when Gabon got its independence. The late Omar Bongo ruled from 1967 until his death in 2009. His son, Ali Ondimba Bongo won the election on PDG ticket in August 2009. He was re-elected on August 27, 2016.
Gabon has a population of 1.5 million people, yet 746, 000 were registered as voters ahead of the August 2016 presidential election. Voters must be aged at least 18 years to vote. According to the statistics, 49.7 percent of the nation’s population is above 18 years.
Residents in Libreville, the capital city said that Twitter and Facebook were blocked on Thursday, a day after violence erupted following the results announcement on Wednesday.
The nation’s sovereign dollar bonds of 2024 and 2025 fell drastically after violence erupted. The 2024 bond lost $2.5 to trade at 89.97 cents while the 2025 fell by $2.620 to trade at 91.87 cents.
African Union, the continental Pan-African body issued its verdict that endorsed Bongo’s re-election. It said that the election process was peaceful, democratic and all-inclusive but cited few irregularities.
At least 1,000 people had been arrested by the security forces by Thursday evening, a day after violence broke out in Libreville. The government described the protesters as criminals out to destabilize peace in the nation under the guise of political protests.
