Elected in 2009 after the death of his father, Ali Bongo Ondimba’s 14 years as president of Gabon have been marked by several struggles to consolidate his power. Despite contested elections and a stroke, the heir of the “Bongo dynasty” has managed to stay at the helm of the country, earning him the perception by supporters as a phoenix rising from the ashes.
Having been at the helm of Gabon for 14 years, Ali Bongo has had to fight several times to consolidate his power, inherited from his father, and now faces an attempted coup d’état aimed at overthrowing the dynasty that has ruled the country for 55 years.
A few hours before the announcement of the dissolution of Gabonese institutions by a group of military personnel on the Gabon 24 television channel, housed within the presidency itself, Ali Bongo had just been declared the winner of the August 26 presidential election and reelected for a third term with 64.27% of the votes, according to the official results, which the coup plotters claim were “manipulated.”
In his 14 years in power, the reserved and affable president, elected in 2009 after the death of his father – the unmovable and uncompromising Omar Bongo – has transformed into a ruthless hunter of “traitors” and “profiteers” at the top of the state, facing those who believed he was finished in 2018 after a stroke in Saudi Arabia.
Ali Bongo then disappeared for ten long months abroad, undergoing recovery and intense rehabilitation that seem to have made him a survivor but have shaken his power.
Since then, his opponents have regularly questioned his intellectual and physical abilities to lead the country, with some even claiming that a double has replaced him. But while a stiffness in his right leg and arm hinders his movement, his mind is still sharp, according to regular visitors, diplomats, and others.
Contested heir
Born Alain-Bernard Bongo in 1959 in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, where his father was a military officer, he spent most of his youth in France, where he completed his secondary education and studied law at the University of Panthéon-Sorbonne. His path was not predetermined. A passionate music enthusiast, he wanted to be the “Gabonese James Brown” and imagined a career, recording a “soul, disco, funk” 45 rpm record in 1978.
Then Alain-Bernard Bongo became Ali Bongo when his father converted the family to Islam in 1973. He was called to Libreville, Gabon, to join his father’s presidential cabinet. Gradually, he was educated in the code of “Françafrique” and the neocolonial relations between France and its former colonies. In 1989, at the age of only 29, his father offered him the Ministry of Foreign Affairs – a position he had to abandon two years later, as the new 1991 Constitution required a minimum age of 35 for ministerial positions.
Parallel to this aborted first term, Ali Bongo served in the National Assembly: he was elected twice, in 1990 and 1996, in the constituency of Haut-Ogooué, the main stronghold of the Bongo family. In 1999, he finally returned to the government, this time as Minister of Defense, a position he held until his father’s death and his own election to the highest office ten years later, in 2009.
During his first term, Ali Bongo proved to be the antithesis of his father: lacking the charisma and confidence of the “patriarch,” who ruled this very wealthy small oil-rich state in Central Africa for 41 years without challenge, he struggled to establish his authority, especially in the face of resistant stalwarts of his all-powerful Gabonese Democratic Party (PDG).
As the heir to part of the immense family fortune, “Mr. Son” or “Baby Zeus” – as he was then mocked – was depicted by the opposition as distant from his people, secluded in luxurious properties in Gabon and abroad or behind the wheel of numerous luxury cars. He was accused of letting advisors and ministers handle the affairs of the country, sometimes blurring the lines between their own interests and those of the nation.
Controversial elections
Until his highly contested reelection in 2016, won officially by a margin of only 5,500 votes. A few months earlier, the president was caught up in a controversy surrounding his birth: one of Omar Bongo’s 54 heirs filed a complaint against unknown persons in the Nantes court for “forgery and use of forgery.” Onaida Maisha Bongo Ondimba, 25 years old and one of Ali Bongo’s half-sisters, claimed that her older brother was lying about his origins and that the birth certificate archived at the central civil registry office of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, based in Nantes, had been falsified. The case was closed without further action.
The narrow margin in the results, however, fueled controversy, and riots broke out. The National Assembly was set on fire. The protests were suppressed by security forces, who also launched an assault on the campaign headquarters of rival candidate Jean Ping, who claimed victory. According to the authorities, these disturbances resulted in three deaths, while the opposition claimed there were around thirty.
This was a wake-up call for Ali Bongo, followed by a second one – his stroke – two events that would precipitate his transformation. His recovery was punctuated by a failed and mysterious coup attempt by a handful of military personnel on January 7, 2019, and a creeping attempt to sideline him by his all-powerful chief of staff, Brice Laccruche Alihanga.
Ali Bongo had entrusted him with the keys to Gabon with blind trust, as he had done with many others before. Brice Laccruche Alihanga has been in prison for over three years now, along with several loyal ministers and senior officials, all targeted by a ruthless “anti-corruption” operation.
Fighting endemic corruption
Since then, the head of state has presented himself as a “father of rigor” to ministers and advisors subjected to audits and dismissed at the slightest suspicion, in a Gabon plagued by endemic corruption since the criticized decades of “Françafrique,” of which Omar Bongo was the emblematic pillar.
Empty words and posturing, endless unfulfilled promises, according to the opposition, for whom the gap between the rich and the poor is widening in this country, one of the wealthiest in Africa per capita but struggling to diversify an economy too dependent on oil.
Recently, Ali Bongo has also transformed into a formidable political strategist, like his father: he has caused disgraces within his own camp and poached from a divided opposition, using ministerial portfolios and flashy titles.
For his supporters, he is a phoenix rising from the ashes, at the cost of painful rehabilitation sessions. For his critics, he is being pushed by an immediate entourage that does not want to relinquish power and its gains after 55 years of the “Bongo dynasty.”
With AFP