A year since coup, Gabon's ousted ruling family in limbo

LIBREVILLE - One year after a bloodless military coup that overthrew Gabon's president Ali Bongo Ondimba, ending 55 years of family rule, the fate of the former dynasty remains in limbo.

Bongo had ruled the oil-rich West African nation since 2009 when he was overthrown by military leaders on 30 August 2023, moments after being proclaimed the winner in a presidential election.

Now 65, the deposed leader has been living in his private estate in Libreville, free to leave the country, the government has said, but "deprived of freedom and contact with the outside world", according to his French lawyer Francois Zimeray.

Bongo's wife Sylvia, 61, and their eldest son Noureddin Bongo Valentin, 32, continue to be held at Libreville's central prison over embezzlement allegations, in conditions denounced by their attorneys.

Gabon's new government, led by General Brice Oligui Nguema, has accused the Bongos of widespread corruption, including rigging the last elections and "manipulating" the weakened head of state after Ali Bongo suffered a stroke in 2018.

On the night of the coup, Gabonese national television showed the arrest of Noureddin Bongo, a close adviser to his father, and other officials next to suitcases filled with cash allegedly seized from their homes.

The military has accused Sylvia and Noureddin of treason, embezzlement, corruption and falsifying the president's signature, among other allegations.

Gabon is one of the richest countries in per capita terms in Africa but one in three people still live below the poverty line, according to the World Bank.

'CONCERNING' DETENTION

Oligui's interim government has shared few details on the detainees and the progress of the case.

Rumours have spread, with some papers alleging the family was being held in a secret villa and had been granted "permission" to leave to attend celebrations with their families late last year. Gabonese state authorities did not respond to the reports.

Gisele Eyue Bekale, the family's Gabonese lawyer, told AFP she had met with the inmates just three times since the coup, alongside the investigating judge.

"My clients told me that all their assets had been seized and transferred, even those acquired before 2009", the year Ali Bongo took over from his father Omar after nearly 42 years in power, she said.

Noureddin's detention conditions were "concerning", she added.

"The last time I saw him, he told me he was in isolation, completely locked up" and without a "right to exercise or access to his lawyer".

His mother "does not receive any visitors and like all inmates, is not allowed her phone".

Bekale said the ousted president's son and wife had not been visited by family since the coup, "counter to the rights of any person detained in prison".

Zimeray, the French lawyer for Ali, Sylvia and Noureddin - all dual French and Gabonese nationals - told AFP that Sylvia and Noureddin had been "incarcerated outside of any legal framework, subjected to torture and bad treatment, in violation of all the rules".

Zimeray in May filed a new complaint alleging the family had suffered "illegal arrest, detention aggravated by acts of torture and acts of barbarism", after an initial complaint in October was dismissed.

The government dismissed the claims as "slanderous and false", spokesperson Laurence Ndong said on the state-owned Gabon 1ere TV channel in May.

"The government wishes to state emphatically that they are not being subjected to any form of torture or mistreatment as stated by their lawyers," she said, adding that Sylvia and Noureddin had been "charged with extremely serious offences".

"Given the political dimension of the case, the prospect of release depends neither on the lawyer nor on the judge," Bekale said.

'THIRSTY FOR JUSTICE'

Joanna Boussamba, a spokesperson for the civil society organisation Copil Citizen, said she worried about a "lack of visibility on the case and the prospects for the trial".

She said the Bongo case had become something of a "taboo" in Gabon.

"We can expect the worst, and find out six months from now that they are all out," Boussamba told AFP.

"The Gabonese people expect justice to be served, that they pay back the money they stole, and for this money to go back into the coffers of the state, that they be tried, sentenced and serve their time."

"We are all thirsty for justice," said Ponce Melchior Nomamina, a 28-year-old photographer interviewed by AFP in a working-class neighbourhood of the capital.

"Apparently, they are delinquents. Those who were in power before misused their positions and the assets they were responsible for," he said.

"I think they should be punished."