Gabon Junta Promises To ‘Respect All Commitments’ After Coup

Gabon will honour all of its domestic and international commitments, the junta said on Thursday, August 31, intending to “reassure all donors, development partners, and the state’s creditors” a day after President Ali Bongo was deposed.

Colonel Ulrich Manfoumbi Manfoumbi, the spokesman for Gabon’s newly formed Committee for the Transition and Restoration of Institutions (CTRI), declared on state TV that the junta would “respect all commitments” at home and abroad and “phase in transitional institutions.”

Manfoumbi stated that Nguema “wishes to reassure all donors, development partners, and the state’s creditors that all measures will be taken to ensure that our country’s commitments, both external and internal, will be respected.”

Brice Oligui Nguema, the general who led the overthrow of the Bongo dynasty, will be sworn in as transitional president on Monday, the army declared on state television.

The constitutional court would be the venue for General Nguema’s inauguration.

The coup occurred shortly after Gabon’s electoral commission released the results of the August 26 presidential election, which gave the incumbent 64 per cent of the vote and a second term.

Gabon’s largest opposition alliance requested military soldiers who seized power on Thursday to continue the election process and finish counting the presidential vote, which it claimed was wrongfully granted to Bongo before the count was completed.

Following the vote on Thursday, the opposition Alternance 2023 alliance “invited the defence and security forces to the discussion in order to work out… the best solution.”

Alternance, led by university professor Albert Ondo Ossa, has previously accused Bongo of “fraud” and asked that he hand over power “without bloodshed.”

The announcement by the junta came on the same day that the African Union’s Peace and Security Council met to discuss the situation in Gabon.

“Now – AU Peace & Security Council meets to consider the situation in Gabon,” the AU body said in a statement on X, formerly Twitter.

The meeting is being presided over by the AU commissioner for political affairs, Nigeria’s Bankole Adeoye, and the current occupant of the council’s rotating chair, Burundi’s Willy Nyamitwe.