30 June 2011
The White House was brief in an official statement after the June 9 visit of the President of Gabon. The statement concluded by noting that “President Obama urged President Bongo Ondimba to take bold steps to root out corruption and to reform the judiciary and other key institutions to ensure the protection of human rights, and he welcomed the reforms that Gabon has taken under President Bongo Ondimba to bring more transparency and accountability to government. Both leaders agreed to continue to work together to promote peace and security, as well as advance good governance in Gabon.”
Journalists as well as civil society activists in Gabon, however, saw the meeting in itself, and the ongoing good relations between the United States and Gabon, as a signal that reform was hardly at the top of the list in U.S. relations with the oil-rich state which has played important diplomatic roles in both the African Union and the United Nations.
Prior to the meeting, representatives of Gabonese civil society released an open letter to President Obama, calling on him to live up to the inspiring words of his speech in Ghana in 2009, and noting that “Gabon today is trapped in a predatory and corrupt system which steals billions of dollars in state resources.”
This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains the text of that letter, courtesy of Pambazuka News (http://www.pambazuka.org). It also contains excerpts from an extensive 2010 report from the U.S. Senate as one of four case studies of U.S. involvement with funds from corruption in African countries.
For a blog summary of coverage of the visit in the United States, see http://africasacountry.com/2011/06/15/ali-bongo-takes-america/
The brief official White House statement is at http://tinyurl.com/6d39uco, and the response to questions by the White House press spokesman Jay Carney is at http://tinyurl.com/6cxkp6s
On protests suppressed in Gabon earlier this year, see the Feb. 17 article in Pambazuka (http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/70961) and additional coverage in Global Voices at http://globalvoicesonline.org/specialcoverage/gabon-unrest-2011/
For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on Gabon, see http://www.africafocus.org/country/gabon.php
For recent issues on illicit financial flows more generally, see http://www.africafocus.org/docs11/iff1105a.php, http://www.africafocus.org/docs11/iff1105b.php, and http://www.africafocus.org/docs10/fin1004.php
— Editor’s Note
Pambazuka News
Gabon in ruins: A democracy devastated Open letter to US President Barack Obama
Marc Ona Essangui
2011-06-23, Issue 536
http://pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/74287
* Translated from French by Ifeoma Morah.
Gabonese President Bongo Odimba’s visit to the US from 6-9 June has generated an outcry in Gabonese civil society. Its members sent a letter of inquiry to President Barack Obama asking him to take stock of a country with a democracy devastated by ruinous governance, but also to remind him of the meaning of his speech in Accra, which must be the basis of relations with African leaders.
Excellency, Mr President
It is in the name of the cardinal democratic values that are the foundation of the United States of America that Gabonese civil society comes to you as you prepare to receive Mr Ali Bongo Odimba, President of the Republic of Gabon, in order to expose to you, who presides over the Security Council of the United Nations, the catastrophic situation of governance and democracy in Gabon. Independent since 1960, Gabon suffers from two principal pathologies which affect all segments of society.
1. The Sick State of Democratic Governance
The main characteristic of this disease lies in the state’s refusal to allow any democratic change, through the confiscation of power by fraud; rigged elections; the results of elections being known in advance; the housing of the electoral list in the Ministry of Interior, where it is subject to systematic manipulation; and trafficking of all kinds in order to maintain a corrupt system hated by the people. Ballot results are thus reversed in favour of the Gabonese Democratic Party (PDG), the party-state, in power for 44 years and one of the last remnants of political monolithism in Africa, which has been responsible for the widespread bankruptcy and ruin of the country.
Yes, Mr President, Gabon is in ruins; democracy is devastated.
Institutions as a whole have no credibility because they are ideologically and politically loyal to the Gabonese Democratic Party. Their sole purpose is the survival of the regime. The last constitutional amendment, decided upon unilaterally by the PDG, was for the sole purpose of strengthening the unlimited power of, and creating a life presidency for, Mr Ali Bongo. This is a perfect example of the democratic stagnation of Gabon.
Similarly, the Constitutional Court is one of the obstacles keeping Gabon from a real march towards democracy and the rule of law. This institution, headed by the lovely mother of Ali Bongo and composed of former chiefs of the ruling party, firmly blocks democracy. She stubbornly refuses the establishment of legal mechanisms for holding reliable, transparent and democratic elections with the direct involvement of civil society in all phases of democratic elections (pre-electoral, electoral, and post-election) in the country. The Constitutional Court has consistently opposed the introduction of biometrics in the electoral system, whereas all political actors and the civil society have unanimously made the providential choice in favor of biometrics.
We make the bitter report that the actions, methods, and practices of the Gabonese government are contrary to international norms and standards of democracy.
Journalists are imprisoned and threatened with death simply because they expose corruption and anti-democratic actions and accuse people from the government or the president’s family. The journalist Desire Ename, managing director of the weekly ‘Voices of the North’, was abducted and detained by the police, an act instrumentalised by a relative of the president, Frederik Bongo. Thanks to the rapid mobilisation of the civil society, Desire Ename was released.
Every day, the freedom to unionise is threatened. Trade unionists defending their rights have been imprisoned. Some trade unionists, members of CONASYCED, saw their salaries suspended for several months for demanding that the government respect the commitments made to them.
Newspapers that are heavily critical of those in power are suspended or destroyed by agents in the service of power. Meanwhile, the two public television channels conduct a shameless manipulation of public opinion.
Forms of democratic expression such as peace marches are banned or brutally suppressed by security forces, whose treatment of the civilian population is similar to forces of occupation and repression.
The opposition parties are also marginalised, and their activities subject to numerous disturbances. Several members and supporters of a dissolved opposition party were removed from the public service or prosecuted.
As can be seen, Gabon is not a democracy. Political power is dictatorial, based on fraud and the repression of democratic forces, as the mechanisms used for sustaining political power are at odds with the democratic values on which the United States are based. It is indeed this same family which confiscates power and diverts public funds for the sole benefit of its small barony.
2. The Corruption of the Ruling Elite, who enrich themselves indefinitely, and the extreme poverty of the growing population
Since the arrival of Mr Ali Bongo Odimba, many decisions to improve the management of the state have been announced, but the implementation of these initiatives is still pending.
Meanwhile, corruption, particularly related to public procurement and management of revenues from extractive industries, is affecting all segments of the Gabonese government. The most significant example this year concerns deals for the 2012 CAN football tournament: The companies who have secured the largest contracts, SOCOBE and Entraco, both belong to the president’s family. Similarly, oil revenues are completely in the hands of the president’s family or relatives.
AllAfrica – All the Time
Continued here:
Reform Not At Top of U.S. Agenda