The top opposition candidate in Gabon’s presidential election challenged the eligibility of Brice Oligui Nguema in an interview with Reuters, saying the putschist-turned-frontrunner posed a threat to democracy.<\/p>\n
Nguema came to power in the August 2023 coup that ended the Bongo family’s 56-year dynasty in the oil-producing Central African nation. He is widely expected to win the\u00a0election on Saturday.<\/p>\n
“Gabonese democracy is in danger,” Nguema’s main challenger Alain Claude Bilie By Nze told Reuters in the town of Lambarene, 240 kilometers (150 miles) southeast of the capital Libreville.<\/p>\n
“Military personnel were allowed to be candidates, so you have the one who controls the forces, who controls the finances, who controls the state, and who is a candidate,” Nze said.<\/p>\n
“We must fight to put an end to this system and send the military back to their barracks.”<\/p>\n
Nguema, 50, promised in the days after the coup to hand over power to civilians in a transition back to constitutional rule.<\/p>\n
But a new\u00a0constitution\u00a0approved in November did not bar Nguema from running and he\u00a0announced last month that he would be a candidate.<\/p>\n
Nguema told Radio France Internationale in March that he had renounced his military status though he has not formally done so. His spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Nze, who was prime minister under President Ali Bongo at the time of the coup, complained of an uneven playing field in the run-up to Saturday’s vote.<\/p>\n
“When (Nguema) visits a province, everything stops. All civil servants go to his rallies. It’s a scandal. It’s never happened like this,” he said.<\/p>\n
Ali Bongo’s critics accused him of rigging the 2016 vote and brutally quelling protests afterwards.<\/p>\n
Nze has created his own movement, “Together for Gabon”, in an effort to distance himself from the Bongo family.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The top opposition candidate in Gabon’s presidential election challenged the eligibility of Brice Oligui Nguema in an interview with Reuters, saying the putschist-turned-frontrunner posed a threat to democracy. Nguema came to power in the August 2023 coup that ended the Bongo family’s 56-year dynasty in the oil-producing Central African nation. He is widely expected to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15890,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Reuters","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,2362,33],"tags":[3940,1472,181],"class_list":["post-15889","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-central-africa","category-featured","category-politics","tag-alain-claude-bilie-by-nze","tag-brice-oligui-nguema","tag-gabon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15889","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15889\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15890"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}