Gabon, a central African nation, recently witnessed a tumultuous turn of events as military officers orchestrated a coup following controversial election results. The aftermath of this political disorder led to a nationwide internet shutdown and subsequent restoration, affecting 2.3 million residents.
Amid the backdrop of upcoming elections, President Ali Bongo Ondimba’s government in Gabon took a drastic step by cutting off internet access and denying foreign news outlets coverage of the electoral process. The elections were held against the backdrop of rising tensions, with the government aiming to curb the spread of “false news” and potential violence by imposing a nationwide internet shutdown.
However, this decision sparked not only outrage but also suspicion. To add to the controversy, President Ali Bongo Ondimba was declared the winner of the election, a declaration met with widespread skepticism. The aftermath of this announcement was telling: the streets of the capital city, Libreville, reverberated with the unsettling sound of gunfire. This event hinted at the existence of deeper, underlying unrest that extended beyond the election results.
And just when it seemed like things couldn’t get more chaotic, a group of Gabonese military officers stepped onto the stage, introducing themselves as the “Committee for the Transition and Restoration of Institutions.” Led by the formidable figure of Gen. Brice Oligui Nguema, who commanded the powerful Republican Guard, this group made a bold move that would forever change the course of Gabon’s history. Their faces appeared on CNN television, and their words were weighty: they were suspending the current regime.
It was like a scene out of a political drama, as the coup leaders declared the election results null and void, took President Ali Bongo Ondimba and his family into custody, and brought the functioning of the government to a sudden halt. The nation was left in suspense, unsure of what the next chapter in this gripping story would bring.
The leaders behind the coup made a serious accusation: they claimed that President Bongo had gone against the constitution by aiming for a third term. On top of that, they pointed fingers at the administration, accusing them of bungling up the entire election process. This whirlwind of events didn’t just cause confusion; it completely flipped the political scene of Gabon upside down.
The coup announcement was accompanied by an immediate restoration of internet access across the country, marking the end of a three-day internet blackout. Monitoring organisations such as NetBlocks, CloudFlare, and the Internet Outage Detection and Analysis (IODA) project at Georgia Tech confirmed the internet’s return to The Record.
This coup is not an isolated incident in the region. Gabon becomes the eighth country in West and Central Africa since 2020 to experience a military takeover. This unsettling trend has the potential to disrupt governance and stability in the region.
Gen. Brice Oligui Nguema, the alleged coup leader, is the commander-in-chief of Gabon’s Republican Guard, a highly influential security unit. Nguema, who is also a cousin of President Bongo, played a pivotal role in orchestrating the coup. The military’s assertion that “all the institutions of the republic” had been dissolved underscored the audacity and scope of the coup attempt.
