Nguema’s Gabon: Reform or Rebrand?

By Reuben Gilhooley

Since its post-war imperial decline, France has held a phantom grip over its former African holdings. Though flags were lowered, and anthems changed, France still continued to operate as de-facto suzerainty of a grand French empire on the continent. While there are still pockets of Francophone elites in Lebanon, Egypt, and Algeria, whatever little impact the sparse descendants of Napoleon’s Imperial Administration can claim, it all pales in comparison to Françafrique, France’s sphere of influence in Africa, principally in the sub-Saharan.

In the face of overwhelming costs, humiliation in the Indochina war, and political instability at home, De Gaulle started the path to formally roll-up France’s empire. To secure the future of French industry and security on the back of African extraction, the Fifth Republic set about establishing Francophile regimes in areas of particular importance, often with former colonial civil servants who had spent time in France and come to love it. France allowed corruption to run rampant in these regimes, so long as the oil continued to flow.

This continues to this day, the expansion of nuclear energy under Hollande and Macron, vindicated by the energy crisis after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, has been built on the back of Niger Uranium. France’s global stability, sourced from its truly independent nuclear deterrent, comes from sub-Saharan raw materials, refined and tested in the Algerian desert, at the time officially a part of France. In 2021, Macron paid his respects, and the respects of the French State, at the funeral of the Chadian President Idriss Déby, who seized power in a coup legitimising the authoritarian regime. The French treasury, the AFT, maintains the value and stability of the two CFA, once standing for Colonies françaises d'Afrique ("French colonies of Africa"), Francs by holding large amounts in their Foreign Exchange Reserves. By pegging the CFA francs to the Franc and then the Euro, the currency remains stable enough to safeguard French investment in the region, and to allow for lower barriers to trade between the nations involved. Theoretically, due to their large reserves, the French exchequer has, as a nuclear option, the power to dump all CFA reserves, tanking the currency on exchange rate markets. 

Gabon in particular attracted attention for its oil fields, with French oil giant Total — once the French Equatorial African Oil Company — using its obscene wealth and influence to operate the apparatus of extraction. Omar Bongo was alleged to have been paid €50 million per year by the company for use of the Gabon oil fields, with Total also being an informal line of communication between Bongo and the French Diplomatic Service.

Ultimately, it seems that in global terms little has changed, with a corrupt soft-Francophile being ousted by a corrupt soft-Russiophile/Sinophile who is related to the postcolonial governing family.

To maintain a stable relationship, France empowered a small number of Francophiles to run the newly independent governments. In the case of Gabon and Congo, this was the Bongo family. From 1967 to his death in 2009, the country was ruled by Omar Bongo, succeeded by his son, who was in turn succeeded by his cousin, newly elected President Oligui Nguema.

Nguema does seem to have been democratically elected, with independent reports from the African Union, and the European Union finding little evidence of voter suppression, particularly on a large enough scale to swing the almost 95% landslide in his favour.

The collapse of the Soviet Union and the influx of economic migrants to France, leading to a greater degree of Frenchmen with African Heritage, has led to the re-examining of Françafrique under a more critical light, at home and abroad.

Starting from 2020, a series of coup d’etats have erupted in the Sahel, termed now the “coup belt”, driven by resentment of French influence and failed jihadist counterinsurgency efforts in Operation Barkhane, instead wanting to become closer to Turkey, or Russia and the paramilitary government-aligned Wagner Group. In Gabon, there was little love for the Bongo regime, despite a rapidly growing oil-lead economy, deprivation, corruption, child mortality was rampant due to widespread corruption and a crumbling infrastructure network.

This shift away from France militarily is happening in conjunction with a general shift away from Europe. China’s Belt and Road Initiative has been welcomed widely in the region for its role in bringing investment and jobs at a massive scale.

Constitutionally, there is the potential for a shift towards a more autocratic arrangement similar to Russia or China, with the position of Prime Minister abolished at a landslide constitutional referendum in November last year. However, at least for now Nguema seems to be pro-democracy, with all major changes happening by widespread popular support.

Nguema holds a US property portfolio of over $1 Million, saying it is private business. Ultimately, it seems that in global terms little has changed, with a corrupt soft-Francophile being ousted by a corrupt soft-Russiophile/Sinophile who is related to the postcolonial governing family.

Image: Flickr