Gabon coup: Ousted president’s soldier cousin named leader of transition

The Committee of Transition and the Restoration of Institutions, the Gabonese military junta has named a new leader in the person of General Brice Oligui Nguema.

He was declared the transition leader on Wednesday, hours after the ouster of President Ali Bongo, whose re-election was cancelled and he was subsequently place under house arrest by the junta.

Oligui Nguema is, however, not a stranger to the corridors of power, Gabon’s security architecture and the Bongo family.

Information available to GhanaWeb indicates that he is a cousin of Ali Bongo and previously served as aide-de-camp of late president Omar Bongo till his demise in 2009.

Following the announcement of the coup, soldiers under his leadership as head of the presidential security unit (Republican Guard) carried Oligui Nguema shoulder high and celebrated his takeover.

But it was only after a meeting of the coup leaders that his place was cemented as leader of the transition.

“Pursuant to all existing laws concerning the position of head of state, General Oligui Nguema Brice has been designated unanimously as the president of the Committee of the Transition and the Restoration of Institutions. President of the transition,” the group’s spokesperson Colonel Ulrich Manfoumbi Manfoumbi said in an address flanked by over a dozen officers.

There is currently no information on the timeline of the transition and when new elections will take place.

Key state institutions have been suspended among them, the National Assembly, the Constitutional Court and the Electoral Commission.