One wonders why there are no howls from the White House. Oh, right, the country isn't named Iran.
Also see: AmeriKa's African War Agenda
Interesting timing, 'eh, readers?
"Gabon erupts over electoral results; Protests rage after victory is handed to son of dictator" by Joel Bouopda Tatou, Associated Press | September 4, 2009
LIBREVILLE, Gabon - Gabon’s government declared late dictator Omar Bongo’s son the winner of presidential elections yesterday, triggering the worst violence in years in the oil-rich nation.
There is your U.S. and MSM interest.
In Gabon’s steamy coastal city of Port Gentil, mobs protesting Ali Bongo’s electoral victory burned France’s consulate, attacked the offices of French oil giant
Over 41 years, Omar Bongo amassed a fortune from the country’s oil wealth, owning 45 homes in France and more than a dozen luxury cars including a Bugatti worth $1.5 million. Meanwhile, a third of Gabon’s citizens lived in wretched poverty, some digging through garbage dumps for food.
Opposition supporters, feeling Sunday’s election was stolen and aghast that the Bongo family would continue to rule, turned their anger on the country’s former colonial ruler, France, widely suspected of having propped up the dictator and meddling in the elections....
I wouldn't be a bit surprised. Colonial masters always left behind special services and key assets. I'll bet a lot of this oil goes to France, and that's the name of the game!
Just before the results were announced, police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters who had camped overnight in the main square flanking the election commission’s office.
This is the thing WE NEED TO DO, America!!!!
We can LEARN from the AFRICANS!
A coffin representing the death of the Bongo regime, which has ruled since 1967, was in the square.
That is SO CREATIVE!!!
Interior Minister Jean- Francois Ndongou then announced that Ali Bongo, 50, the country’s defense minister who campaigned from a private jet and plastered the capital with billboards, won with 41.7 percent of the vote.
Pffft! He didn't win s***!
The top two opposition leaders - Andre Mba Obame and Mamboundou - were nearly tied, receiving 25.8 and 25.2 percent of the vote, Ndongou said. Obame owns a TV station that lost its signal Sunday. The station borrowed equipment to broadcast the results but before dawn Wednesday, masked men opened fire on the station, damaging its satellite uplink, said station manager Franck Nguema.
Reporters Without Borders said journalists have been threatened or beaten and the signals of some TV stations were cut. Mamboundou was injured in the arm by police during the violence, said Louis-Gaston Mayila, head of a political party allied to Mamboundou. Mayila said Mamboundou went into hiding....
Gabonese troops helped evacuate people from offices of Total and Schlumberger, the world’s largest oilfield services company.
Yeah, HE WAS "OUR" DICTATOR!
--more--"
LIBREVILLE, Gabon - The constitutional court declared the son of Gabon’s late dictator the victor of a disputed presidential election yesterday, extinguishing the opposition’s last chance for legal redress and increasing tension in a nation wracked by postelection violence.
The leader of one of the largest opposition parties immediately denounced the court’s declaration, which came hours after angry voters torched a police station in Gabon’s second-largest city.
Louis-Gaston Mayila, head of the Union of Gabonese People, or UPG, said opposition leaders are considering forming a parallel government. “And then we will see which government is more popular,’’ he said....
Bongo, 50, is the eldest child of Omar Bongo, who ruled Gabon for 41 years until his death in a Spanish clinic in June. Although many saw the elder Bongo as the father of the nation and tacitly accepted his decades-long grip on power, many also said they wouldn’t accept a second Bongo.
Opposition leaders undertook a nearly 24-hour protest outside the election commission Thursday as they awaited results. Security forces fired tear gas to disperse the demonstrators, just before the results were issued. Gabon’s opposition leaders have since gone into hiding....
--more--"
I expect that is the last we will hear of it for some time.
Update: I was wrong.
"Bongo appears at soccer stadium
LIBREVILLE - Hundreds of soldiers were deployed around Gabon’s soccer stadium for a World Cup qualifier yesterday as the country’s new president arrived and postelection violence continued for a third straight day. On Friday, the country’s constitutional court declared Ali Bongo the winner of the divisive presidential race. Soldiers and riot police set up a perimeter around the stadium and stood guard at every entrance (AP)."
Now I expect that to be the last we hear of Gabon in the Glob.
