Ten years after Gabon’s post-election violence, painful questions remain
The crisis erupted on the night of 31 August to 1 September 2016, after Bongo was declared the winner of a highly contested presidential election against opposition leader Jean Ping.
Security forces launched an armed assault on Ping's campaign headquarters in Libreville, marking the beginning of several days of unrest, looting and violent repression. A decade later, the true death toll remains unknown.
For survivors and relatives of those killed, the events have never really ended.
"This is not an event that ended on 31 August. It continues to this day. We are haunted – sometimes even in our dreams – by those who died," said Gildas-Amour Ngomba Ngomba, a member of the Réconciliation association.
"Today, we are demanding the truth, and this means through an investigation, because to bring the truth to light, an investigation is necessary."
Since the fall of the Bongo dynasty in the 2023 military coup, victims have been able to speak more openly. President Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema has left the door open to providing care for people injured in 2016, but has remained cautious about reopening the wider question of responsibility.
Oligui Nguema was posted abroad at the time, but several members of the security establishment who were already in positions of authority in 2016 remain influential today. Barricades on a street following an election protest in Libreville, Gabon, on 1 September 2016.
Calls to reopen a painful chapter
Jean-Gaspard Ntoutoume Ayi, now an MP and formerly a spokesperson for Ping's 2016 campaign, believes that helps explain the reluctance to revisit the crisis.
He argues that the security forces that overthrew Bongo in 2023 may be uncomfortable examining why they failed to protect the population seven years earlier.
"I think that in 2023, the defence and security forces did what they should have done in 2016," he said, adding that there remained considerable reluctance among both the political class and the wider public to place responsibility on them.
Others say Gabon cannot move forward without confronting what happened.
"There are passive players, there are active players; some are still here, some are no longer here, and some at least hold the truth about this case," Senator Marc Ona Essangui told RFI.
"Who gave the orders? Who carried them out? These are questions we must ask ourselves. To heal these wounds, it is absolutely essential that people speak out."
Former government spokesperson Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze, one of the main figures of the Bongo era, proposed creating a Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission during his presidential campaign in 2025.
For Ngomba Ngomba, establishing responsibility is also about preventing a repeat of the violence at future elections.
"If we continue to condone this, we are setting the stage for the collective memory to relive the same kind of event," he said.
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Questions over France's role
The search for accountability also extends beyond Gabon.
In September 2016, a Franco-Gabonese businessman who had been detained during the violence filed a complaint in France, including allegations of crimes against humanity.
He says he remains haunted by what he witnessed at Ping's headquarters.
"I remember a young man; I think he'd been shot in the collarbone and the bullet was sticking out as if someone had snapped a baguette in two," he told RFI.
Further complaints have since been lodged in France, where investigators are examining allegations of crimes against humanity as well as the possible involvement of French nationals.
Some French citizens were working under contract with Gabon's Republican Guard at the time of the assault, and several are named in a complaint seen by RFI.
Two witnesses present at Ping's headquarters also told RFI that they heard soldiers speaking French with French accents, apparently issuing orders during the operation.
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Scrutiny of French cooperation
Questions have also been raised over the cooperation of the French authorities with the investigation.
In 2020, the French gendarmerie ordered the Foreign Ministry to provide documents relating to the 2016 crisis. According to a senior civil servant who later reported the matter to prosecutors, the ministry's Africa Directorate initially supplied just 35 of 315 available documents.
An internal email seen by RFI reportedly indicated that the documents provided should focus on French victims.
The French Foreign Ministry told RFI that it "does not comment on an ongoing judicial investigation and is cooperating fully with the judicial authorities".
For many Gabonese, however, memories remain strong of what they saw as France's silence following Bongo's disputed re-election and the violence that followed.
Paris imposed no sanctions of its own at the time, frequently pointing instead to the European Union's position.
Ten years later, the judicial investigations are still open – and for survivors, that offers at least the possibility that some of the unanswered questions surrounding 2016 may yet be addressed.
This has been adapted from an original article by RFI's French service