As the most powerful leader of oil-rich Gabon, Ali Bongo Ondimba has two passions, music and forestry, that have established powerful relationships around the world.
An accomplished musician, Mr. Bongo recorded a disco-funk album and attracted James Brown and Michael Jackson to Gabon. As president, he built a music studio in his seaside palace and played improv jazz to foreign diplomats at state dinners.
Recently, Mr. Bongo among Western scientists and conservationists, who are fascinated by both the paradisiacal beauty of Gabon, an Arizona-sized country covered in lush rainforest and teeming with wildlife, and his commitment to protect it.
But among his own people, Mr. Bongo, 64, embodied a family dynasty, founded by his father, that dominated Gabon for 56 years — until this week, when it collapsed.
Military officials seized power on Wednesday, hours after election officials declared Mr. Bongo as the winner of a disputed election last weekend. Few saw it, least of all the president. When his own bodyguards came for him, Mr. Bongo seemed genuinely confused.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” Mr. Bongo, speaking from his home, said in a video authenticated and circulated by some of his many Western advisers. “I’m calling you to make noise.”
It is the latest in a spate of military coups in African countries, which have toppled weak governments. (“Dejà coup,” said an analyst from Sudanwhich had its own coup in 2021.) But while other takeovers have been prompted by violent unrest, in peaceful Gabon it’s different: A sign that Bongo’s rule, which has lasted tightly for half a century, has run its course.
No trace of Mr. Bongo on Thursday, a day after his sad plea for help. The leader of the coup, Gen. Brice Oligui Nguema — a cousin of Mr. Bongo — has announced that he will be sworn in as “transitional president” next Monday.
Other African leaders, fearing they might be next, are cautious. In neighboring Cameroon, President Paul Biya — in office for 40 years and, at age 90, the world’s oldest serving leader — announced an abrupt change in his country’s military leadership. Rwanda did the samewhich like Gabon has been ruled by one man for decades.
As Mr. Bongo’s fate hangs in the balance, reactions have been mixed. Foreign conservationists have expressed concerns about what’s next for a country that has worked so hard to preserve its pristine forests and seas. Just last month, Gabon negotiated a landmark $500 million deal debt settlement agreement which freed up $163 million for marine protection.
“The power vacuum could lead to a free-for-all where poaching, illegal logging and deforestation increase,” said Simon Lewis, a professor of global change science at University College London, who advised Gabon. about climate policy. “The Gabonese’s hope of making huge profits from their forests may disappear.”
In Libreville, Gabon’s crowded seaside capital, the verdict is more mixed. “I’m free!” shouted Alaphine, a young woman in a crowd of supporters who declined to give her last name. But Christopher Ngondjet, a 25-year-old law student, said he felt ripped off.
He welcomed the change from the Bongos, he said, but was concerned about military rule. “The president has done a lot of good things, especially in the environment,” he said. “I don’t know if the generals will have the same interest.”
In many ways, Gabon has more in common with some Persian Gulf states than with its African neighbors. It has a small population of 2.3 million people, large oil wealth and is a sparsely populated country; 88 percent of the land is forest and there are few roads.
As oil prices soared in the last quarter of the 20th century, the Bongo family ruled like an undeclared monarchy. President Omar Bongo took power in 1967 and became a close ally of France, Gabon’s former colonial ruler. By most estimates, he fathered at least 53 children with different women, a way of cementing political alliances.
After Omar Bongo died in 2009, the torch was passed to Ali, one of his seven “official” sons, who won the presidential election that year.
Bongos love the baubles of extreme wealth — Bentleys, villas in Paris, vacations on the Côte d’Azur. Ali Bongo often rides into Libreville in a Rolls-Royce and mingles with King Mohammed of Morocco, an old friend who has a private palace in Gabon.
French investigators accused Mr. Bongo and his family of corruption. But what sets their country apart from neighboring oil-rich kleptocracies, such as Equatorial Guinea, is that some wealth also flows downstream.
Levels of education and health care are higher in Gabon than elsewhere in the region. Good students are sent to France on government scholarships. Its timber industry provides 30,000 jobs, largely thanks to Mr. Bongo’s insistence on adding value in Gabon, not abroad.
With its neat markets and palm-lined corniche, Libreville lacks the constant bustle of neighboring capitals. The US Agency for International Development classifies Gabon as a middle-income country.
Certainly, poverty is widespread: a 2013 McKinsey report estimated that 30 percent of Gabonese live on $140 per month. But even in the poorest parts of Libreville living conditions are better than most of the region.
Mr. Bongo’s kitchen cabinet is full of Western advisers who walk through government offices and in one case appoint a minister: Lee White, a British-born scientist, who since 2019 has been water minister , forest, sea and environment.
About 15 years ago, Mr. Bongo in the country’s forests — home to western lowland gorillas, forest elephants, chimps and mandrills, and part of the Congo Basin, one of the world’s most important carbon sinks.
Omar Bongo, created 13 national parks covering 10 percent of Gabon’s land area, and Ali Bongo continued that passion. He flies by helicopter to his private reserve, where he keeps lions, tigers, cheetahs, cougars and leopards.
He became a regular at international climate conferences, and courted powerful, wealthy allies. Last year, King Charles, who praised Mr. Bongo’s policies, received him at Buckingham Palace. During a visit to Gabon, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, pledged $35 million for forest conservation.
Mr. Bongo’s advocacy is partly motivated by self-interest. It inflamed his foreign image and opened the door to a potential fortune in carbon credits – billions of dollars Mr. Bongo has persuaded the West to pay Gabon to help preserve its rainforests.
But foreign officials who have met Mr. Bongo say his gentle, friendly demeanor can fade as he gets excited about nature. In a 2016 interview with the Times, Mr. Bongo reminisced about growing up with a pet Siberian tiger and gushed about his current pets in the presidential reserve. “So many,” she said, looking at the names of some of her lions, Goliath and Greta, and a cheetah called Sahara.
But Mr. Bongo’s system began to show cracks. After the financial collapse of 2008, the drop in oil prices hit Gabon hard. As the economy collapsed, inequality worsened.
The fleets of Mercedes and Rolls-Royce cars that rolled through the small streets of the capital, parked at posh seafood restaurants or outside the presidential palace, began to crumble more than usual.
In forest communities, farmers complained that growing numbers of hungry elephants — a direct result of Mr. Bongo’s anti-poaching efforts — were eating their crops. Despite oil revenues, they complain, passable roads are almost non-existent outside the capital. “Let the elephants vote for him,” was a slogan of critics during the 2016 election.
In that vote, Mr. Bongo showed his knuckles to stay in power. In his strongholds, voter turnout was an unlikely 99 percent. Security forces surrounded the headquarters of the opposition party and at least one person was killed.
Daniel Mengara, founder of the ousted opposition group Bongo Must Go, says oil revenues have helped the people of Gabon, but the Bongos have loomed large. “We deserve better than what we have and what we have is suffering,” he said.
In 2019, Mr. Bongo suffered a stroke and disappeared for 10 months, only to reappear with a cane. His relationship with France has weakened: He has welcomed Chinese and other investment, and last year Gabon joined the British Commonwealth.
Since 2020, a series of coups has shaken West Africa: first in Mali, then Burkina Faso, Guinea, Sudan and, last month, Niger. Despite threats and sanctions from African and Western powers, nothing has been reversed.
Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu has warned of a “spread of autocracy,” where brave soldiers in other countries decide they should take over as well.
Few thought Mr. Bongo was in immediate danger. But then he pushed through a controversial election, and the coup plotters, led by his own cousin, brought the contagion to his doorstep.
Declan Walsh reported from Nairobi, Kenya, and Dionne Searcey from New York. Yann Leymangoye contributed reporting from Libreville, Gabon.
