Omar Bongo

Omar Bongo Ondimba
Omar Bongo in 2004
President of Gabon
In office 2 December 1967 – 8 June 2009
Prime Minister	Léon Mébiame Casimir Oyé-Mba Paulin Obame-Nguema Jean-François Ntoutoume Emane Jean Eyeghe Ndong
Vice President	Didjob Divungi Di Ndinge
Preceded by	Léon M'ba
Succeeded by	Guy Nzouba-Ndama
Personal details
Born	(1935-12-30)30 December 1935 Lewai, French Equatorial Africa (now Gabon)
Died	8 June 2009(2009-06-08) (aged 73) Barcelona, Spain
Political party	Gabonese Democratic Party
Spouse(s)	Patience Dabany (1959–1986) Edith Lucie Bongo (1990–2009)

El Hadj Omar Bongo Ondimba (born Albert-Bernard Bongo) (30 December 1935 – 8 June 2009) was a Gabonese politician who was President of Gabon from 1967 until his death. After Cuban President Fidel Castro stepped down in February 2008, he became the world's longest-serving ruler, excluding monarchies and the longest ruling head of government (but not head of state).

Early life

The youngest in a family of twelve children, Bongo was born on 30 December 1935 in Lewai, a town of the Haut-Ogooué province in southeastern Gabon near the border with the Republic of the Congo. He was a member of the small Bateke ethnic group. Lewai was renamed Bongoville in honour of Bongo's work to develop the town.

After his primary and secondary education in Brazzaville (then the capital of French Equatorial Africa), Bongo held a job at the Post and Telecommunications Public Services, before starting his military training. This training allowed him to serve as a second lieutenant and then as a first lieutenant in the Air Force, successively in Brazzaville, Bangui and Fort Lamy (present-day N'djamena, Chad). He was honorably discharged as captain.

Political career

After Gabon's independence in 1960, Albert-Bernard Bongo started his political career, gradually rising through a succession of positions under President Léon M'ba. Bongo campaigned for M. Sandoungout in Haut Ogooué in the 1961 parliamentary election, choosing not to run for election in his own right; Sandoungout was elected and became Minister of Health. Bongo worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs for a time, and he was named Assistant Director of the Presidential Cabinet in March 1962; he was named Director seven months later. In 1964, during the only coup attempt in Gabon's history, M'ba was kidnapped and Bongo was held in a military camp in Libreville, though the alliance was placed back in power 2 days later.

On 24 September 1965, he was appointed as Presidential Representative and placed in charge of defense and coordination. He was then Minister of Information and Tourism, initially on an interim basis, then formally holding the position in August 1966. M'ba, whose health was declining, appointed Bongo as Vice-President of Gabon on 12 November 1966. In the presidential election held on March 19, 1967, M'ba was re-elected as President and Bongo was elected alongside him as Vice-President. According to Bongo, due to "M'ba's long absence from political life", he essentially carried out the functions of the President while serving as Vice-President. He became President on 2 December 1967, following the death of M'ba on November 28. At age 31, he was Africa's fourth youngest president at the time, after Michel Micombero of Burundi and Gnassingbé Eyadéma of Togo.

In 1973, Bongo converted to Islam, taking the name Omar Bongo. In 2003, he added Ondimba as his surname.

In the early 1990s Bongo ended the domination of the Gabonese Democratic Party and allowed multi-party elections held in 1993 and 1998 in response to popular demand. Previously, it had been a one-party state for 16 years. Bongo won both times, taking 51.2% and 66.88% of the vote respectively. To boost public support for himself, he entered into talks with the opposition, negotiating what became known as the Paris Agreement in a successful attempt to restore calm.

In 2003 the constitution was changed to eliminate any restrictions on the number of terms a president can serve. Bongo's critics accuse him of intending to rule for life. Bongo announced his candidacy for the 2005 presidential election on 1 October. On 6 October it was announced that the election would be held on November 27, although security forces would vote two days earlier. According to official results, Bongo won the election with a large majority of 79.2%. He was sworn in for another seven-year term on 19 January 2006.

President Bongo officially meets with former American president George W. Bush in 2004 while both were President.

Bongo gave himself the image of a peacemaker, playing an important role in attempts to solve the crises in the Central African Republic, Congo-Brazzaville, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Among Gabonese, he was seen as a charismatic and straightforward figure, popular for the relative stability of his country during his reign.

International and regional roles

President Bongo was Grand Chancellor of the International Parliament for Safety and Peace, which is an International Organisation with volunteer diplomatic service .

Allegations of corruption

Bongo was one of the wealthiest heads of state in the world, with this attributed primarily from the benefits of oil revenue and alleged corruption. In 2005, an investigation by the United States Senate Indian Affairs Committee into fundraising irregularities by lobbyist Jack Abramoff revealed that Abramoff had offered to arrange a meeting between U.S. President George W. Bush and Bongo for the sum of 9 million USD. Although such an exchange of funds remains unproven, Bush met with Bongo 10 months later in the Oval Office.

He has been cited in recent years during French criminal inquiries into hundreds of millions of euros of illicit payments by Elf Aquitaine, the former French state-owned oil group. One Elf representative testified that the company was giving 50 million euros per year to Bongo to exploit the petrol lands of Gabon. As of June 2007, Bongo, along with President Denis Sassou Nguesso of the Republic of the Congo, Blaise Compaoré of Burkina Faso, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo of Equatorial Guinea and Dos Santos from Angola is being investigated by the French magistrates after the complaint made by French NGOs Survie and Sherpa due to claims that he has used millions of pounds of embezzled public funds to acquire lavish properties in France.

In 2009 Bongo was in a major row with France over a French inquiry into luxury properties he had bought in the country and claims by anti-corruption activists they were acquired with embezzled state funds.A French court decision in February 2009 to freeze Bongo's bank accounts added fuel to the fire and his government accused France of waging a "campaign to destabilise" the country. The assets freeze was part of a probe to find out if Bongo, his ally President Denis Sassou Nguesso of Congo-Brazzaville and Equatorial Guinea's President Teodoro Obiang Nguema had plundered state coffers.The leaders denied any wrongdoing.

Personal life

Bongo's first marriage was to Patience Dabany. Together they had a son, Alain Bernard Bongo, and a daughter Albertine Amissa Bongo. Ali-Ben (Alain Bernard Bongo) served as Foreign Minister from 1989 to 1991, becoming Defence Minister in 1999.

His first child, daughter Pascaline Mferri Bongo Ondimba was born 10 April 1956 in Franceville, Gabon. She was Foreign Minister of Gabon and is currently director of the presidential cabinet.

Bongo then married Edith Lucie Sassou-Nguesso (born March 10 1964), in 1990. She was the daughter of Congolese President Denis Sassou-Nguesso. She was a trained pediatrician, known for her elegance and her commitment to fighting AIDS. Edith died on March 14 2009, just after turning 45, in Rabat, Morocco where she had been undergoing treatment for several months.The statement announcing her death not specify the cause of death or the nature of her illness. She had not appeared in public for around three years preceding her death.. She was buried on March 22 2009 in the family cemetery in the northern town of Edou, in her native Congo. The burial, nationally televised in Gabon and Congo, was also attended by the presidents of Benin, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Togo.

Illness and death

On 7 May 2009, the Gabonese Government announced that Bongo had temporarily suspended his official duties and taken time off to mourn his wife and rest in Spain. .

It was reported by the international media that he was seriously ill, and undergoing treatment for cancer in hospital in Barcelona, Spain,. The Gabonese government maintained that he was in Spain for a few days of rest following the "intense emotional shock" of his wife's death, but eventually admitted that he was in a Spanish clinic "undergoing a medical check up". AFP eventually released a report stating among other things that "While Gabon's government has insisted he was undergoing a medical check-up, several sources said he was being treated for intestinal cancer, which they said had reached an advanced stage".

On 8 June 2009, unconfirmed reports quoting French media and citing sources "close to the French government" reported that Bongo had died in Spain.. The Government of Gabon denied the report. The same day, Gabon's prime minister released a statement saying that he went to visit Bongo in the Quiron clinic in Barcelona:"This morning I visited the President, accompanied by the President of the National Assembly, the Foreign Minister, the head of the President's cabinet and senior members of the presidential family and after a meeting with the medical team we can confirm that the President is alive." The Premier made no comment on Bongo's state of health after reading the statement to reporters.

The BBC then released a report stating that:- "The Spanish foreign affairs ministry backed [Prime Minister] Ndong's assertion, saying: "We have confirmed that he [President Bongo] is alive. We have no further information about him". But later on Monday, reports in the Spanish media said Mr Bongo had died shortly after Mr Ndong's news conference. They quoted members of Mr Bongo's entourage as saying the African leader had died at 1200GMT. The clinic and the Spanish government refused to comment on the latest reports".

The Gabonese government maintained its position. Sky News reported that a Gabonese government spokesman had stated:"The presidency of the Gabonese Republic would like to stress that the President of the Republic, the Head of State, His Excellency Omar Bongo is not dead," ...He is continuing his holiday in Spain following his checkup at the Quiron Clinic in Barcelona". Speaking on French radio, spokesman Raphael N'Toutoume added that the latest update he had heard was good news - and that Mr Bongo was preparing to leave the clinic."We are getting ready to welcome the head of state. No date for his return has been set," he said.

His death was confirmed by the country's Prime Minister, Jean Eyeghe Ndong, in a written statement on 8 June 2009. In his statement, Mr Ndong said Mr Bongo had died of a heart attack shortly before 1230GMT on 8 June 2009.

See also

• Bongo from Congo
• Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD-IV), 2008.

References

• Reed, Michael C. (June 1987), "Gabon: A Neo-Colonial Enclave of Enduring French Interest", The Journal of Modern African Studies, 25 (2), Cambridge University Press: 283–320, doi:10.1017/S0022278X00000392, OCLC 77874468.

External links

• International Herald Tribune: After Castro quits, an African autocrat is world's longest-serving leader
• Omar Bongo's Official Presidential Facebook page
• Necrology on France 24, June 8, 2009 (video)