Wilfried Devillers / Photo credits: Gabon 24 / AFP
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07:16, August 31, 2023
Less than 24 hours after the coup in Gabon, General Brice Oligui Nguema was appointed President of the Transition. A position of high responsibility, which makes him the new strong man of the country. The son of an officer, the soldier climbed all the rungs, until he became one of the best placed to return power.
Brice Oligui Nguema: here is the name of the new strongman in Gabon. Less than 24 hours after the coup d’etat, which returned the power of Ali Bongo Ondimba to the head of the country, this general has already appointed the new president of the transition by the putschist soldiers. This veteran soldier enjoys great popularity in the country. Proof of this is in a video posted on social networks, Brice Oligui Nguema is applauded by the crowd even before being appointed President of the Transition. “Oligui president”, shout his supporters.
The son of an officer, Brice Oligui Nguema trained at the Royal Military Academy of Meknes in Morocco and with the Gabonese commandos. He then quickly rose through the ranks to become Omar Bongo’s aide-de-camp until the death of the former president in 2009. Dismissed under Ali Bongo, who succeeded his father, he made a comeback ten years later. He was then propelled colonel in charge of intelligence of the Republican Guard in 2018.
One of the best placed to carry out a coup?
And only six months later, he took the head of the famous Republican Guard, to become today the central element of the Gabonese security apparatus. General Brice Oligui Nguema was in this sense one of the best placed to organize the fall of President Bongo whom he ‘retired’, in his own words. Its stated objective is now to ensure the transition. But until when ? This, the head of the Republican Guard has not yet specified.