A military intervention after a dubious re-election in Gabon in August brought the number of coups in Africa since 2020 to seven. The overthrow of the president in Gabon happened just a month after a coup in another West African country, Niger.
President of Gabon since 2009, Ali Bongo Ondimba was deposed by his security personnel and General Brice Oligui Nguema was appointed leader during the transition and sworn in as president in the capital, Libreville, on Sept. 4. Army officials and Gabonese religious leaders attended the ceremony.
A general election had been conducted on Aug. 26, though international observers had been barred from the country. In the days after the election, as votes were counted and delays in the announcement of results persisted, a curfew was imposed on citizens and internet access was cut off. The military leaders who deposed Mr. Bongo claimed that electoral malpractice was one of the reasons for the coup.
But another reason surely must be the growing frustration of the general public in Gabon with a ruling elite who live in luxury while life for average Gabonese, despite its oil riches, remains a struggle. Gabon is a member of OPEC, but its oil wealth is concentrated in the hands of a few and nearly 40 percent of Gabonese aged 15 to 24 were out of work in 2020, according to the World Bank. Its oil export revenue was $6 billion in 2022, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Since 2017, there have been 18 coups worldwide, and all but one—Myanmar in 2021—have occurred in Africa.
Hours after the coup, Mr. Bongo appeared in a short video released on the internet urging people to “make some noise” on his behalf. But the only noise the next day was the cheering of the people supporting the soldiers who had participated in the coup. Most Gabonese celebrated the end of the Bongo dynasty’s rule, which began in 1967 with Mr. Bongo’s father, Omar Bongo Ondimba. Images of residents out on the streets of Libreville, snapping selfies with Gabonese soldiers, were beamed worldwide.
The Bongos in Gabon are prime examples of a phenomenon familiar to Africans—presidents who regularly schedule elections in accordance with their country’s constitutional requirements but who seem to easily hold on to power, election after election. The leaders of Uganda, Rwanda, Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon have been in power for at least two decades.
The overall number of coup attempts in Africa averaged four per year between 1960 and 2000. After the turn of the century, the number of coups declined, but Africa has still experienced more coups than any other continent. Since 2017, there have been 18 coups worldwide, and all but one—Myanmar in 2021—have occurred in Africa.
The Rev. Serge-Patrick Mabickassa, an official of Gabon’s Catholic bishops’ conference, said that the military coup had revived hope among the people of God. He said there were “explosions of joy on the streets of Gabon” after the military announced it had removed Mr. Bongo.
Assessing conditions in Gabon in the weeks since the coup, Father Mabickassa describes a “healthy collaboration between the population and the military. On the whole, the Gabonese people have reconciled with their army.”
“This act by the defense and security forces,” he said, “has been and continues to be welcomed by the people.”
He added that the Catholic Church in Gabon is following the developments in the country “with close attention.” According to Father Mabickassa, the Archbishop of Libreville, Jean-Patrick Iba-Ba, had a consultative meeting with General Nguema after the coup, during which the archbishop emphasized the “sacredness of life and respect for human dignity.”
Another reason for the coup must be the growing frustration of the general public with a ruling elite who live in luxury while life for average Gabonese, despite Gabon’s oil riches, remains a struggle.
Several complex factors drive the prevalence of coups in Africa.
In the post-Cold War era, the fall of authoritarian governments gave hope to West Africans that real political change might occur once the great powers stopped sponsoring African proxy wars. Many African states embraced democracy in the 1990s, but how democratic experiments have played out in Africa has left many people disappointed.
Democracy in West Africa is weak. Although elections are regularly held, many essential facets of democracy—like informed and active participation, respect for the rule of law, civil liberties and independent judiciaries—remain absent from many African societies.
A survey of 16 African countries showed that voters often chose parties not because they believed in their policies but because they feared reprisals by elected officials. In many parts of the continent, election rigging is a reality and a trigger for coups.
A 2023 poll conducted by the pan-African research network, Afrobarometer, revealed declining support for democracy among Africans over the last decade, falling from 73 percent to 68 percent. The continuing fragility of democracy on the continent creates conditions for abrupt unconstitutional changes in government. Countries susceptible to coups are often ones where the democratic space is controlled or threatened.
And so-called “democratic governments” in Africa are often unashamed sponsors of political repression. In 2022, Afrobarometer published a poll which found that only 44 percent of Africans said elections enabled voters to remove leaders they did not want.
Another study suggests that political power in Africa is often inherited rather than democratically contested. Many African presidents also tamper with their country’s constitutions to stay in control longer.
Many African states embraced democracy in the 1990s, but how democratic experiments have played out in Africa has left many people disappointed.
Rwanda’s president, Paul Kagame, who has been in power since 2000, recently announced that he would seek re-election in 2024. He made constitutional changes in 2015 that will allow him to extend his term.
In 2022, a Human Rights Watch report criticized the Kagame administration for silencing political opponents and critics. Freedom of expression and assembly in Rwanda have also been restricted under Mr. Kagame.
In Africa, poor governance, high levels of corruption and impunity by political elites, and weakened state institutions have often left governments unable to deliver the services citizens need. Bad governance leads to political instability. Political and social unrest usually precedes coups.
Ordinary African citizens do not have weapons or the strength to overthrow their governments. They often hang on until a military faction takes advantage of the situation and overthrows governments, allegedly on the people’s behalf. Youthful crowds, for example, said the coup in Burkina Faso in 2022 was “what we want.”
Another contributing factor is increasing socio-economic problems in many parts of West Africa. Poorer countries with fragile institutions are more vulnerable to coups. Many struggling African countries have large populations of young people who have become increasingly frustrated by their seemingly hopeless conditions.
Countries that struggle with insurgency and terrorism are also disproportionately more likely to see coups, says Jonathan Powell, a researcher from the University of Central Florida.
In Africa, poor governance, high levels of corruption and impunity by political elites, and weakened state institutions have often left governments unable to deliver the services citizens need.
Consideration also needs to be given to so-called “external influences.” Some of these influences can be described as “political indifference” to military coups among global powers. Countries like Russia and China, which have growing influence in Africa, are governed by authoritarian regimes themselves and do not take a stand on undemocratic practices, allowing economic interests to dictate their relationships with individual countries.
Some researchers say that the fingerprints of foreign powers can be found all over some coups in West Africa. Russia is alleged to have had a role in the 2021 and 2022 coups in Mali and Burkina Faso. The coup leader in Mali is also reported to have had U.S. training and assistance.
The influence of France, the region’s former colonial power, is a common denominator in West African coups. “Françafrique” is a term used to describe the emerging neo-colonial relationship between France and the nations that emerged out of the colonial period. This has underlined the accusation that the French seek to control African nations’ affairs.
Leaders in eight former French colonies in West and Central Africa have been ousted in military coups over the last three years. Each coup provokes a new round of anti-French sentiment, as the one-time colonial power gets blamed for interfering and as coup leaders shore up popular support with anti-French rhetoric.
After the recent coups in Niger and Gabon, a foreign affairs analyst from Senegal, Chris Ogunmodede, told CNN that the Gabonese attacked French businesses because they represented French neo-colonialism. In the past, France intervened to reinstate ousted allies. “In 1990, and again in 2009, when there were uprisings against the [Bongo] dynasty, France dispatched troops to Libreville to restore order,” The Times of London reports. Those interventions seem less likely now. In mid-October, French troops, in fact, began departing Niger for Chad after the new governing junta demanded that they be withdrawn.
“The systems of government that former French colonies have, which Paris imposed, are no longer fit for purpose,” Mr. Ogunmodede told CNN. “In a country like Gabon… one family has ruled for about 50 years; that’s not really a government; that’s a kingdom, and they are not an outlier.”
In other parts of Africa, some leaders have ruled for decades. In Cameroon, 90-year-old Paul Biya has been president since 1982. He splits his time between France and Switzerland, spending very little time in Cameroon—the country he is presumably governing. Western countries that host him ignore the situation in Cameroon.
“The ongoing events in Gabon, taking place in the wake of the coup in Niger, shine another spotlight on France’s dysfunctional relationship with its former colonies in Africa and the damaging ways Western support for autocrats on the continent is just as corrosive to democratic governance as the military coups they claim to oppose,” Mr. Ogunmodede said to CNN.
Mr. Oluwole Ojewale from the Institute of Security Studies told CNN that there was a sense that “even though France granted independence, they are still tied to the umbilical cord of France. There’s a subtle thinking that nothing takes place in Francophone countries without the tacit approval of France.”
At the same time, he also notes a historic attitudinal shift among younger people in these countries. They have no relationship, like their parents did, to the former colonial powers. The new generation seeks diverse geo-political partnerships beyond the historical ties with former colonial powers.
Leena Koni Hoffmann, an associate fellow of the Africa Program and the lead researcher for the Social Norms and Accountable Governance project at Chatham House, told Al Jazeera: “While it is important to pay attention to so-called anti-Western sentiments, I think the greater focus is that fact that the democracy has not centered the interests of many of the citizens in these countries.”
As young Africans grow more frustrated with bad governance and economic stagnation or decline, military takeovers are seen as a shortcut to a better future. Regional analysts warn that Gabon will not be the last coup in Africa.
