The Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) on Friday, announced that it was maintaining the suspension of Gabon.
According to the African States, the sanction was imposed following the overthrow of President Ali Bongo Ondimba by the military last August.
It was gathered that ECCAS decided to maintain the decision to suspend Gabon’s participation in Community activities until constitutional order is restored.
Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Burundi, Central African Republic, Congo, Sao Tome and Principe, Chad, Cameroon and Rwanda were represented at the summit.
The lifting of this sanction would have represented a first step towards reintegration on the international stage, almost four months after the coup d’état led to condemnation from Western capitals and Gabon’s suspension from the African Union.
Meanwhile, since taking power, General Oligui has met with all the leaders of ECCAS member countries, with the exception of Angolan President João Lourenço.
On the night of August 30, having just been declared the winner of the presidential election, Ali Bongo Ondimba was overthrown by almost all the general officers of the army and police force, led by General Brice Oligui Nguema.
All the political parties, including Mr. Bongo’s, and the vast majority of civil society organizations, immediately rallied behind General Nguema’s government, praising it not as a “coup d’état” but as a “liberation coup”, as the coup plotters put it.
Mr. Bongo was elected 14 years ago, following the death in 2009 of his father Omar Bongo Ondimba, who had ruled this small oil-rich Central African country for 41 years.
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