Opposition leader Jean Ping says the election was stolen, with the number of votes cast in Haut-Ogooue inflated to give victory to Bongo, whose family has ruled the central African oil-producing country for nearly half a century.
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French Prime Minister Manuel Valls told RTL radio that European observers have criticized the vote.
Violence broke out in Libreville on Wednesday, after Gabon’s Interior Minister Pacome Moubelet Boubeya announced the incumbent President Ali Bongo as the victor of Saturday’s poll, defeating his closest opponent and main opposition candidate Jean Ping by a very slim margin.
He said “common sense would command a recount of the ballots”.
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Bongo was first elected president in 2009 following the death of his father Omar, who had led the country for 42 years.
“A high-level delegation composed of African Heads of State, accompanied by senior officials of the AU Commission and the United Nations, is ready to be dispatched to Libreville, as soon as the conditions for such a visit are met”, said the president of the AU, Chadian President Idriss Deby, in a statement.
“About 15 French citizens are now missing in Gabon, many of whom carry dual citizenship”.
“We can not accept that our people will be killed like animals without reacting”, Ping wrote on Facebook. “We slept in our pee”, said a man who asked that his name be given as Matthieu to protect his identity.
There are claims of fraud in the recent presidential poll, notably in Bongo’s home province of Haut-Ogooue as the turnout there exceeded 99 percent, with the incumbent president gaining 95 percent of the votes. “I propose to cease all activity and begin a general strike”, Ping said in a statement on Monday.
After a week of post-election violence in Gabon, an uneasy calm is returning slowly to the streets of Libreville, Gabon’s capital, according to Quartz. I did this. And immediately the difficulties we’ve seen stopped.
Gabon authorities have so far dismissed calls from the opposition and Western powers including former colonial ruler France to publish more detailed results of the August polls, prompting the justice minister to resign on Monday.
Meanwhile, criticism is mounting over the election’s results.
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“We urge all parties to reject violence and show responsibility to favour at all times dialogue”.
