This is the last article you can read this month
You can read more article this month
You can read more articles this month
Sorry your limit is up for this month
Reset on:
Please help support the Morning Star by subscribing here
GABON’S new military leaders said today ousted president Ali Bongo was free and can leave the country for medical treatment.
Colonel Ulrich Manfoumbi, spokesman for the transition committee, said Mr Bongo was “free to move given his state of health.”
He added: “He can, if he wishes, go abroad to carry out his medical checks.”
The ousted president’s state of health was not immediately clear.
He had suffered a stroke in late 2018 that kept him from his duties for months. Local television Gabon24 broadcast a meeting late Wednesday between Mr Bongo and Abdou Barry, head of the United Nations Office for Central Africa.
“I found him in good health,” Mr Barry said following the meeting.
Mr Bongo was toppled from power on August 30 amid a resurgence of coups in parts of Africa and shortly after he was declared the winner of a disputed election that would have extended his family’s 55-year reign.
He had succeeded his father, Omar, in 2009 who had been in power since 1967.
The new military leader, General Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema, has promised to return power to the people by organising free, transparent and credible elections but has given no date for a transition.
