Politicians banned from travel
2009-08-24 19:01
Brazzaville - Several leaders of opposition parties in the Republic of Congo have been banned from leaving the country during a probe into an outlawed demonstration, a government spokesperson said on Monday.
Alain Akouala Atipault said: "These opposition leaders are not under house arrest, but we need them here for the enquiry that has opened into the march they held" after a presidential election in mid-July.
Two of the opposition leaders, the vice-president of the Panafrican Union for Social Democracy, Ange Edouard Poungui, and Emmanuel Ngouelondele, the president of the Party for Democratic Alternance,Emmanuel Ngouelondele, have been stopped from leaving the country.
They took part, with Mathias Dzon, in a banned march on July 15, shortly after the publication of complete provisional results of the presidential poll on July 12, in which President Denis Sassou Nguesso was declared re-elected with 78.61% of the votes cast.
Dzon had been seen as the main challenger to the former military ruler. The parties of all three opposition leaders are members of the United Front of Opposition Parties (FUPO).
Akouala Atipault said the travel ban "only concerns those leaders who took place in this march. We will exercise diligence (for the investigation) to be completed."
The opposition rally of July 15 was banned by Congolese authorities and the police moved in to disperse demonstrators with tear gas and, according to some reports, live ammunition.
Officials say that two people were injured and the opposition says that one person was wounded by a bullet.
Several opposition parties in Congo called for a boycott of the presidential poll, charging that the outcome would be rigged.
Sassou Nguesso is one of Africa's longest-serving leaders having first come to power three decades ago.
