Rogombe in talks on election

2009-06-23 14:20

Libreville - Gabon's interim President Rose Francine Rogombe will on Tuesday and Wednesday meet the leaders of political parties to pave the way for a presidential election, an official statement said.

On Tuesday, Rogombe will meet members of the presidential majority loyal to the late president Omar Bongo Ondimba, who ruled the oil-rich equatorial African state for 41 years until his death earlier this month.

The talks will start at around 16:00 (15:00 GMT), according to the partly government-owned daily L'Union, which published a timetable.

Rogombe will have talks with members of about a dozen opposition parties on Wednesday, starting at 10:00.

In a message to the nation on Saturday, Rogombe announced that she would be holding a "broad consultation with the active forces of the nation",  with a view to elections for a new head of state.

Consultations and consensus

She vowed to act "under the triple seal of the constitution, consultations and consensus."

A trained lawyer, Rogombe was Senate speaker when she was sworn in as acting head of state on June 10, two days after Bongo's death was announced at a private clinic in Spain.

During the preparations for an elaborate state funeral held on June 16 and Bongo's subsequent burial in his native region, Gabonese authorities also moved fast to avoid a power vacuum, in line with the constitution.

Sources close to the government said that Rogombe's consultations are likely to lead to a consensus on a need to revise the electoral roll in the country of some 1.5 million people.

Under the constitution, elections are due within 45 days of the swearing-in of an acting head of state, unless a case of "force majeure" arises. The voting registers are widely regarded as sufficiently inaccurate to postpone the poll.

Some sources predict an election in September, while others say that it may not happen until the last quarter of the year, perhaps even in 2010.

Thorny relations

In an interview broadcast on Monday by French public television channel France 24, Prime Minister Jean Eyeghe Ndong said he did not see how a presidential election could be held by the end of July.

"I don't see how in 45 days we can sort out the problem of the presidential election," Ndong said. "I hope I am not getting ahead of myself, but it seems certain that it will take us more than 45 days."

Ndong did not rule out the possibility that he could run for the presidency, which is equally true of several members of his cabinet, notably including the defence minister, Ali Ben Bongo, a son of the late leader.

Under the late Bongo, Gabon switched to a multiparty political system in the 1990s, but his Gabonese Democratic Party is strongly implanted. Despite the oil wealth, many Gabonese are very poor and Bongo's last months in power were marked by thorny relations with France, the former colonial power, and allegations of corruption.

- AFP