Voice Of The Oppressed: ...Boos For Sarkozy At Omar Bongo's Funeral

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June 17, 2009

...Boos For Sarkozy At Omar Bongo's Funeral

Nicolas Sarkozy may be enjoying a (modest) popularity surge in France after his UMP party fared well in European elections, but the same cannot be said in Gabon, where the President was copiously booed as he turned up for today's state funeral of his deceased counterpart, Omar Bongo Ondimba.

Jacques Chirac received applause when he left his limousine, but this rapidly turned to jeers when Sarkozy appeared to pay his respects to Africa's longest-serving head of state.

Given Chirac's reception, the French ambassador sounded a little lame when he claimed that the boos were not against "the President in person" but against the image projected in France of Gabon and the fact that Bongo's demise was announced 24 hours prematurely by a French news website.

"Go home we don't want you, leave," chanted the protesters. "Timber, petrol, manganese, we've given you everything. If France is what it is, it's thanks to Gabon. We don't want this anymore. We want the Americans and Chinese," said one.

Chirac was a close friend of Bongo (and, if you believe Valérie Giscard d'Estaing, received money from him to fund his 1981 presidential campaign); Sarkozy paid him lip service but Bongo was outraged that the French leader had failed to crush a legal complaint about where his family got the money to pay for 39 luxury properties in France and various flash racing cars. A court order to block some of his France-based bank accounts further irked him.

Having said that, did Sarkozy not remove his cooperation minister, Jean-Marie Bockel, after he encouragingly declared that the old days of "la Françafrique" - France's murky ties to its former African colonies - were over? Bongo was reportedly furious and called for his head, which duly rolled.

Will things change now? The Elysée claims they already have. Many in Gabon are not so sure...nor am I

Posted at 03:47 PM in Africa | Permalink

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