Rédaction Africa Links 24 with Griffin Ondo Nzuey
Published on 2024-03-30 09:08:30
Challenging the legality of the decree designating participants in the Inclusive National Dialogue, the Vision 2025 platform now led by Herve Patrick Opiangah fears that the upcoming April conference is already biased, as it is organized to serve only the interests of the military in power and their supporters. It threatens not to participate.
It’s a foregone conclusion. This is at least the sentiment expressed by Vision 2025 on Saturday, March 30 in a declaration in Libreville. While praising the initiative of a national dialogue following the coup d’état carried out in late August 2023 by the Gabonese Armed Forces (FAG), the young platform now led by Hervé Patrick Opiangah fears that this consultation will only benefit the same military officials, whose number of participants is considered too high, while several political leaders have been excluded. The presence of government members and ministerial officials is not reassuring either.
“We note with disapproval that those who are supposed to implement [the resolutions of the dialogue] become both judges and parties. So, what value are we going to give to this pre-biased consultation?” the platform questions, believing that these talks are actually organized “for the preservation of undisclosed interests” of the Committee for Transition and Restoration of Institutions (CTRI) and its affiliates.
Regarding the decree designating participants in these meetings, Vision 2025 considers it illegal. Made public late at night on March 26, this text, it argues, was taken in “blatant contradiction” to the law on political parties. This decree, the platform regrets, “alienates by its divisive nature the democratic principles and the rule of law.” “We regret the stifling of political parties that have autonomous functioning, according to the law,” said Bonaventure Nzigou Manfoumbi, former president of the structure composed of 30 political parties out of the 140 legally recognized in Gabon, who says they reserve the right to refuse any participation in an “exclusive dialogue” like the one planned for next week.
Read the original article(French) on Gabon Review
