"LE GABON ENERVANT" OR "ANNOYING GABON"

English version  Some time ago, CBON visited the province of Nyanga, accompanied by numerous dignitaries from that province, including Séraphin Moundounga, and by compliant journalists who presented us with nighttime fishing trips, an endless string of projects, and even a supposedly anonymous “great farmer” who turned out to be nothing more than the wife of a sitting minister. But a little later, a fellow countryman went back to Nyanga and gave us a bleak account, worlds apart from the syrupy portrayals of the kounabelist journalists. This countryman is named Giovanni Boulingui, and his reporting earned him a stay in the cells of the intelligence services. Dear readers, Giovanni Boulingui shows us that kounabelist journalists are not reliable, and that to get accurate information, one absolutely must diversify one’s sources, cross-checking official narratives with those of independent journalists, local NGOs, or direct testimonies from the field. In societies where the press is fr...

English version  In a recent interview with Christian Bernard Rekoula, Jean Gaspard Ntoutoume AYI, now a member of parliament, made two important claims about Gabon’s debt: 1. That Gabon is badly indebted 2. That the debt/GDP ratio isn’t as significant as it seems, since large countries like the USA or France are indebted at more than 100% of their GDP. While this blog agrees with the first claim, it seems to us that the deputy is mistaken on the second. On substance, what the deputy says about bad debt is largely corroborated by independent sources: Fitch, the IMF, the World Bank, etc. Ntoutoume Ayi, the former Director General of Public Debt, doesn’t merely point to a high level of debt: he criticizes the quality of that debt, that is, what the borrowed money is used for and at what cost. He estimated that these new loans will generate an interest burden of more than 1,000 billion CFA francs over ten years, and according to an article covering his remarks, more than 1,400...

English version  He calls himself a builder, but is he merely an apprentice constructor, or worse, actually a destroyer? This question marks a substantive distinction, not just a matter of vocabulary. These three figures reflect different governance logics: • The destroyer  dismantles institutions, concentrates power, crushes checks and balances, and leaves a country more fragile than he found it, even if he can point to grand speeches or short-term successes. • The constructor  produces concrete, visible achievements such as roads, schools, hospitals, and one-off reforms, but without necessarily transforming the deep structures of the state, governance, justice, a diversified economy, and so on. • The builder , in the most demanding sense, goes further: he lays lasting foundations, solid institutions, the rule of law, an economy less dependent on rent, mechanisms for peaceful transfer of power, so that the country keeps standing after he leaves. The builder c...