Jurassic Park

There was a time when Africa's political landscape was dominated by dinosaurs. These were heads of state who'd been in power for donkeys' years, sometimes since independence. They were to be found especially amongst the Francophone countries of sub-Saharan Africa. They were invariably pro-French in their foreign policy, and generally pro-business in their domestic economic policies, especially when it came to growing and protecting their own sizable business interests. They provided stability. A good example was Felix Houphouet-Boigny, president of Cote D'Ivoire from independence in 1960 until his death in 1993 et apres lui la deluge!

Time's taken its toll on the dinosaurs, and there aren't too many left. There's Paul Biya in Cameroons, in power since 1982, Jose Eduardo dos Santos, president of Angola since 1979 and Dennis Sassou-Ngouessou in Congo-Brazzaville who also came to power first in 1979, but who hasn't held the top job uninterruptedly. But the real daddy stegassaurus is undoubtedly Sassou-Nguessou's son-in-law, Omar Bongo in Gabon.

Bongo, or Jean-Albert as he called himself before converting to Islam, has been president since November 1967, Actually he's been in charge since at least the summer of 1966 when his mentor and Gabon's first president Leon M'Ba handed over effective control because of ill-health. Forty-two years! That's some innings. At 73 he's still relatively young and shows no signs of giving up.

He has always been able to count on the backing of the French. When some soldiers tried to topple M'Ba the French put down the revolt. The reasons were fairly obvious: Gabon has huge oil reserves (and is a member of OPEC). Also, there are big uranium deposits there, and we all know how much the French rely on nuclear energy for their power.

But it seems that President Nic is starting to reassess France's legacy ties. For one thing, a French court has frozen President Bongo's bank accounts. It all goes back to a dispute between Bongo and a French businessman regarding the sale of a shipping-line to the president. There was a dispute about payment: the president probably felt that there shouldn't be any, and as the businessman just happened to be on Gabonese soil at the time of the spat. he was arrested and thrown into jail. It soon became known that the whole thing could be settled with sufficient goodwill and enough cash forthcoming from the other side, and so the businessman's son made a payment of something like $500.000 to President Bongo for his father's release. Once free daddy and son felt out of pocket, and a French court found in their favour and demanded that the president give the money back. Pending which they've frozen his bank accounts. And the French government and the Quai d'Orsay are saying and doing rien to help the president.