In Gabon, with less than a year to go before the highly anticipated general and notably presidential elections, the electoral architecture is being put in place. Revision of the electoral lists, new Gabonese Election Center, reforms, many files are on the table which is not without already creating certain tensions between power and opposition.
The revision of the electoral list will start from one day to another, in particular with the training of agents. The Ministry of the Interior has written to all the governors in order to reserve rooms for this process which will extend to the diaspora.
This launch has enraged the opposition, which accuses the government of ignoring for months its proposals for a major electoral reform, an overhaul which was to be legally ratified before the end of the year.
But if the government does not rule out dialogue, this project will not succeed, according to a source at the Ministry of the Interior. ” We had to do it much earlier. For such a reform, you need meetings, negotiations, President Bongo as arbiter and the Constitutional Court to validate. It’s unrealistic “says this interlocutor.
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Then, the implementation of a new biometric identity card should start at the same time as the revision of the lists. Negotiations with the French group Thalès are underway, the ministry is told.
Finally, power and opposition are working on the formation of a new Gabonese Election Center, a key institution responsible for organizing the 2023 elections. Each camp examines the profiles of candidates who will be negotiated in an ad hoc joint committee. The Ministry of the Interior drafted the decree creating this commission and “it will be approved shortly “, indicates an official source.
The profile of the president of the new CGE will be essential. “You need a technocrat, a competent senior executive with extensive experience in administrative management. Someone who is independent-minded”, says an official of the PDG presidential party. “If the process is transparent, the parties should agree on the right personhe says.