Gabon president proposes cutting presidential mandate to five years

LIBREVILLE (Reuters) – Gabon President Ali Bongo on Monday proposed shortening the presidential mandate from seven to five years as he began consultations to prepare for elections this year and measures to prevent violence.

More than two days of deadly unrest followed Gabon’s last elections in 2016 after the opposition rejected Ali Bongo’s victory and alleged fraud.

“On the eve of future general elections, I have today decided to set the term of office for all elections to five years,” Bongo said on Monday.

The move will require constitutional reform and a vote in parliament.

Sixty-four-year-old Bongo has been president of the oil-producing West African nation since succeeding his father, Omar, who died in 2009.

He has not said whether he will run for a third term in the 2023 race for which an exact date has not yet been set. There are currently no constitutional term limits in Gabon.

His 2016 victory triggered clashes between police and protesters during which the parliament was torched. Estimates of the death toll from the unrest range from a few people killed to more than 50, while hundreds of others were arrested, according to U.S. democracy watchdog Freedom House.

Bongo suffered a stroke in October 2018 and was flown to Morocco for medical treatment. He spent three months abroad but returned shortly after a coup attempt was thwarted in his absence.

The consultations on the upcoming elections are scheduled to last until Feb. 24.

(Reporting by Gerauds Wilfried Obangome; Writing by Sofia Christensen; editing by Barbara Lewis)