A court in Gabon convicted the wife and son of the ousted president Ali Bongo, on Wednesday for financial crimes and sentenced them in absentia to 20 years in prison.
Sylvia Bongo, 62, and Noureddin Bongo, 33, who were taken into custody shortly after the 2023 coup that toppled Ali Bongo, who had ruled the Central African nation since 2009, were accused of crimes including embezzlement of public funds and money laundering, which they reject.
They were detained for nearly two years before being transferred to house arrest in May and then flown with Ali Bongo to Angola, which said it had taken the family in “for humanitarian reasons.”
Lawyers for the Bongos have denounced the proceedings against them as an illegal “show trial.”
“This verdict was predetermined in the office of President (Brice) Oligui Nguema a long time ago – today was merely a rubber-stamping exercise,” Noureddin Bongo said in a statement on Wednesday.
Maixent Essa Assoumou, president of the Specialised Criminal Court that tried the Bongos, said the verdict was “absolutely not an act of revenge, but a restoration of order.”
The 2023 coup in Gabon was one of eight in West and Central Africa between 2020 and 2023. Nguema, the coup leader, was sworn in for a seven-year term as president in May after winning an election with nearly 95% of the vote.
