African press review 1 September 2016

Gabon’s parliament is burnt down as nationwide anger boils over, following Ali Bongo Ondimba proclaimed victory in Saturday’s Presidential election.

Vanguard

The Nigerian newspaper says results announced by the Interior Minister Interior Minister, gave Bongo 49.80 of the vote against 48.23 percent for his rival Jean Ping. The paper notes that he edged the opposition leader by a razor-thin 5,594 votes out of a total 627,805 registered voters.

The Vanguard says the election Ping's appeal of the result is likely to focus on disputed results in one of the country’s nine provinces - the Haut-Ogoue, the heartland of Bongo’s Teke ethnic group.

According to the newspaper, while the electoral commission put nationwide turn out for Saturday's vote at 59.46 percent it soured to 99.93 percent in the Haut-Egoué where Bongo won 95.5 percent.

Times Live

The South African publication says just under 628,000 people were registered to vote in the Central African nation, which is home to 1.8 million people. According to Times, the head of the country's electoral commission on Wednesday rejected calls by EU observers, the United States and former colonial power France for each polling station to publish its results.

Daily Nation

The Kenyan newspaper reports that thousands of people took to the streets to express their fury and publishes an enlarged photograph of flames and smoke billowing from the National Assembly building in Libreville. The paper says at least six people were admitted to hospital with bullet wounds while underlining self-congratulatory remarks Bongo made a little earlier that the election was "peaceful and transparent".

The Nation underlines the irony that despite the fact that the former French colony boasts one of Africa's highest per capita incomes at 7,400 euros, thanks to pumping 200,000 barrels of oil a day, one third of its population lives in poverty.

Le Soleil

The Senegalese Le Soleil newspaper says it was intrigued by the Libreville regime's attempt to denounce a so-called international conspiracy against the incumbent Bongo, publishing a long article on a press conference given by Gabon's minister of communication Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze.

According to Le Soleil, By-Nze spoke at length about a so-called adulterous relationships between opposition leader Jean Ping and lawyers of the Bongo family trying to discredit his biological relationship with the late President Omar Bongo and disinherit him of his share of the family's large fortune.

Gabon’s communication Minister named Barristers William Bourdon the legal counsel of the Survie anti-graft association, saying he belonged to the same "Françafrique" so precious to Robert Bourgi and writer Pierre Péan who authored a damning book Nouvelles Affaires Africaines about Ali Bongo. The Gabonese government official accused the three of behaving like "racketeers", according to the Dakar-based publication.