It’s been a busy month for Gabon. Former coup leader Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema was sworn in as President on May 3 for a seven-year term after the Constitutional Court affirmed his April 12 election victory with 94.85% of the vote. The night before the inauguration, the military junta he led was dissolved, making Gabon the first in the series of military coups to beset West Africa’s Franc Zone countries to make the transition from military dictatorship to President through elections.

Despite deposing the Bongo family political dynasty during the August 30, 2023, bloodless coup, many observers expected Oligui Nguema to be a continuation of the Bongo regime because he is cousin to former President Ali Bongo Ondimba, who governed from 2009 to 2023. Probably thanks to family connections, he became aide de camp to Ali Bongo’s father, the late President Omar Bongo, and later became head of the praetorian guard, the Republican Guard, under Ali Bongo.

But Oligui Nguema’s modest roots sets him apart from the ultra-wealthy ruling elite in Libreville that surrounded the Bongo family. Gabonese commentators see him as pragmatic and not ideological and say he is confident enough of his own position to have been able to draw on experienced people from the previous Bongo regimes as well as from their opponents when forming a government.

Oligui Nguema wasted no time in appointing a government peopled with highly experienced economists and technocrats, with a strong overall private-sector bent. He abolished the Prime Minister’s role, appointing in its stead two Vice Presidents. Barro Chambrier, the de facto Prime Minister who will run government, spent several years on the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF’s) executive board, representing several francophone African countries. He then returned to Gabon to take up a series of junior Minister roles – for forestry, water, development, the budget and statistics – and did not rush to join Oligui Nguema’s military junta. He served as Mines, Petroleum and Hydrocarbons Minister under Ali Bongo Ondimba before becoming leader of the Rassemblement pour la Patrie et la Modernité and a strong critic of Bongo. He brings a strong understanding of natural resource, the environment and development imperatives. Séraphin Moundounga, meanwhile, was Education and then Justice Minister during Ali Bongo’s first term but went into opposition and exile to protest the circumstances of Bongo’s re-election in 2016, and has returned to serve as the Presidency’s protocol officer. The new Finance Minister, Henri-Claude Oyima, previously headed BGFIBank, the largest banking group in the six-country Central African CFA bloc, CEMAC. A champion of the private sector, he served as chair of the board of the regional stock exchange and president of Gabon’s employers’ federation. Meanwhile, Oil and Gas Minister Sosthène Nguéma is a young engineer and technocrat.

Policy-wise, Oligui Nguema has been careful to acknowledge long-standing anti-Bongo dynasty grievances. He has proven to be in touch and yet pragmatic. During the transition, he paid off public-sector salary arrears, reduced the prices of essential goods, and launched public projects to create jobs. He slashed fees for setting up business and helped small traders by distributing taxis and motorbikes to set up taxi and courier services. He also distributed hundreds of disability mobility scooters. He ostensibly drew people into the political process through a national dialogue, tweaking a new Constitution to formalise the French Fifth Republic model of a strong Presidency, while scrapping the Prime Minister’s post, thus weakening Parliament’s position.

He has demonstrated sensitivity to a growing desire among Gabonese and others in West and Central Africa for more control of key resources. He ordered State-owned Gabon Oil Company to acquire the assets of oil and gas exploration and production company Assala Energy in 2024 and most recently to acquire those of Tullow. Tullow announced on May 13 that it had sold 100% of its shares for a total of $300-million. The original sale was announced in March; since then, the oil price has taken a beating as markets fear US President Donald Trump’s tariff war will spark a global recession.

Both deals give the Gabonese State a significant slice of the country’s hydrocarbon operating assets, but the cost has been significant and potentially risky for the commodities trading group, as Gabon’s repayment will reportedly be funded out of the oil revenues from the assets. This had raised fears in some quarters that the new government would seek to renegotiate the deal or scrap it altogether. Others were concerned that, given Gabon’s high levels of public debt, the country would not be able to finance it. Gabonese officials are determined the deal should go ahead, although some have intimated that terms have been renegotiated to take cognisance of the slump in oil prices. Government sources say Oligui Nguema is likely to drive the deals to a conclusion to deliver on his promises – notably because the Gabonese go to the polls again in October – this time to elect a new legislature.

A financing deal was signed with Swiss-based commodities group Gunvor to fully underwrite the Tullow deal and to part-finance the transaction. Gunvor also provided much of the $1.28-billion needed to finance the acquisition of a 75% stake in Assala’s assets producing 45 000 bb/d from Carlyle.

In a first phase, the government opted to raise funds on the regional market – the CFA-franc regional money market of CEMAC. It had some success but then lender appetite dried up as the market became worried about Gabon’s high debt levels, inherited from the Bongo era. In February, the government managed to raise $520-million through an expensive new Eurobond, and much of the proceeds were used to clear an old $318-million obligation that was falling due this June – the same time as the first disbursement on the Tullow deal will be due.

The government has since shifted tack, seeking instead to reprofile debt, to shift it onto a more manageable longer-term basis. The Public Accounts Ministry has announced that ten financial institutions had backed Gabon to extend the maturities of regional market debt worth $1.01-billion from 2.3 years to six years through what it described as a voluntary exchange with banks. Restructuring means Gabon now has access to $585.78-million. However, it’s likely these deals and the high levels of pre-government spending will push the government to seek a staff-monitored IMF programme. To get an IMF deal over the line, Oligui Nguema will need all the frontline experience of his government to square up popular oil ownership and IMF demands for fiscal prudence and broader economic development.