A former president of the National Assembly in Gabon, leader of an opposition party, was arrested on Saturday at the border, returning from Congo with three suitcases filled with banknotes representing nearly two million euros, learned AFP on Sunday from judicial sources.
Guy Nzouba-Ndama , 76 years old and president for 19 years of the lower house of Parliament, had resigned in March 2016 with a bang, a month before running for president against the head of state, Ali Bongo Ondimba , then to rally his rival Jean Ping, beaten by a few percentage points by the outgoing.
His arrest comes 10 months before the August 2023 presidential election for which Nzouba-Ndama is a potential candidate.
President of the party Les Démocrates, he "was arrested yesterday (Sunday) in Kabala, in the east, shortly after crossing the border from the Congo" , an official from the prosecution of Franceville (east) told AFP. , who requested anonymity.
Mr. Nzouba-Ndama had "aroused the suspicions of the customs officers by refusing to submit his luggage to their control, they warned the gendarmes who stopped his vehicle a few kilometers further", according to the magistrate. The soldiers "searched his luggage and discovered 1,190,000,000 FCFA in banknotes in three suitcases" (about 1.9 million euros), according to this source, information confirmed to AFP by another magistrate and a senior official. of the government.
A video showing the search in the presence of Mr. Nzouba-Ndama has gone viral on social networks.
It is not forbidden to pass from a country of the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (CEMAC, of which Gabon and Congo are part) with any amount of money but "it must be declared to customs and its possessor must justify its origin and destination within the framework of the rules on the fight against money laundering or the financing of terrorism" , according to the two magistrates.
Mr. Nzouba Ndama "is heard in police custody in Franceville by the General Directorate of Research (DGR) of the gendarmerie, as part of a preliminary investigation opened by the prosecution on the source and destination of these funds" , a announced late Sunday afternoon one of the two sources.
Faithful to President Omar Bongo Ondimba, who reigned for nearly 42 years (1967-2009) unchallenged over this small oil-rich Central African state, Mr. Nzouba-Ndama continued to lead the National Assembly under the mandate of his son Ali Bongo Ondimba until his resignation in March 2016.
In 2017, he founded Les Démocrates, which will win 10 seats in the 2018 legislative elections, becoming the country's second political force after Ali Bongo's Parti Démocratique Gabonais (PDG), and was a potential candidate for 2023.
Ali Bongo Ondimba , elected in 2009 after the death of his father, has not, to date, formally announced his intention to run for a third term in August 2023, but he is strongly encouraged to do so every day by his party.
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