Read more
Gabon, like other countries around the world, has declared war on the coronavirus. But, in reality, the pandemic has tested the very foundations of Gabonese society, and has once again had a magnifying glass effect on the country's governance. In other words, the management and steering of covid-19 ended up reducing a global health crisis to a societal crisis in Gabon. A societal crisis perceptible through various evils that already constituted the cardinal values of the Bongo-PDG system and of Gabonese society, namely: political opportunism and lies, greed on the part of the main players involved in managing the crisis, incivism on the part of citizens, a lack of professional ethics and cronyism in the management of a crisis that should have involved all available skills and imposed rigorous management of the funds released. Finally, the management of covid-19 in Gabon highlighted the hidden vices of the "Gabonese evil", notably the country's poor governance, on the one hand, and the carelessness and incivility of the population, on the other.
About the author
Jérôme TOUNG NZUE is a sociologist, essayist and consultant. He is a Research Fellow (CAMES) in Development Sociology at the Institut de Recherche en Sciences Humaines (IRSH), CENAREST (Gabon).
