Omar Bongo Ondimba

Who is Omar Bongo Ondimba?

Omar Bongo Ondimba, born Albert-Bernard Bongo in Lewai (present-day Bongoville) in Haut-Ogooué province in 1935, was Gabon's second President and, by the time of his death, the longest-serving head of state in modern African history. He entered the civil service and French colonial administration as a young man, rose quickly under founding President Léon M'ba, and was appointed Vice President in 1966. When M'ba died in 1967, Bongo succeeded him and went on to rule Gabon for forty-two years, from 1967 until his death in 2009. He converted to Islam in 1973 and adopted the name Omar Bongo, later adding the ancestral name Ondimba in 2003. For more than two decades he presided over a single-party state built around his Parti Démocratique Gabonais before yielding to domestic and international pressure and introducing multiparty elections in 1990, which he and his party continued to win. His long tenure was underwritten by Gabon's oil wealth and close, often controversial ties with France, and he became known as a skilled political survivor who preferred co-opting rivals over confronting them. He died in a Barcelona clinic in June 2009 and was succeeded by his son, Ali Bongo Ondimba.

Sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Omar Bongo" · BlackPast.org, "Omar/Albert-Bernard Bongo (1935-2009)" · Wikipedia, "Omar Bongo"