Story: News Desk

A security analyst, Emmanuel Kotin, has stressed that the only way to stop military coups is with good governance.

Kotin’s comments follow the recent coup in Gabon, where army officers seized power and annulled the results of the recent presidential election, which was won by President Ali Bongo.

Kotin in an interview  in Accra on Wednesday said that “if you look at the history of Francophone countries, it has always been a system where a family will rule for a long period of time, following the tenets of their colonial masters. In Gabon, for example, one family has been able to rule the country for over 50 years. So Francophone countries have a peculiar problem. But there is also a mix of factors at play, due to globalization and the export of culture.”

“People are increasingly becoming aware of their rights, and you see that we have older people who are ruling younger people… and not giving them the opportunity, and they don’t seem to get their way out, it goes through some form of triggers and when it explodes these are some of the things that happen. So it is a wake-up call that good governance, nothing but good governance is the panacea to stopping these military coups.”

Meanwhile, Gabon’s President Ali Bongo has called on his “friends all over the world” to “make noise” about the coup in a video that has been circulating on social media.

In the video, Bongo says that he is safe and that his family is safe. He says that he does not know what is happening in the country and that he is urging his friends to speak out against the coup.

“Nothing is happening. I don’t know what is going on.”

He again urges his “friends” to speak up, before thanking them.