Gabon Tightens Social Media Control, Accused of Human Rights Violations

Gabon’s media regulator indefinitely suspended major social media platforms in February, citing security concerns during anti-government protests, a move that became a nationwide talking point.

Within weeks of the announcement, use of virtual private networks (VPNs) to bypass the restrictions surged in the Central African nation. As gendarmes began stopping young people at checkpoints in the capital Libreville and other urban centers to confiscate phones with VPNs or detain their owners, warnings spread by word of mouth. Activists and opposition members said their accounts were also suspended due to state official interference.

Social media had helped people organize and stay informed since December, when education and health workers protested over salaries and the cost-of-living crisis. The government cited misinformation, pornography, and hate speech as reasons for the shutdown.

Human rights groups have called on the authorities to follow legal procedures to prosecute any offenders, rather than collective punishment through unconstitutional restrictions on free speech.

“The deliberate and prolonged interference with access to essential digital media platforms in Gabon is a blatant disregard for people’s fundamental rights, particularly freedom of expression and the right to access information,” said Felicia Anthonio, campaign director of the #KeepItOn coalition, a global alliance of hundreds of human rights groups.

Nelly Ngabima, a controversial activist also known as Princesse de Souba, said she received threats from Gabonese government officials who said they would make her “disappear from social media.” Within months, her accounts with a combined 300,000 followers on Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok were suspended.

“They create fake accounts and attach our identities to them, then report us for identity theft,” she said. “Today, Gabonese people are even afraid to send WhatsApp messages out of fear. They don’t dare take their phones outside.”

The restrictions were temporarily lifted in April. However, a new regulation passed in February requires social media users to provide verified names, addresses, and ID numbers. Social networks risk fines of 50 million Central African CFA francs (about 66,000 pounds) and imprisonment for non-compliance.

The law is one of several sweeping changes aimed at systematizing the suppression of dissent, including a controversial nationality code signed in February and published last month. It has been criticized for restricting the rights of naturalized citizens and enabling the state to strip citizenship from citizens.

“In my humble view and opinion, what is said here and there is not so much about the substance of the debate as it is about its form,” said government spokesman Charles Edgard Mombo, implying that criticism is merely because the code took effect before parliamentary ratification. He cited article 99 of Gabon’s constitution, which requires parliament to ratify decrees signed by the president during emergencies.

Former prime minister and opposition leader Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze, who filed a lawsuit against the restrictions in a Libreville court, was arrested in April on charges of fraud and breach of trust in an old case from 2008. His supporters say the charges are fabricated.

Ngabima served as a Gabonese intelligence operative from 2015 to 2019, with roles including phone tapping and monitoring messages of politicians and military personnel until she left the country. Now living in France, she warns that her experience shows the regime’s capacity to surveil those it considers dissidents.

Gabon is a country with a large young population, rich in oil, but with a third of its people living in extreme poverty, and where nepotism and corruption are rife. It also has a well-documented history of suppressing dissent. The last internet shutdown occurred in August 2023, just before a disputed election that Ali Bongo won. Internet was restored four days later, after the military overthrew Bongo and placed him under house arrest.

After taking power that same month to end 56 years of Bongo family rule, General Brice Oligui Nguema presented himself as a different leader. The 2025 presidential election, which he won with over 90% of the vote, was significantly more open to media monitoring than previous elections under the Bongos, with foreign media allowed to film vote counting.

However, his critics argue he has long been part of the core power group, a relative of Bongo and part of the security apparatus, and is now using the same harsh playbook as his predecessors, particularly in opaque economic management.

“Today, Gabonese people are still dying of hunger, without jobs, and struggling to get medical treatment… all that existed during Ali Bongo’s time,” Ngabima said. “In fact, strictly speaking, nothing has changed. You cannot remove Mr. Ali Bongo because you condemn certain actions, and then come and reproduce the same things. That is impossible.”