Old Etonian ‘tortured for family money' in Gabon jail

Telegraph

27-03-2025

Born into one of Africa's kleptocratic ruling families, Noureddin Bongo enjoyed a gilded youth on the playing fields of Eton.
While he mixed with the rich and famous in Windsor, his grandfather and father governed Gabon with iron fists, looting state coffers to fund their lavish lifestyles.
But since a coup led by a cousin two years ago, the Old Etonian has been languishing in a filthy prison cell accused of embezzlement.
The father of three's immediate family, who live in London, claim he has been held 'hostage' by Gabon's new regime, which wants to access his family bank accounts.
Mr Bongo says he has been tortured, telling his lawyers that interrogators forced a hammer into his mouth and then used it to hoist him in the air.
He was arrested with his Sylvia, his 62-year-old mother, as part of investigations by the new regime into alleged corruption and embezzlement.
Shortly after the coup, Gabonese state TV showed pictures of Mr Bongo, who worked as an advisor to his father, sitting with other arrested officials next to suitcases filled with cash.
Lawyers for Mr Bongo claimed he was forced to pose with the money to make it look like ill-gotten gains, and that he and his mother were being held 'outside of any legal framework'.
His European lawyers filed a civil action before a magistrate in Paris, Gabon's former colonial power, alleging 'unlawful arrest and sequestration aggravated by acts of torture and barbarism'.
The government of Gabon has described the claims – including the hammer torture – as 'slanderous'.
Mr Bongo's plight was raised by Lord Goldsmith, the environmentalist and former foreign office minister, who is a fellow old Etonian. Until the coup, he had supported Gabon on conservation programs in the central African nation, which joined the Commonwealth in 2022.
'It is deeply troubling that human rights should be trampled on in this fashion in a Commonwealth country like Gabon,' Mr Goldsmith said. 'The international community must hold the country's military junta to account – and ensure international standards of justice and transparency are met.'
The Bongo family governed Gabon for more than half a century. The 42-year rule of Omar Bongo, Noureddin Bongo's authoritarian grandfather, was one of the longest of any African leader.
Over five decades, the Bongos became one of the continent's richest first families, buying luxury cars and mansions in the US and France.
One in three people in Gabon still live below the poverty line, although living standards have risen due to oil wealth.
Ali Bongo Ondimba, Noureddin Bongo's 66-year-old father, took over in 2009.
He pledged reforms, only to be overthrown in a bloodless coup in August 2023 led by Brice Oligui Nguema, a distant cousin and leader of Gabon's Republican Guard.
Gabon was partially suspended from the Commonwealth in the wake of the Bongo government's collapse.
It was one of a spate of coups in across west and central Africa – including Mali, Sudan, Niger and Burkina Faso – some of which have been linked to Kremlin efforts to gain a foothold in the region.
Noureddin Bongo first moved to the UK aged eight and has spent much of his adult life in Britain, with friends describing him as an anglophile. His French wife Lea, 33, and three British-born sons were originally detained as well, but have since been allowed to go to London.
'His family worry they will never see him again,' a source said. 'This shouldn't be happening in a Commonwealth country.'
There is speculation that the arrests are to prevent Ali Bongo, who has not been charged, contesting elections next month. Mr Nguema, who has pledged a return to civilian rule, is expected to be a candidate.
'Noureddin had no political ambitions in Gabon, preferring life in London,' a family source told The Telegraph. 'At the time of the coup, he was in Gabon to support his father during the election period.
'One of his sons was just one year old at the time his dad was taken hostage. He hasn't seen him since.'