PUBLISH WHAT YOU PAY INTERNATIONAL – GLOBAL WITNESS – REVENUE WATCH INSTITUTE – PUBLIEZ CE QUE VOUS PAYEZ PLATEFORME FRANÇAISE

JOINT PRESS RELEASE – Monday 5 January 2009

Publish What You Pay condemns arbitrary arrest of anti-corruption campaigners in Gabon and calls for their release

Publish What You Pay (PWYP), the global civil society movement for transparency in the oil, gas and mining industries, condemns the arbitrary arrest of anti-corruption campaigners in Gabon, including PWYP Gabon Co-ordinator Marc Ona and PWYP Gabon member Georges Mpaga.

The Gabonese authorities should immediately release Ona, Mpaga and the three other members of civil society, including two journalists, who were arrested on 31st December and are being detained by the judicial police. There are no formal charges or official warrants against them. [1]

“Our Gabonese colleagues do not have access to legal assistance and we do not know anything about their detention conditions. We are seriously concerned about their physical and mental integrity and are afraid that they might be at risk of ill-treatment,” said Radhika Sarin, the international coordinator of Publish What You Pay. “We call on the international community to insist that they be released.”

The arrests follows a campaign of official harassment against Ona and other activists who have raised concerns about management of public money in Gabon and called for more transparency and accountability in the country’s oil and mining sectors.

In January 2008, 22 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), including members of PWYP Gabon, were temporarily suspended by the government for alleged violations of public order. The suspension, which froze the legal status of the Gabonese NGOs and barred them from activity, was reversed following an international outcry.

In July 2008, Ona and other civil society campaigners were summoned for questioning by the Gabonese police after they called for an investigation into a controversy concerning the financial affairs of the country’s chief prosecutor. No charges were brought against them.

Ona continues to face unjustified travel restrictions which have prevented him from travelling abroad since June 2008. [2]

This harassment of Ona has taken place even though he is a member of a national committee that oversees the implementation in Gabon of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), a global initiative for greater openness in the oil, gas and mining industries. Gabon has endorsed the EITI, and its government officials sit on the same committee as Ona. [3]

“Civil society groups have the right to express themselves on how resource wealth is managed by public authorities in their country. The continued intimidation of Marc Ona and other campaigners is against the spirit and the letter of the EITI,” said Michel Roy, International Advocacy Director of Secours Catholique.

PWYP demands the immediate release of the detained civil society members, and urges the government of Gabon to respect due process and the right of defense. PWYP also appeals to the international community, including those governments and other bodies that support the EITI, to call on Gabon to respect the right of civil society to fully participate in policy discussions and foster a democratic and peaceful dialogue on the management of oil and mining revenues.

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NOTES

[1] The five individuals being held in police detention are Marc Ona Essangui, National Co-ordinator of PWYP Gabon); Georges Mpaga, President of ROLBG, the Gabonese civil society network for good governance, which is a member of PWYP Gabon; Grégory Ngoua Mintsa, a public servant and civil plaintiff in a complaint filed in Paris on December 2, 2008 calling for an investigation into assets acquired in France by three African heads of state, including the President of Gabon; Gaston Asseko, a journalist with radio Sainte-Marie; and Dieudonné Koungou, a journalist with Tendance Gabon.

[2] In June 2008, Marc Ona was detained at Libreville airport while en route to an international meeting on resource revenue transparency in New York. Since then, Ona has been prevented from travelling out of the country on two other occasions and has received no legal basis or written justification for this travel ban.

[3] The EITI is a global multi-stakeholder initiative for disclosure of company payments and government revenues from oil, gas and mining. The participation of independent civil society is a fundamental component of the multi-stakeholder nature of the EITI, which champions dialogue between governments, industry, and civil society. 24 resource-rich countries, including Gabon, are implementing the EITI. For more information: www.eitransparency.org

MEDIA CONTACTS

RADHIKA SARIN (London)
PWYP INTERNATIONAL COORDINATOR
+44 7917 885 302
Email: rsarin@publishwhatyoupay.org

MARIE-ANGE KALENGA (Yaoundé)
PWYP AFRICA COORDINATOR
+32 479 08 03 56 or +32 496 588 145
Email: mkalenga@mac.com

MICHEL ROY (Paris)
SECOURS CATHOLIQUE
+33 60 79 934 60
Email: michel-roy@secours-catholique.asso.fr

JULIE MCCARTHY (New York)
REVENUE WATCH INSTITUTE
+1 212 548 0648
Email: jmccarthy@revenuewatch.org