{"id":11871,"date":"2025-07-24T10:06:19","date_gmt":"2025-07-24T10:06:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/?p=11871"},"modified":"2025-07-24T10:06:20","modified_gmt":"2025-07-24T10:06:20","slug":"togos-ruling-family-faces-backlash-over-attempt-to-consolidate-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/?p=11871","title":{"rendered":"Togo’s Ruling Family Faces Backlash Over Attempt to Consolidate Power"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A new constitution that has allowed Togo’s long-time head of state, Faure Gnassingb\u00e9, to shift to a new role as all-powerful prime minister \u2013 and escape the constraint of presidential term limits \u2013 has triggered anger on the streets of the capital, Lom\u00e9. Protests are set to continue this Friday.<\/div>\n
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At least five demonstrators have died while confronting official security forces in recent weeks.<\/p>\n

But it is not the orthodox political opposition \u2013 predictably crushed in local elections last week \u2013 that has mobilised frustrated young Togolese people.<\/p>\n

Instead, it is musicians, bloggers and activists who have tapped into popular anger and weariness with a regime that has been in power, under the leadership of Faure Gnassingb\u00e9 or, before him, his father Gnassingb\u00e9 \u00c9yad\u00e9ma, for almost six decades.<\/p>\n

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That outstrips even Cameroon’s President Paul Biya, 92, –\u00a0who has just confirmed his intention to stand for an eighth successive term\u00a0in elections later this year \u2013 or Gabon’s father-and-son presidents, Omar Bongo and Ali Bongo, the latter of whom was deposed in a coup in August 2023.<\/p>\n

The 59-year-old holds the premiership because his Union pour la R\u00e9publique (Unir) party dominates the national assembly – and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future, thanks to a constituency map gerrymandered to over-represent its northern heartlands and understate the voting weight of the pro-opposition coastal south.<\/p>\n

Gilbert Bawara, Togo’s civil service and labour minister, maintains the 2024 election was above board, with “all the major political actors and parties” taking part.<\/p>\n

“The government cannot be held responsible for the weakness of the opposition,” Bawara told BBC Focus on Africa TV last week.<\/p>\n

He added that those with a genuine reason to demonstrate could do so within the law, blaming activists abroad for inciting “young people to attack security forces” in an attempt to destabilise the country.<\/p>\n

The new constitutional framework was announced at short notice in early 2024 and quickly approved by the compliant government-dominated national assembly. There was no attempt to secure general public approval through a referendum.<\/p>\n

A one-year transition concluded this May as Gnassingb\u00e9, who had been head of state since 2005, gave up the presidency and was installed in the premiership, a post now strengthened to hold all executive power and total authority over the armed forces.<\/p>\n

To occupy the presidency, a role now reduced to a purely ceremonial function, legislators chose the 86-year-old former business minister, Jean-Lucien Savi de Tov\u00e9.<\/p>\n

This reshuffling of the power structure was presented abroad by regime mouthpieces as moving from a strong presidential system to a supposedly more democratic “parliamentary” model \u2013 in tune with the traditions of the Commonwealth, which Togo, like Gabon, had joined in 2022, to broaden its international connections and reduce reliance on traditional francophone links with France, the former colonial ruler.<\/p>\n

The transition to new constitutional arrangements designed to perpetuate Gnassingb\u00e9’s rule passed off almost without outside comment from international partners whose attention is currently focused on Gaza and Ukraine rather than Africa.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new constitution that has allowed Togo’s long-time head of state, Faure Gnassingb\u00e9, to shift to a new role as all-powerful prime minister \u2013 and escape the constraint of presidential term limits \u2013 has triggered anger on the streets of the capital, Lom\u00e9. Protests are set to continue this Friday. At least five demonstrators have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123457,"featured_media":11872,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3590,41],"tags":[3733],"class_list":["post-11871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bbc","category-general-news","tag-faure-gnassingbe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/123457"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11871"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11871\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11875,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11871\/revisions\/11875"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}