Bongo among world's most corrupt leaders

Libreville, Gabon: When longtime dictator Omar Bongo died last week, he left behind at least 66 bank accounts.

The first family owned 45 homes in France, including at least 14 in Paris and 11 on the French Riviera. And they boasted of 19 or more luxury cars, including a Bugatti sports model that cost the Republic of Gabon $1.5 million (Dh5.5 million).

But most of the country Bongo governed for 41 years is still covered in jungle. A third of its people live in poverty so dire that some dig through the trash dump to feed their children.

The contrast makes it all the more striking that hundreds of thousands of those people lined the streets of the capital this week to bid goodbye to the 73-year-old ruler who bled their country dry.

Women wept and waved signs that said, "Merci Papa" - thank you, father. Businesses put up billboards with messages of loss, such as: "Gabon weeps."

On a continent that has seen more than its share of presidents-turned-dictators, Gabon is perhaps one of the best examples of what analysts call "the chief complex."

So long was Bongo in power that his countrymen came to view him as a hereditary chief, a man whose authority is unquestioned.

The acceptance raises the question of what will happen now in a nation that calls itself a democracy but has in fact never known one.

Gabon - where Bongo won election six times in a row - will hold its next elections within 90 days. And already, several of the estimated 30 children he fathered are rumoured to be jockeying for power.

"The Gabonese don't know what democracy looks like. Their point of reference is the village - and in the village, no one questions the chief," said Anges Ratanga Atoz, a political science professor at Libreville's Omar Bongo University. "And after all, what did Bongo do that was so bad? Did he kill anyone? No."

In the village, each family is expected to turn over a share of their harvest to the chief, who uses the grain to feed his people in times of drought.

But if the chief also builds himself a brick-and-mortar house while everyone else lives in grass huts, no one says anything. And when he dies, the people mourn.

Masses of Gabon's 1.5 million people waited outside the airport last week for the convoy carrying Bongo's body on a special flight back from Spain.

Several thousand white and red roses were flown in from France for the funeral, and the coffin was placed inside the presidential palace, surrounded by bouquets.

Thousands of people made pilgrimages to pay their respects.