Franceville Travel Guide

The official tourist website of Franceville claims that the region surrounding the city "hits you with its resemblance to the Auvergne plateaus." I am confounded by this statement. Franceville's plains are encroached on on one side by the mighty jungle and on another side by sandy hills that roll their way all the way to the Republic of Congo. I assure you, it is a far cry from quaint France.

Franceville is where President Bongo was born. Over the past 40 years of his presidency, the city seems to have become a personal shrine to his glory. It basks proudly with its tarmac roads, high-rise bank buildings and important and official-looking government buildings. All this for a town in the middle of the jungle, a town to which no roads essentially connect to (the author spent five days of driving 10-25 miles an hour to reach there from Libreville), a town whose city limit is also essentially a border with the past-- to washed out roads, mud brick villages and bush meat vendors. The contrasts are stark.

Many people in Gabon will tell you that the city of Franceville has profited enormously from Bongo's own personal mission to develop his native village and to make the members of his family extremely rich.

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Franceville Travel Guide

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