Gabon's coup leader Brice Oligui Nguema is looking to cement his grip on power as the oil-producing Central African nation holds a presidential election on Saturday that analysts expect to be a one-sided affair.

Nineteen months after overthrowing President Ali Bongo, whose family ruled Gabon for more than half a century, Nguema, 50, has pitched himself as a change agent cracking down on the corrupt old guard.

Lionel Ekambou, a nurse, joined the line outside a polling station at a school in Libreville that opened at 7 a.m. (0600 GMT), eager to cast his vote for Nguema, who has been interim leader since spearheading the coup as an army general.

"His social project meets my expectations and, I am convinced, will contribute to building a better future," the 28-year-old said.

Criss-crossing the country in a baseball cap bearing his "We Build Together" slogan, Nguema has vowed to diversify the oil-reliant economy and promote agriculture, industry and tourism in a country where a third of the population lives in poverty.

Yet not everyone believes Nguema, a former aide-de-camp for Ali Bongo's father Omar Bongo, who served as president for more than 40 years until his death in 2009, represents a genuine break with the past.

"He sold us a dream," Libaski Moussavou, 34, tsaid before casting his ballot, accusing Nguema of surrounding himself with Bongo-era holdovers "whom the Gabonese people decried".

Nguema's main challenger is Alain Claude Bilie By Nze, who was serving as prime minister under Ali Bongo before the August 2023 coup, the eighth in West and Central Africa since 2020.

Nze, 57, has tried to distance himself from the Bongo family while questioning Nguema's ability to run, saying this week that military men should "go back to their barracks".

A new constitution approved in November cleared the way for Nguema's candidacy.

Soldiers hold General Brice Clothaire Oligui Nguema aloft in Libreville after the coup. – AP

Analysts say his status as the frontrunner comes from a sense that people were broadly happy with the coup and him being the most visible candidate during the campaign.

Nze's close ties to the old government – which was accused by critics of vote-rigging that it denied – also undermine his warning that Nguema poses a threat to Gabonese democracy, said Florence Bernault, a historian of Central Africa at Sciences Po.

"He doesn't seem to be very well placed to criticise," Bernault said.

Power cuts

Nearly 900,000 voters are registered to cast ballots at polling stations across the densely forested and sparsely populated country of around 2.5 million people. An additional 28,000 are registered to vote abroad.

Gabon's economy grew by 2.9 per cent in 2024, up from 2.4 per cent in 2023, driven in part by infrastructure projects and increased production of commodities such as oil, manganese and timber, according to the World Bank.

But many voters said they were mostly concerned about basic services, citing power cuts that plague the capital.

"We talk about it every day. So this is a primary urgency because we don't want to have this any more, these daily power cuts," said 40-year-old electrician Herve Regis Ossouami.

"I don't know a Gabonese person who would say they don't want water and electricity."