Sassou-Nguesso sworn in as president

Denis Sassou-Nguesso was sworn in on Wednesday in the Republic of the Congo (ROC) capital, Brazzaville, as president of the ROC, following his election on 10 March with reportedly more than 85 percent of the national vote. This was the first time Sassou-Nguesso has been elected to the presidency - an office he first seized in 1979 and held until 1992, and then seized again in 1997 and held until the present day. The investiture took place in the presence of seven African heads of state - Omar Bongo of Gabon, Idriss Deby of Chad, Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea, Amani Toumani Toure of Mali, Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ange-Felix Patasse of the Central African Republic and Fradique de Menezes of Sao Tome and Principe. During an address to mark the occasion, Sassou-Nguesso vowed to clean up public finances, create employment for youth, restore order to public administration, and pursue close cooperation with the rest of the world. Last week, on 10 August, the inaugural ceremony was held for the newly formed National Assembly, of which Jean-Pierre Thystere Tchicaya, head of the Rassemblement pour la democratie et le progres social political party, was elected president. The National Assembly will ultimately consist of 137 deputies elected from all regions of the country, once a remaining eight seats are filled when elections are held in the embattled Pool region. Of the 129 so far elected, 53 belong to Sassou-Nguesso's Parti congolais du travail (PCT). Together with parties allied to the PCT, Sassou-Nguesso should be able to count on the support of an overwhelming 120 deputies. The National Assembly replaces the National Transition Council (NTC), an interim parliament, which was officially dissolved on 9 August. Since 1998, the NTC, comprising 75 Sassou-Nguesso-appointed members, has operated on place of the bicameral parliament existing prior to the 1997 civil war. The Senate was also inaugurated, with Edouard Ambroise Noumazalaye, secretary-general of the PCT, as its head. The senate consists entirely of members of the PCT and allied parties. Given the amount of control Sassou-Nguesso will have over the new parliament, critics have sceptically observed that it will not differ greatly from the NTC. Sassou-Nguesso, 59, first seized power in a 1979 military coup. Following his defeat by Pascal Lissouba in 1992, he again seized power in October 1997, in advance of elections in which he was due to oppose Lissouba. Sassou-Nguesso, in turn, faced a rebellion launched by militias loyal to Lissouba and Bernard Kolelas in 1998. Civil war has displaced up to one-third of the ROC's 3.1 million residents, and left some 10,000 dead. Ceasefire agreements were signed by all sides at the end of 1999. The ROC, an oil-rich country bordering the much larger DRC, is a former French colony which gained independence on 15 August 1960.