President Eyadema dies after 38 years in office, frontiers closed

President Gnassingbe Eyadema of Togo, Africa’s longest serving head of state, has died in office after ruling his country continuously for 38 years, Prime Minister Kofi Sama said on Saturday.

Sama said in a communiqué on state radio that Eyadema, a former army colonel who came to power in a 1967 coup, had died on Saturday morning while being evacuated from the small West African country for medical treatment.

There had been persistent rumours in government circles in recent days that Eyadema, who was 69, was ill.

Unusually Eyadema failed to turn up Lome airport to meet Cape Verdean President Pedro Pires when he passed through Togo on Thursday on his way home from the African Union summit in Nigeria. Pires was greeted by the prime minister instead.

Sama described the death of Eyadema, who had ruled Togo with an iron hand, as “a veritable national catastrophe.”

He warned against chaos developing in the former French colony and said the security forces were determined to maintain order.

All land frontiers, ports and sea ports would remain closed until further notice, the prime minister added.

Frightened people hastened home as soon as they heard the news and state television showed a cross on an empty screen while religious music played in the background.

Eyadema, who prevented Togo’s exiled opposition leader, Gilchrist Olympio, from standing against him in the 2003 presidential election, left no obvious successor.

According to the constitution, the President of the National Assembly, Fambare Ouattara Natchaba, should take over as interim head of state until fresh elections are held.

Although Eyadema maintained cordial relations with a series of French presidents, and France has a military base in the capital Lome, his regime was shunned by most other western governments because of its poor record on democracy and human rights.

The Togolese government began negotiations with European Union last year on the resumption of EU aid which has been suspended for the past decade.

Parliament voted through electoral reforms last month that were designed to meet European concerns over the fairness and transparency of elections in the country.

Eyadema’s death leaves President Omar Bongo of Gabon as Africa’s longest serving head of state.

Like Eyadema, Bongo was a military officer who came to power in a military coup in 1967. But while Eyadema seized power in January that year, Bongo staged his own coup 10 months later.