Gabon: Social media reopens after eight months of blockage, but you will have to show your ID
The High Authority for Communication (HAC) of Gabon lifted the suspension of social media imposed on February 17, 2026, during an extraordinary plenary session on Saturday, October 24, 2026. Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram are accessible again after an eight-month blackout, during which WhatsApp only functioned intermittently.
To justify the initial measure, the regulator had cited "a worrying rise in informational disorder," reports Direct Infos Gabon. The HAC accused online content of fueling conflicts and divisions, and stated it needed this time to adapt the legal framework applicable to the platforms.
The return, but with conditions
The reopening is not a simple return to the status quo. According to Africanews, users will now have to present an official identity document, which puts an end to online anonymity. The HAC indicates that it has established exchange protocols with Meta, TikTok, and YouTube and has direct access to their priority reporting tools in order to have content deemed illicit removed in real time. Delegations from Meta and TikTok are expected in Libreville to clarify this partnership.
The blockage did not stop Gabonese people from speaking out: many turned to virtual private networks. The Swiss publisher Proton reported a 60,000% increase in downloads of its VPN tool the day after the blackout, according to Africanews.
Eight months of protest
The suspension came in the midst of a wave of social protest, less than a year after the election of President Brice Oligui Nguema, according to Africanews. The opposition saw it as an abuse of power; the appeals filed in court were all rejected, the same media outlet indicates, noting that former Prime Minister Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze, one of the most critical voices, has been incarcerated since April for alleged acts dating back to 2008. He has not been tried and is presumed innocent.
Gabon thus joins the list of African countries that have experimented with cutting off platforms as an instrument for managing political crises. It emerges with a compromise that does not resolve the underlying issue: access is restored, but at the cost of mandatory identification and closer cooperation between the regulator and the major platforms. For Gabonese journalists, unions, and activists, the question remains as to what nominative speech will still be able to say without risk.
This article was written in French with the help of artificial intelligence from the sources cited below, then translated from French automatically. Read the original.
