Vocabulary and job title change, but Faure Gnassingbé remains master in Togo

It's not all about the vocabulary or the title of the position, but about the content it contains. In Togo, the fact has gone somewhat unnoticed. But since Saturday, May 3, 2025, in this West African country, it is no longer impressive to be given the title of President of the Republic.

Under last year's constitutional reform , the title was stripped of its substance. It now has only a symbolic dimension. What powers and privileges the office once held has been entirely transferred to a new position called "President of the Council of Ministers."

And of course, Faure Gnassingbé, in power for twenty years, is the one who inherits this new role. Faure Gnassingbé, whose desire to stay in power is the main motive behind the constitutional reform, behind which some, perhaps naively, would like to see a touch of innovation.

The Togolese leader is quite clever. Visibly educated by the crises that resulted from all the famous third terms, Faure Gnassingbé clearly chooses to go about things differently. Certainly, his goal is also to stay in power as long as possible. But he did not want his desire to be as blatant as elsewhere, notably in Guinea and Ivory Coast .

This is why he did not wait until his last term to address constitutional reform. Similarly, by emphasizing the evolution of the presidential system towards a parliamentary one, he was rather masking his own interests by pretending to put the people back at the center of the democratic process. Schematically, Faure Gnassingbé [reserves] the background for himself, and the front of the stage for his country's deputies. In appearance, at least. Because, in reality, he has ensured that he will remain the alpha and omega of all sectors of his country's life for a long time to come.

And clearly, the strategy is quite effective. For example, last Saturday [May 3], he quietly inaugurated the first term of the ^Fifth Republic. A term for which he will have made no great effort. No election campaign, no televised debate, no assessment of the record, no presidential election with stakes, no fraud to orchestrate, no electoral disputes and, consequently, no pretext for a coup d'état.

Everything was settled in a few minutes in the National Assembly, where things were made all the easier by the fact that Unir, the presidential party, holds 108 of the 113 seats. How convenient, isn't it? So much so that one can imagine other leaders across the continent wanting to be inspired by the magic formula.

But beware, the formula is not necessarily exportable. It is worth wondering whether its experimentation in Togo is not also attributable to the Togolese opposition and civil society.

Indeed, if the Togolese government can manage the country according to its own good will, is it not because the countervailing powers have discredited themselves in the eyes of the population? In any case, the inertia that has meant that the same family has been at the head of the country for almost sixty years [Faure Gnassingbé imposed himself at the head of the country after the death of his father, Gnassingbé Eyadéma, president from 1967 to 2005] challenges the entire political class and, more broadly, the entire Togolese elite, from independence to the present day.