Gabon: Court sends Gabon to the polls as planned

Gabon's constitutional court has ruled that parliamentary elections will take place on 17 December as planned, despite opposition demands for a delay in the poll to introduce biometric voters cards, officials said. Gabon's opposition has been campaigning for months to delay the elections in order to introduce the biometric system, which has been implemented in many countries for digital chips in passports and electoral cards, using individual biological data such as fingerprints or eye retina scans to combat fraud.