Albert Ondo Ossa
Albert Ondo Ossa (born 17 July 1954) is a Gabonese politician, member of civil society and associate professor of economics at Omar Bongo University.

Biography

Early life 
Albert Ondo Ossa was born in 1954 in Minvoul in the province of Woleu-ntem in Gabon into a family with deeply Christian roots.

He is the son of Ossa Nze Ondo Emmanuel and Angone Nzolo Albertine.

His father's village is Essabat Melen, 15 km from Minvoul and his mother's is Medson 4, in the suburbs of the same locality, where the Catholic mission of Aleppo is located. The mission is known to have contributed to the education of many women who became executives.

After primary studies in Minvoul, Albert Ondo Ossa joined the Bessieux college in Libreville from 1966 to 1974. After obtaining the baccalaureate, he joined the National University of Gabon from 1974 to 1978. He obtained a doctorate in economics at the Nancy 2 University in France in 1984, and presented a complementary thesis in 1985.

Career 
In 1987, Albert Ondo Ossa passed the competitive examination for the faculties of economics and management in Dakar (Senegal). He then went through all the university grades at the Omar Bongo Ondimba University to become from 1988 to 1990 head of the economics department and then in 1990 dean of the faculty of law and economics. In 1993, he founded, within the same university, the Laboratory of Applied Economics (LEA) of which he is the director, and whose journal has been published since 2013. In 1996 he obtained the rank of full professor. This academic career is also characterized by union activism. He was a member of the SNEC (National Union of Teachers and Researchers) from 1990 to 1998. This was the first free union which made a decisive contribution, in 1990 in Gabon.

Albert Ondo Ossa has contributed to and/or conducted work in the sub-region on questions of coordination of budgetary policies, monetary policies, and other economic, social and political issues. He has worked in particular as a consultant to the Ministry of Planning of Gabon and the United Nations on the Gabon 2025 project.

In 2006, Albert Ondo Ossa joined the government, under the leadership of President Omar Bongo and Prime Minister Jean Eyeghe Ndong. He was successively Minister of National Education and Higher Education (2006), Minister of Higher Education and Research (2007), Minister of Scientific Research & Technological Development (2008) . He was a candidate for the 2009 presidential election following the death of President Omar Bongo Ondimba.

Albert Ondo Ossa is a candidate for the 2023 presidential election and an active member of the "2023 alternation" collective alongside other opposition candidates. After discussion in the Alternance 2023 collective, he was chosen as the main opposition candidate against Ali Bongo Ondimba. The election result was annulled following the coup d'état four days later.

References 

1954 births
Living people
Gabonese economists
Government ministers of Gabon
Articles with authority control information
Gabonese Christians
21st-century Gabonese politicians
People from Woleu-Ntem Province
Gabonese academics
Candidates for President of Gabon
Education ministers of Gabon