In Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo on his way to his sixth term

It is safe to say that Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo will be re-elected President of Equatorial Guinea on Sunday 20 November. At 80, the man who is seeking a sixth term at the head of the Spanish-speaking country, the third largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa, has always obtained scores ranging between 93.7% and 99% of the votes. Backed by a coalition that brings together fourteen political parties, his unavoidable Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE) holds 99 of the 100 seats in the outgoing National Assembly and all 55 seats in the Senate. His forty-three years of reign allowed the iron-fisted leader to afford the world record for longevity in power for a head of state in office, if we except monarchies.

In this election played in advance, the stainless president will face two candidates. Under the label Convergence for Social Democracy (CPDS), the only authorized opposition party, Andrés Esono Ondo is running for the first time in the supreme ballot. The other candidacy is that of Buenaventura Monsuy Asumu, of the Social Democratic Coalition Party (PCSD), a formation linked to the PDGE in the legislative and municipal elections. The latter, of which “the political transition program insists on the commitment to fight against poverty and on the redistribution of national wealth”, has already served three times “enforcement”in the words of the opposition, to the incumbent.

Nearly 428,000 voters, out of 1.4 million inhabitants, are called to the polls to choose their president, but also their deputies, senators and mayors. The presidential election, initially scheduled for April 2023, was brought forward and associated with the others, officially to make savings made necessary by the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. The country, whose oil production has been divided by three in a decade, had to request in 2021 assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in the amount of 67.3 million dollars under the rapid financing instrument. . With a declining oil rent, the GDP per capita fell from 21,711 dollars in 2012 to 8,462 in 2021.

“Fragile” health

Even if his entourage and the media strive to give Mr. Obiang the image of a president living like an ascetic, “His state of health is fragile”, assures a source close to the presidency. The few public appearances of the man who came to power in 1979 after a coup in which he overthrew his uncle, the bloodthirsty dictator Francisco Macias Nguema, confirm this.

Within the PDGE, where he was appointed to re-enlist only two months ago, the question of his new candidacy has long been debated. In November 2021, the party-state, meeting in congress, had not appointed anyone to succeed him. Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, nicknamed “Teodorin”, was widely anticipated. Already vice-president and defense minister, the eldest son of the president, aged 53, has the support of the prime minister, Francisco Pascual Obama Asue, of the general secretary of the PDGE, Jeronimo Osa Osa Ecoro, of the secret services and of the ‘army. In Malabo, some young people also appreciate him, especially when he invites stars of football and show business at great expense, and finances scholarships abroad.

Teodorin lives as a jet-setter, appearing on social networks driving luxury cars with starlets

But Teodorin, owner of the only private media company in the country, radio-television Asonga, drags his bad reputation on the international scene like a ball. Provocative and immature, he lives like a jet-setter, appearing on social networks at the wheel of luxury cars with starlets, while nearly 80% of the population of his country lives on less than 1.90 dollars a day. day. “Even if he has calmed down a bit, he is not yet reassuring enough”assures our source – in particular to be dubbed by his father and the old caciques of the PDGE.

Succession struggle

In France, Teodorin was sentenced in 2020 to a three-year suspended prison sentence, a fine of 30 million euros and the confiscation of all his property, seized for “laundering of misuse of corporate assets, embezzlement of public funds and abuse of trust” between 1997 and 2011. In the United States, he had to give up 26 million dollars in assets to put an end to prosecution for corruption. And in the UK he has been banned since 2021. Future convictions still hang over his head like a sword of Damocles.

His half-brother, Gabriel Mbega Obiang Lima, is his arch-enemy in the succession struggle. Reputed to be serious, trained in the United States, he has been Minister of Mines and Hydrocarbons for ten years, a crucial position in a country where income depends mainly on oil reserves. “Gabriel embodies everything that Westerners appreciate and the United States is the country’s largest oil investor, explains Benjamin Augé, researcher at the French Institute of International Relations (IFRI). But the Santomean origins of his mother, Celestina Lima, the president’s second wife, do not work in his favor in a clan where dynastic rule must take precedence. » The scenario of a third way, foreign to the descendants of the old patriarch, seems unthinkable to date.

In Equatorial Guinea, the fear of a coup has been turning into paranoia for several years, even if there have already been serious attempts. At the end of October, the country closed its land borders with Cameroon and Gabon to “avoid the infiltration of groups” can “destabilize” the presidential campaign, according to the authorities. The electoral period was marked by the arrest of more than 150 activists from Citizens for Innovation, a banned party, human rights defenders and Leoncio Prisco Eko Mba, alias “Adjoguening”, a rapper hostile to power. They were accused of fomenting “attacks” versus “petrol stations, Western embassies and the homes of ministers”.