Equatorial Guinea, a geographical speck on the landscape of Africa, is surely one of the sad stories of the continent. The late President Masie Nguema Biyogo, the uncle of the present dictator, remains one of the worst tyrants ever produced by Africa. His 11-year reign in Equatorial Guinea was characterized by brutal massacres and horrifying atrocities against his compatriots. For instance, about 150 alleged coup plotters were executed at the national stadium on December 25, 1975 with the killings accompanied by the sound of a band playing  Mary Hopkin’s tune, **Those Were The Days**! An estimated 7,000 Europeans were said to have emigrated from a country of about 300,000 population, while about 45,000 Nigerians were evacuated  in 1976. In all, between September 1968 when Nguema Biyogo was inaugurated as president and August 1979 when he was overthrown, an estimated 80,000 citizens were reported to have been killed by the regime with about one-fourth of that number fleeing into exile.

Amidst horrendous repressions and a prostrate economy, Teodoro Obiang Nguema, the current president, terminated the regime of Nguema Biyogo in a bloody military coup. Like other coup-makers in Africa, he promised a better life for Equatorial Guineans, but after 30 years in power, that hope has remained a pipe dream. President Obiang Nguema is reputed to run an empire of corruption. Even though the discovery of crude oil and its exploitation since 1996 have led to a dramatic increase in government revenue, the average Equatorial Guinean still lives in abject penury and want. Equatorial Guinea is one of the largest producers of oil in the Sub-Saharan Africa, but like Nigeria, its wealth is concentrated in the hands of the tiny ruling clique. A report of the Senate of the United States in 2004 revealed that President Nguema, his family and government functionaries, siphoned off at least 35 million US dollars, allegedly through the Washington-based Riggs Bank.

Nguema is not only the executive president of Equatorial Guinea. He is also the head of the judiciary, with the Supreme Court justices acting as his advisers. The parliament (Chamber of Representatives) is no more than an impotent deliberative assembly because the president also makes laws by decree. Members of the legislature are at his beck and call since they hold office at the pleasure of the president!

President Nguema garnered 95.4 per cent of votes cast in the recent November 29, 2009 polls, which were supervised by his cabinet minister, with supporters of the ruling Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea  (PDGE) allegedly supervising the polling stations. Nguema had, through a presidential decree, originally slated the elections for 2010 but through another decree on October 16, 2009, he changed the date to November 29, which the opposition parties denounced as an attempt to deny them adequate time to prepare for the elections. 

We condemn these blatant violations of the fundamental rights of the citizens of Equatorial Guinea, and call on the dictator to put an end to them. The international community, through relevant agencies of the African Union, the European Union and the United Nations, must rise to its moral duty to assist the Equatorial Guineans to throw off their insufferable yoke. President Nguema must be forced to open up the political space and allow his citizens to breathe the refreshing air of democracy and freedom. In view of the fact the citizens of Equatorial Guinea were shortchanged in the November 29, 2009 poll, we are left with no other option, furthermore, but to call for  new elections under the aegis of the United Nations.