World’s Longest-Serving President Wins Sixth Term in Equatorial Guinea With 99% of the Vote
28th April 2016
Teodoro Obiang Nguema has never received less than 97 per cent of the vote in an election. On Monday, with partial results indicating that 99.2 per cent of the vote has gone in his favour, Equatorial Guinea’s leader was surely all set for another seven years in a seat that has no doubt molded to his figure.
One-sixth of African countries have an executive who has been in power for more than 20 years, which equates to nine out of 54 of the continent’s leaders. Mr Obiang, who took power nearly 37 years ago in a bloody coup, has Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Isaias Afwerki of Eritrea and King Mswati III of Swaziland for company. But Mr Obiang is most similar to José Eduardo dos Santos of Angola.
Mr Dos Santos and Mr Obiang preside over Africa’s second and third highest crude-oil producers, respectively, and are accused of embezzling much of the resulting wealth, while not distributing it fairly, if at all, to their citizens. Equatorial Guinea, once a Spanish colony, has the biggest gap of any country worldwide between its per-capita wealth and its human development index – a sure sign that there are a few outliers skewing the per-capita figure way upwards.
No doubt they are victims of White Privilege.