Election Date: May 4, 2008

Abstract: At stake: Chamber of People’s Representatives

At stake: Chamber of People’s Representatives

Background

Equatorial Guinea is a coastal territory located between Cameroon and Gabon, which also includes the islands of Bioko and Annabon. Two relatives have ruled the African nation since it attained its independence from Spain in 1968. Francisco Macías Nguema administered the country for 11 years, but constant abuses to human rights forced a third of the population to flee.

Teodoro Obiang Nguema ousted his uncle in 1979, and ordered his execution. Despite releasing many political prisoners during his first few days as ruler, Obiang has maintained Equatorial Guinea’s overly repressive culture, where dissent frequently leads to punishment.

In the 1980s, president Obiang forced opposition leader Severo Moto into exile and sentenced him in-absentia to 68 years in jail for allegedly planning several coups to overthrow him. Moto settled in Spain, where he was granted political asylum.

When petroleum deposits were discovered in the island of Bioko in 1996, Obiang turned the country into one of Africa’s leading oil and gas producers. The opposition claims that the average inhabitant has seen little or no benefits from the gleaming industry.

The oil boom meant that Equatorial Guinea’s economic growth went up by 71.2 percentage points in 1997. Macro-economic indicators still talk today of a robust growth but, besides having a richer elite, the country remains practically unchanged.

Equatorial Guinea has endured racial tensions involving the Fang community, located in the mainland, and the minority Bubi who live in Bioko. In 1998, 15 people were sentenced to death by a military tribunal after violence erupted in the island.

The first open presidential election was held in 1996, with Obiang garnering 99 per cent of the popular vote as the candidate for the Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE). The ballot was internationally rebuked for fraudulent conditions.

After the 1999 legislative election, several members of the opposition Popular Union (UP) were arrested after declaring that the vote had been rigged. In July 2001, exiled activist Florentino Ecomo Nsogo of the Party of Reconstruction and Social Well-Being (PRBS) returned to Equatorial Guinea after Obiang made a public commitment to allow opposition parties to register.

The 2002 presidential election was also marred by irregularities, as four candidates withdrew before the vote took place. Celestino Bonifacio Bacale of the Convergence for Social Democracy (CPDS) complained that citizens were not allowed to cast their votes in secret, and Buenaventura Moswi of the Social Democratic Coalition Party (PCSD) claimed that only the president’s name was included in the ballots used in several voting stations, making it impossible for the electorate to choose an opposition contender.

In November 2003, the European Union (EU) committed international observers to the Equatorial Guinea parliamentary election. The proposal was brought forth to the EU by Plácido Micó Abogo, leader of the CPDS. Micó was arrested for political dissent along with 67 political activists in 2002, for his role in an alleged coup attempt. After a confession purportedly obtained through torture, Micó was kept in jail for more than a year. The trial originally considered capital punishment as a possible sentence.

The interior ministry agreed to fund the electoral campaigns of the country’s 13 contending parties in the 2004 parliamentary vote. Each political organization received $18,230 U.S. to finance their activities.

In March 2004, just weeks before a legislative election, authorities foiled an attempted coup d’état against Obiang allegedly led by former British soldiers. In August, Sir Mark Thatcher, the son of former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, was arrested in connection with the purported operation. The charges read that Mark Thatcher was related to the "possible funding and logistical assistance in relation to [an] attempted coup in Equatorial Guinea." Thatcher ultimately pleaded guilty to negligence in investing in an aircraft without knowing what it would be used for and received a four-year suspended jail sentence.

In the April 2004 election, the ruling PDGE was the winner with 68 seats, followed by the Democratic Opposition (OP), a loose alliance of several political organizations with close ties to the president. The CPDS—widely regarded as the lone alternative to government-friendly parties—won only two seats with 5.8 per cent.

Click here for Equatorial Guinea’s 2004 Legislative Election Tracker 

In August 2006, the PDGE’s Ricardo Mangue Obama Nfubea became prime minister, after Biteo Borico stepped down.

2008 Chamber of People’s Representatives Election

On Mar. 1, Equatorial Guinea president Teodoro Obiang Nguema dissolved Parliament and called for a legislative election on May 4. The president defended his decision to hold an early legislative ballot, saying it would be cheaper to combine it with municipal elections.

On Mar. 11, former British army officer Simon Mann admitted in a televised interview that he plotted to oust Obiang in 2004, and declared: "It was a fuck-up and I have to carry the can for that. Now I blame myself most for simply not saying ‘cut’ two months before we were arrested. That’s what I should have done and there, you know, I was bloody stupid. Mea culpa."

Mann, a former member of elite British special forces who helped found two security firms that hired mercenaries to work all over Africa in the 1990s, also said he was not the operation’s leader but mainly "the manager’. Mann had been arrested with 70 other men—most of them South African—at Harare’s International Airport, where they had allegedly stopped to collect weapons to stage the coup in Equatorial Guinea.

On Mar. 12, Spain’s Supreme Court restored the political asylum status of Severo Moto, Equatorial Guinea’s most prominent opposition leader. Moto had lost his status in Spain in 2005, when the Spanish Cabinet revoked it because of his alleged involvement in several coup attempts in his own country.

Voting took place on May 4. Opposition Convergence for a Social Democracy (CPDS) secretary-general Placido Mico Abogon called the process “a repetition of what the government has always done” and affected by “arbitrary procedures in many polling stations” such as harassment of CPDS representatives and insufficient ballots.

On May 5, preliminary results suggested an overwhelming victory for the ruling Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE). In at least two constituencies, official tallies showed that every single vote went to the PDGE.

On May 9, interior minister Clemente Engonga—who also serves as the president of the National Electoral Commission—stated that the PDGE and the Democratic Opposition (OP), a loose alliance of several political organizations with close ties to the president, had secured 99 of the 100 seats at stake. The CPDS would have only one legislator.

Political Players

President: Teodoro Obiang Nguema - PDGE
Prime minister: Ricardo Mangue Obama Nfubea - PDGE

The president is elected to a seven-year term by the popular vote.

Legislative Branch: The Cámara de Representantes del Pueblo (Chamber of People's Representatives) has 100 members, elected to a five-year term by proportional representation in multi-member constituencies. Before the 2004 election, the Chamber had 80 members.

Results of Last Election:

President - Dec. 15, 2002

	Vote%
Teodoro Obiang Nguema (Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea)	97.1%
Celestino Bonifacio Bacale (Convergence for a Social Democracy)	2.2%

Note: Four presidential candidates (including Bacale) withdrew alleging fraudulent conditions.

Chamber of People's Representatives - Apr. 25, 2004

	Vote%	Seats
Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE)	47.5%	68
Democratic Opposition (OD)	40.8%	30
Convergence for a Social Democracy (CPDS)	5.8%	2

 

 

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