The son of one of West Africa's longest-ruling dictators has commissioned the building of a luxury superyacht for himself worth $380 million -- almost three times more than his country spends annually on health and education for its impoverished people, an anti-corruption group said today.
Teodorin Obiang, the 41-year-old son of Equatorial Guinea's dictator, is the agriculture minister in his father's government but spends much of his time in California, with a $35 million mansion in Malibu, a fleet of luxury cars and a private jet. His government salary is $6,799 a month -- making him certainly comfortable by U.S. standards but extremely wealthy compared with others in his home country. But even on that salary, it would still take him 4,600 years to pay for the luxury yacht he's ordered.
The suspicion is that he has no intention of paying for it with his own money but rather with stolen funds that really belong to the poor residents of Equatorial Guinea. As in many African countries, corruption is rampant, and a top government job often means free rein to dip into government coffers.
The $380 million yacht, which has yet to be built, would be the world's second most expensive boat, behind one that belongs to Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich. It's supposed to be 387 feet long, housing a movie theater, restaurant, bar, swimming pool and a $1.3 million security system with floor motion sensors and fingerprint door openers, the anti-corruption group Global Witness said today. Obiang was previously building another boat equipped with a shark tank on board, it said.
Word of Obiang's over-the-top yacht comes amid increased scrutiny of the lavish lifestyles of Middle Eastern or African dictators -- like Libya's Moammar Gadhafi and his family -- despite the relative poverty of the people they rule. Many live the high life and stash assets in foreign countries. Last week, the U.S. and Switzerland froze assets of Gadhafi and some of his sons.
Global Witness has been investigating Obiang's business dealings for more than a year and has made public details of his lifestyle, including his salary, on its website. Its undercover investigators visited a shipyard in northern Germany where the yacht is scheduled to be built, verifying the project's price tag and owner.
"Evidence points to corruption by Teodorin on a scale that would not be possible or attractive if countries like Germany and the U.S. were not safe havens, in terms of free passage for him and for his questionable private wealth," Gavin Hayman, director of campaigns at Global Witness, said in a statement on the group's website.
He added that "$380 million is a staggering sum -- that a president's son from such a poor country has ordered this yacht is outrageous extravagance on his part."
U.S. law prohibits corrupt foreign officials from getting U.S. entry visas, and the U.S. Justice Department and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has investigated and documented Obiang's wealth, concluding that most of it comes from corruption. But he continues to be granted entry into the U.S., to visit his Malibu home. That's because of Obiang's close ties to the American oil industry, former and current U.S. State Department officials told The New York Times in November 2009.
Obiang's father, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, took control of Equatorial Guinea in 1979 after a bloody coup. His government's riches come almost exclusively from business with Exxon Mobil, Marathon, Hess and other oil companies that drill in Equatorial Guinea, after oil was discovered there in the mid-1990s.
But instead of helping to improve poor Africans' lives, the country's oil wealth has largely lined the pockets of its ruling elites like Obiang. Equatorial Guinea has one of the world's highest per capita incomes, but nearly 80 percent of its citizens live below the poverty line, according to the CIA World Factbook. Disease is rampant, and most citizens have no access to clean water.
Meanwhile, the elder Obiang was rated No. 8 on Forbes magazine's list of the world's richest leaders. He has a fortune estimated at $600 million.
The son of Equatorial Guinea's dictator of 30 years commissioned plans to build a superyacht costing $380 million, nearly three times what the country spends on health and education each year, a corruption watchdog said Monday. The statement from Global Witness said that German company Kusch Yachts has been asked to build the yacht, housing a cinema, restaurant, bar and swimming pool, though construction has not yet started.
Global Witness has been urging Washington to institute sanctions against Teodorin Obiang, whose extravagant lifestyle currently includes a $35 million-dollar mansion in Malibu, California, a $33 million jet and a fleet of luxury cars, while earning a salary of $6,799 a month as agriculture minister.
The government press office in Equatorial Guinea confirmed that the president's son had ordered the yacht design, but said he "then dismissed the idea of buying it."
It said that if the order had gone ahead, he would have bought it with income from private business activities and not "with funds derived from sources of illegal financing or corruption."
President Teodoro Obiang, who reportedly is grooming his son to succeed him as president, took power in a bloody 1979 coup. Forbes has estimated his wealth at around $600 million...
Teodorin Obiang justified his wealth in a sworn affidavit to a South African court questioning his ownership of luxury mansions and expensive cars in Cape Town in 2006.
He stated that public officials in his country are allowed to partner with foreign companies bidding for government contracts and said this means "a Cabinet minister ends up with a sizable part of the contract price in his bank account."
The tiny West African nation may be oil rich, but U.N. statistics show that 20 percent of children in Equatorial Guinea die before reaching the age of 5, and the average citizen is unlikely to live beyond 50. The State Department report on human rights also has condemned killings by security forces and the torture of prisoners.
Meanwhile, writer Juan Tomas Avila Laurel is in the 17th day of a hunger strike demanding justice for the people of Equatorial Guinea, inspired by the popular revolutions that have ousted longtime leaders of Egypt and Tunisia and now threaten Libya's Moammar Gadhafi.
Avila Laurel, 44, left Malabo for Barcelona, Spain, amid fears for his safety the day he began his hunger strike Feb. 11. He joins one-third of the population living in voluntary or enforced exile, according to the U.S. State Department.
The government has reacted to the author's hunger strike by denouncing "the web of gossip, lies and miserable maneuvers" surrounding reports about Equatorial Guinea.
"Nonetheless, we hope this person's example also serves to silence many mouths who continuously speak of lack of freedom and respect for human rights in Equatorial Guinea since, as is more than evident, this person has acted at all times with absolute freedom," it said in a statement on its website.
Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue (born c.1971, nicknamed Teodorín) is the son of Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, the president of Equatorial Guinea, by his first wife, Constancia Okomo. According to opposition figures, Teodoro is the favourite to succeed his father, who is rumored to be suffering from prostate cancer. He is much feared and reviled but exercises power through his domination of Equatoguinean media, being the owner of the only private radio station, Radio Asonga and the director of state owned TV Asonga.
Teodoro, officially the agriculture and forestry minister in his father's government, lives much of the time in Paris, London, Rio de Janeiro, and Malibu. He drew criticism from the international media for spending close to R10,000,000 over a weekend in South Africa on champagne, property renovations, a black 2004 Bentley Arnage, a cream 2005 Bentley Continental R from MG Rover Cape Town and a 2005 Lamborghini Murcielago,[1] although the properties may soon be forcibly auctioned due to his failure to pay a South African businessman.[2] American law enforcement officials believe that most or perhaps all of his wealth comes from corruption connected to oil and gas reserves in Equatorial Guinea.[3]
Obiangs' foreign concerns include two houses in South Africa, worth a combined R50,000,000 , a $31,000,000 compound in Malibu, California, a 5,000 square feet (460 m2) home in the affluent 16th arrondissement of Paris, and the hip hop music record label TNO Entertainment. He also owns (as of 2008) one of the 30 models of the Bugatti Veyron 16.4 sports car [4] (estimated at 1 100 000 euros) and a Maserati MC 12 at 700 000 euros.[4]
