In These New Times

“Ships are sent out at the first opportunity; the natives driven out or destroyed; their princes tortured to discover their gold; a free licence given to all acts of inhumanity and lust, the earth reeking with the blood of its inhabitants: and this execrable crew of butchers, employed in so pious an expedition, is a modern colony, sent to convert and civilise an idolatrous and barbarous people.”

Gulliver’s Travels- Jonathan Swift

As in Sierra Leone, shades of 18th century imperialism.

Rodrigo Angue Nguema(YAHOO)

Wed Jun 18

South Africa, Spain and the United States each approved a plot to topple Equatorial Guinea’s president, British mercenary Simon Mann told a Malabo court Wednesday.

Testifying at his ongoing trial, Mann said the Spanish government was 100 percent ready to support the operation, whose participants included Mark Thatcher, son of former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher.

The United States and unnamed oil companies agreed that the political situation in Equatorial Guinea was unstable and that a change of government would be welcome, he added.

Mann — who prosecutors allege spearheaded the operation — also stated that South Africansecret services had passed him a message from its head to the effect that it was giving him a green light to mount a coup.

Speaking calmly, with his hands clasped behind his back, Mann’s testimony was translated from English into Spanish by a court interpreter.

Quizzed by Attorney General Jose Olo Obono, Mann said Spain was chosen because it was the former colonial power in the territory, the US because of its importance in the oil sector and South Africa due to its significance as a regional power.

Asked about the allegations, Spanish foreign ministry spokesman Manuel Cacho told AFP in Madrid: “The Spanish government obviously denies these allegations, as it already did in 2004 through Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos.”

Mann, 55, said the coup was aimed at installing Severo Moto as president — Moto being a political opponent of Obiang who has been sentenced in absentia to several years in jail. Moto now is behind bars in Madrid for the trafficking of arms to Malabo.

Mann described Mark Thatcher as a key member of the plot, with a role that went beyond raising financing for the failed 2004 bid to oust the oil-rich African country’s president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema.

Thatcher had been in contact with Moto to transport him to the Spanish Canary Islands off Africa’s west coast and then on to Mali to await his return to power in the oil-rich former Spanish colony, Mann said.

Thatcher agreed to pay for Moto’s travel costs, Mann added.

Dressed in a striped prisoner’s shirt, Mann said he came in touch with Thatcher when they were neighbours inCape Town.

A preliminary meeting with the coup’s alleged creative force, London-based millionaire Ely Calil, had revealed that Thatcher and Calil knew each other, Mann added.

Thatcher pleaded guilty in 2005 to breaking the anti-mercenary laws of South Africa, where he was then living. He avoided prison with a suspended four-year sentence and a three million rand (380,000 euros, 505,000 dollars) fine.

Equatorial Guinea has already issued an international arrest warrant for Thatcher, who left South Africa for the United States.

Mann — who faces 30 years in jail if convicted — was arrested in 2004 at Harare airport with 61 alleged accomplices when their plane touched down en route to Equatorial Guinea.

Zimbabwean authorities accused them of trying to pick up arms before launching their coup attempt. Mann said at the time that the group was on its way to provide security to private mines in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Obiang has been in power in Equatorial Guinea since he overthrew his own uncle, Francisco Macias Nguema, in 1979. Under his rule the former Spanish colony has become one of sub-Saharan Africa’s biggest oil producers, but the country’s oil revenues are a state secret.