El Opinador Compulsivo

Hablando de Guinea Ecuatorial. Ustedes que pensaban que lo peorcito de África era Zimbabwe, Somalia y Sudán.

Mamita querida:

Where Equatorial Guinea departs from the standard African narrative is in exactly how brutal and capricious its newly installed dictator proved to be. The son of a witch doctor, Macías Nguema began as a populist politician among the Fang, the country's largest ethnic group. His election in 1968 was hailed by Spain as "a peaceful, friendly, and constructive development." He promptly kicked off an 11-year reign of terror.

Nguema flattened the cocoa plantations, outlawed fishing in an island nation, and destroyed all the industry. He had 10 of his original 12 cabinet ministers killed, banned Western medicine, and let cholera run amok in regions whose political support he doubted. He declared that "intellectuals are the greatest problem facing Africa today" and then forbade use of the word "intellectual." He established links with the Soviet Union and kidnapped foreigners for ransom. He referred to himself as "God's Unique Miracle," shut down nearly all the country's schools and churches-in the overwhelmingly Christian country-and once, according to the Financial Times, "unskillfully hanged" 150 people in a soccer stadium "to the strains of Mary Hopkin singing 'Those Were the Days' over the loudspeaker system." A bit showy, you think? Perhaps, but it was Christmas. Reports indicate that Nguema was a keen practitioner of one of the local anthropological curiosities-cannibalism. This taste may explain his cherished skull collection.