POLITICS Bloomberg Businessweek June 17, 201938
FROM LEFT: XINHUA/ZUMA PRESS; DAVID DEGNER/GETTY IMAGESTyranny
Writ Small
○ TinyEquatorialGuineahasoilbuthowmuch
longercanthatfueltherulingfamily?actedatthebehestoftheWhiteHouse.Delrahim
deniestheadministrationhadanyinvolvement.
Althoughhelostthefight,Delrahim’swillingness
totakethemattertocourtwasgroundbreakingin
antitrustenforcement.
Simons,whooftenpointstohisrecordtargeting
anticompetitiveconductbycompanieswhenheran
theFTC’scompetitionbureaufrom 2001 to2003,
toldsenatorsata hearinglastyearthattheplaceto
lookforantitrustviolationsis wherethere’slikely
tobepotentialmarketpower.“Thatdescription
woulddescribesomeofthesebigtechplatforms
thatwe’realltalkingaboutinthenewsregularly,”
hesaid.“Sothosearetheplacesyouwouldlook.
Andwithoutcommentingonanyspecificcom-
panyoranyspecificinvestigation,thisissome-
thingthatis a priorityforus.”—David McLaughlin,
Naomi Nix,andDanielR.Stoller○ President ObiangTHE BOTTOM LINE The U.S.’s two top antitrust enforcers have
the administration’s backing in taking an aggressive approach to
investigating big tech companies for violations.fires. To pass time, unemployed men play Akong,
a local board game. Many were idled after Obiang’s
building spree ended two years ago. The country
has some of the world’s worst social indicators: Less
than half of the population of about 1.3 million peo-
ple has access to clean water, and 20% of children
die before reaching the age of 5, United Nations data
show. More than half of all children of primary age
aren’t in school.
Poverty is in the eyes of the beholder—at least
according to Gabriel Mbaga Obiang Lima, one of
the president’s sons and the minister of mines and
hydrocarbons. He acknowledges difficulties in tack-
ling what he calls “pockets” of destitution, which
he blames on the poor having too many children
and not saving enough money. “When our peers
from Nigeria and Sudan come to see our slums,
they say: ‘This is not poverty. Come to our country
to see real poverty.’”
His father, the president, rules the country from
Malabo, which is set on a volcanic island about
150 miles from the rest of the country on the main-
land. Obiang’s rise to power began in Spain—the
former colonial ruler of Equatorial Guinea—where he
received military training at an elite academy during
the 36-year-long dictatorship of Francisco Franco.
When the African country became independent in
1968, Francisco Macias Nguema was elected presi-
dent—and Obiang, his nephew, rose to become head
of the national guard. Macias hated intellectuals—
he even banned the word “intellectual.” A third of
the population was killed by Macias’s security forces
or fled during his decade-long rule. Obiang over-
threw his uncle in 1979. Macias was put on trial and
executed by firing squad.
Until the 1990s, Equatorial Guinea’s main source
of revenue was cocoa and coffee. Then oil was dis-
covered. (The country is the smallest member of
OPEC.) Since then, Obiang has tightened his grip
through a system of patronage that enriches his
family and allies. Obiang’s eldest son and vice pres-
ident, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, flaunts
his private jet trips and yacht parties on Instagram.
“Teodorin” (or little Teodoro) was convicted in
absentia by a French court in 2017 for embezzling
more than $100 million of Equatoguinean pub-
lic money to buy a fleet of supercars and a man-
sion near the Champs-Élysées. He spent more
than $300 million from 2004 through 2011 on lux-
uries, including Michael Jackson memorabilia, U.S.
Department of Justice lawyers said in a separate
money laundering case settled in 2014. That sum
amounted to slightly less than 10% of Equatorial
Guinea’s annual oil revenues at the time, and accord-
ing to a paper published by the Center for GlobalThe six-lane highway stretching from Equatorial
Guinea’s airport to its multimillion-dollar seaside
resort in Sipopo is lined with skyscrapers, a state-
of-the-art Israeli-run hospital, and luxury homes sur-
rounded by carefully tended gardens. The 16-mile
drive suggests the country’s oil reserves have
enriched this tiny 11,000-square-mile West African
nation, which has been ruled for almost 40 years
by one man, President Teodoro Obiang Nguema
Mbasogo. State media once compared him to God.
Veer off the route, and the picture that emerges
is much less divine. In Fishtown, one of as many
as eight shanty communities in the capital, Malabo,
hundreds of people live in wooden shacks. Children
romp near sewage that flows onto dirt roads strewn
with trash. Street vendors sell tomatoes and beans
under a mesh of electrical wires that often spark