A renowned dissident in Equatorial Guinea died in prison while serving a 60-year sentence.
Julio Obama Mefuman, 51, a Spanish citizen who was kidnapped from South Sudan in 2019, “died at Oveng Azem jail” in the eastern city of Mongomo, according to the MLGE3R movement.
It specified no date for Obama Mefuman’s death but accused the country’s conservative regime of “torture”.
The Movement for the Liberation of the Third Equatorial Guinea (MLGE3R) was established in Spain, the previous colonizer of the central African state.
Simeon Oyono Esono Angue, the foreign minister of Equatorial Guinea, stated on Monday that Obama Mefuman “died in a Mongomo hospital following sickness,” but denied any allegations of torture.
The death was verified by a representative for the Spanish Foreign Ministry, but no other details were provided.
Andres Esono Ondo, leader of Equatorial Guinea’s only authorized opposition group, the Convergence for Social Democracy, tweeted that “Julio Obama’s death in prison” was unacceptable. He called for an international inquiry “to clarify what happened and ensure that all detainees enjoy the right to family visits”.
Ondo voted in presidential elections last November, where President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, 80, received 94.9 percent of the vote.
Amnesty International has urged President Obiang to launch an “independent and urgent investigation” into the killing of Obama Mefuman.
Obama Mefuman died less than two weeks after Spain’s High Court ordered an investigation into his suspected kidnapping and torture, as well as the kidnapping and torture of a second dissident, Feliciano Efa Mangue, who also had Spanish citizenship.
A judicial source said the two, along with two Equatorial Guinea nationals who reside in Spain, were seized in South Sudan in late 2019 and flown to Equatorial Guinea.
In March 2020, Mangue was handed a 90-year term and Obama Mefuman 60 years for allegedly having taken part in an attempted coup against Obiang in 2017.
aljazeera
