A court in Equatorial Guinea on Wednesday convicted a senior government minister of embezzlement and sentenced him to eight years in prison, after he had earlier become infamous when sex tapes showing him and other officials’ wives were made available online.
Hilario Mitogo, director of the Supreme Court press, also confirmed in a WhatsApp message that Baltasar Ebang Engonga had been convicted by the Bioko provincial court of misusing funds that were reported as official travelling allowances to himself.
Engonga, a married man who had headed the nation’s financial probe agency, was charged together with five other top officials of embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of allowances in the oil-producing nation of Central Africa.
Popularly referred to by his pseudonym “Bello,” Pawa Engonga was the subject of global news in November when obscene videos some reportedly shot in his ministry of finance office circulated online while he was in detention to stand trial.
The judge sentenced him an eight-year prison term and penalty of $220,000 (roughly Ksh 28.5 million).
