Dictator
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo
The world's longest-serving current president, having seized power from his uncle in a 1979 coup.
Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo has ruled Equatorial Guinea since overthrowing and executing his uncle, Francisco Macías Nguema, in a 1979 coup, making him the world's longest-serving current head of state. Oil discovered in the 1990s transformed the small country into one of Africa's wealthiest by per-capita GDP, yet the majority of its population remains in poverty while Obiang's family has amassed vast personal fortunes — his son and vice president, Teodorín Obiang, was convicted in absentia by a French court in 2017 of embezzling public funds to buy Parisian mansions and a private jet, a case detailed by Transparency International.
Elections are held periodically but routinely return Obiang with margins exceeding 90 percent amid an almost complete absence of independent media or organized opposition. He is widely expected to eventually hand power to Teodorín, continuing family rule into a second generation.