The Wonga Coup (9 page)

Initially Moto had a good relationship with Obiang. They probably knew each other from Spain when they even pursued the same girlfriend. The new president sent Moto to Cuba for a meeting of ‘non-aligned' countries, those which leaned neither
east nor west in the Cold War. In 1980 he became technical director in the ministry of information and tourism (a tricky job in a country that sees little of either) and the following year was made minister himself. There the friendship ended. Moto said he wanted media freedom, democracy and other reforms that Obiang would not tolerate. In December 1981 he fled to Spain and founded an opposition group, the Progress Party. ‘Obiang is responsible for all the problems in Equatorial Guinea' became his well-worn refrain.

For the next two decades they played a lively game of catand-mouse. Moto was occasionally let back into Equatorial Guinea to register his political party or to contest an election. Once there he was often arrested, accused of plotting a coup, convicted and jailed, then somehow released into exile and given an amnesty. After one trip home in 1988 he was sentenced to death. In 1996, he returned to contest a presidential election, but he and other opposition candidates then withdrew, calling it a sham. Eventually – of course – he was arrested, tried (in the same cinema used for Macias in 1979) and convicted of defaming the president, trying to corrupt a policeman and plotting a coup. He got a thirty-year term and was told to stay out of politics. Soon he was out of jail and back in exile.

Perhaps it suited Obiang, as he held sway over factions of the ruling family, to point to Moto as an external threat. Obiang's power-hungry son, Teodorin, and disgruntled brother, Armengol, caused more worries than any opposition figure. If Moto was a credible bogeyman they might be kept in line. In 1997 Moto made his most direct attempt to take power. He went to Angola to recruit a team to overthrow Obiang. Angola seemed an ideal place to do that. The pretty seaside capital, Luanda, bustled with arms traders, smugglers,
scheming politicians, mercenaries and every other stock character of modern Africa. And though fresh food and water were in short supply, guns and ammunition were plentiful. Semi-automatic rifles could be bought for a few dollars in big public markets, like Roque Santeiro, in rough corners of town. Moto procured a boat in Luanda harbour and prepared to sail the short distance to Equatorial Guinea.

Then Angola's police showed up. The country has a decent spy network and the security forces were probably tipped off. The head of the Angolan presidential guard detained Moto and his men and prepared to send them to Equatorial Guinea. Yet again, Moto and his men slipped the net. They were flown instead to Spain on the Angolan president's personal plane. Perhaps the Spanish offered military aid to Angola in return for Moto, or maybe it suited Obiang to leave his troublesome priest on the loose. In his absence a court in Equatorial Guinea handed Moto an impressive – though meaningless – jail term of 121 years.

The endless game little benefited Moto, but, there again, life was not too hard. He was comfortable and honoured in Madrid, where he had a home, a wife and four children. He sang in church, put on weight, wore his smart suits and collected human rights awards (he is a ‘Knight of the Yuste Imperial Order', no less). Spain's prime minister, Jose Maria Aznar, was fond of him. A part of the reason: Spain lacked oil contracts in its former colony. Other European powers – the British in Nigeria, or the French in Gabon – have entrenched national oil firms in their old colonial territories. But Spain missed out. Its national oil company, Hispanoil, prospected in the 1980s but failed to spot one of Africa's most lucrative offshore fields. Instead, American companies prospered. If Moto one day took office, grateful for Madrid's support,
Spanish oil firms might benefit. But there was no sign of that happening. He could wait to win a free and fair election, but it would snow in Malabo first. To get power, Moto needed to grab it. The ragtag hired guns in Luanda harbour had been useless. He needed professionals.

Mann's first meeting with Moto happened in Madrid early in 2003, probably in February or early March. Mann was impressed. He later recalled Moto's studies for the priesthood and thought him a ‘good and honest man' who planned to improve the lives of ordinary people. Moto's chief assistant, a General Sargoso, formerly Obiang's head of security, was also present. Mann was struck by Sargoso's story of why he had fled to exile: he had apparently argued with the president, then Obiang had raped his wife and he had been forced to watch. True or not, the tale left a strong impression on the Briton. Moto equally warmed to the visiting former SAS man, asking if he could help arrange a ‘military escort' to take him home. He hinted that an internal uprising by soldiers and civilians was due early in 2004. Mann agreed, later calling it a ‘necessity [to] try and help the cause'.

Others in the Wonga Coup broadly confirm this version of events. One plotter who met Mann in London shortly after the Madrid trip thinks he was first asked for an escort to guard Moto in elections planned for April 2004. But the elections were not presidential, so quite what Moto planned to do is unclear. According to this version Mann declined, saying, ‘It's a nice idea, but it won't work.' Then, some weeks later, he was called to a second meeting with Moto and told of a more daring plan: to grab power. Afterwards Mann reported that ‘this is a more serious game than I thought …[it has] changed scale'.

Another man also confirms the broad account of events in Madrid. Crause Steyl is a tricky character to pin down. He is known as a risk-taker, a dynamic man. ‘The human material is good. He's a very nice guy but he's got fire in his arse,' says a farmer friend, adding that Steyl ‘has more than the average get up and go'. One of his brothers disapproves, thinking him odd, perhaps ‘because he was weaned on goat's milk'. A pilot with minimal formal military experience, Steyl worked with Mann from the early days in Executive Outcomes, both in Angola and Sierra Leone. Steyl frankly admits to playing a major role in the Wonga Coup. Interviewed for this book in 2005 he immediately defended the attempt: ‘We didn't see Obiang as a baby catcher. It's not all that wrong to get rid of him. It could have been messy, but millions in the world are dying all the time. Yes, you do something illegal, but if it had worked you would have said it's not a bad thing.'

Mann called Steyl in 2003 and said, in general terms, he had a new ‘project' planned. They met at a hotel Mann favoured, the Sandton Towers in Johannesburg, where Mann said, ‘The boys have asked me to help them. I've not told Amanda [his wife] anything yet. I want to know if you'll play with', recalls Steyl. He immediately agreed. Mann did not say where in Africa the project would unfold, but he wanted a small group of important men to fly from Spain to Uganda. ‘He said I would have to arrange aircraft to do the logistics. He has a team to be picked up in Spain and I must work out a quote to move it at least as far as to Uganda from Spain. He also said it's not necessarily Uganda.' Afterwards Steyl browsed online and soon learned there is only one Spanish-speaking country in tropical Africa. He guessed, too, it would be oil rich: ‘And the place had to have oil. I mean, who's going to do a coup in Zimbabwe?' He found a country that is roughly the same
distance from Spain as Uganda. ‘Until that moment I hadn't ever heard of Equatorial Guinea,' he admits.

Steyl, a man fond of bravado, claims he did not hesitate over the plot. ‘I calculated we had a 30 per cent chance of success, but most coups are family feuds. That makes our one, this one, the poshest of all coup attempts. If you're not killed in the first week, the most chance would be two years in jail. That's all.' And the chance of financial gain was enormous: ‘It's better to live like a lion for one day than as a sheep for a hundred days.' He pauses to elaborate. ‘In fact, it is better to live like a lion for a hundred days! All the projects I've done with Simon have been successful: in Angola; in Sierra Leone; Papua New Guinea; and in other things like equipping Angolan aircraft with spy cameras. Everything we've touched has turned to gold. Simon is full of ideas. He finds profitable solutions.' Just how profitable Mann would later spell out in detail.

‘Another bloody Moustache, that's all we need.'

Nigel Morgan

Johann Smith is no angel; nor does he claim to be one. A veteran of 32 Battalion, he fought covertly in Angola (where he was twice shot) and formed close ties with Unita leader Jonas Savimbi. He worked as a liaison officer for the South Africans, gathering intelligence on the Unita leader for many years. He says that he once saved Savimbi's life by smuggling him out of Luanda, Angola's capital, in a diplomatic car. Smith, who now walks with a pronounced limp because of bullet wounds (and thus is called Peg Leg by some friends), eventually quit the army in the early 1990s suffering post-traumatic stress. He did not work with Executive Outcomes, now saying he was reluctant to turn against Savimbi. But he kept in touch with other veterans. The old officers (mostly white) formed a social club in Pretoria. The footsoldiers (mostly black) made a habit of visiting him, seeking work or small amounts of money, notably after Executive Outcomes closed shop. Smith helped them where he could, and in return picked up information on their activities.

He also developed another line of interest, in Equatorial Guinea. From 1996 he visited the oil rich country regularly, forming close ties with the regime, offering information and advice. After a decade of friendly relations, the rulers in Malabo trusted white South Africans, and Smith fashioned himself as a freelance intelligence operative. He helped Obiang organise early (and badly flawed) multi-party elections and advised on political matters. He took up a trade that is popular in Africa, as a freelance intelligence man. Just as rag-and-bone merchants worked in Britain a century ago, pottering around streets on a cart pulled by a horse, loaded with junk, trading as they went, the modern intelligence dealer darts about Africa with a laptop and satellite phone, lingering in hotel bars, picking up scraps of information where he can, selling them on to willing buyers, whether corporate or government. The more sophisticated use electronic, online or other surveillance.

Smith specialised in warning of threats to Obiang's security, especially coup attempts. Equatorial Guinea became ‘his patch', he says, which he guarded against other intelligence merchants. He spent time in Malabo, having made some forty visits by 2004, sometimes for months on end. He had good access to Obiang and others in the government and even became a godfather to one minister's child. In 2000, long before the Wonga Coup was launched, he produced a report alleging that ex-mercenaries from Executive Outcomes plotted to put the exiled politician Severo Moto in office. That made some sense: Moto had been caught red-handed trying to launch a coup in 1997 and everybody expected him to try again. Another time Smith alleged that Russian special forces had sleepers in the country and were ready to seize power.

By 2000, however, a new business opportunity arose. Several other freelance intelligence men were interested in
west Africa, including a jovial and sandy-haired individual called Nigel Morgan. A Briton of Irish descent, Morgan is a former member of the Irish Guards (he calls them the Micks) where he worked in military intelligence. His character is one that the novelist Graham Greene might relish. He trained briefly as a Jesuit priest, shortly after working for a thinktank that advised Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. Known by friends and neighbours as Nosher or Captain Pig, he has a startlingly red face, the sort that glows in a dark room, having spent years under the African sun while swallowing pints of pink gin and tumblers of whisky. His love of hearty English food, rich cheese and cigars is matched only by the pleasure he takes in spinning yarns and arguing about politics.

By the turn of the century Morgan had met Smith and, along with a couple of others, they formed a small firm, Cogito. The goal was to sell intelligence services to Equatorial Guinea and to foreign firms that worked there. But Cogito got nowhere. Much depended on Smith producing the right introductions and, he says, a ‘sixth sense' warned him to hold back. There was ample time, however, for all involved to learn that Equatorial Guinea lacked a serious defence force. Soldiers were often drunk, equipment was kept in poor repair, and levels of training were low. Smith reflects that ‘maybe even then the plan was started for a coup'. Smith was also approached directly by Greg Wales, the accountant with ties to Mann and Executive Outcomes who touted for business in Equatorial Guinea. Smith refused, unwilling to trust Wales.

Cogito folded after another brief foray, this time to Angola. Morgan moved on, hired by a Belgian diamond mining company to end chronic theft at its operations in Congo. He recruited some ex-32 Battalion soldiers, through Smith, to be his guards. Among them was a man called Victor Dracula, an
Angolan of fierce fighting pedigree, although not considered particularly bright. Once asked, outside a South African court, why he had the name Dracula, he replied, ‘I can only say this: I took blood!' Another was Sergio Cardoso, from Sao Tome and Principe, who is described admiringly by a fellow fighter as ‘a thug, very ugly, a mulatto built like a brick shit house. But quite friendly if he doesn't want to kill you.' Morgan also hired a young South African communications expert, James Kershaw, as his personal assistant. A taciturn man in his early twenties with a snub nose and pale skin, Kershaw proved unusually skilled at radio, online and advanced forms of electronic communication. He and Morgan operated closely together until the anti-corruption project collapsed in 2003. All these men would later have their parts to play in the story of the Wonga Coup.

Then, in 2003, another freelance man appeared on the scene. Servaaf Nicolaas (shortened to Nic, Niek, Nick or Nicky) du Toit was considered a ‘legend' in the ranks of South African special forces. ‘He was a brilliant soldier, brilliant officer,' says Smith, though the two men are not close. Another mercenary and veteran calls him ‘a good man, a gentle person, a good soldier. He was a hero in Angola.' A lawyer who later interviewed him concludes: ‘He's very composed, calm. He answers the bare minimum of what you ask. He is very philosophical.' His long army career, in the special forces and fighting in Angola, was followed by a brief spell with Executive Outcomes. In 1996 he became a site manager for a mining company, Namco Diamonds, in Angola, at roughly the time Mann developed the diamond interests of Executive Outcomes there. The two got to know each other about this time.