Fangs a Lot

It was only last fall that an improbable little part-island, part-mainland Spanish territory in Africa won its independence and sidled into the world's consciousness as the 126th member of the United Nations. The omens could not have been brighter. Spanish U.N. Ambassador Don Jaime de Pinies applauded "the splendid example of peaceful independence" set by tiny Equatorial Guinea, and in return the nation's U.N. ambassador, Saturnine Ibongo lyanga, said his countrymen hoped to be "an Iberian bridge to Africa." All differences seemed ironed out between the 60,000 Fangs of underdeveloped Rio Muni, the mainland wing, and the 8,000 Bubis of the prosperous island of Fernando Poo. Francisco Macias Nguema, 45, was elected President, and his fellow Fang, cosmopolitan Atanasio Ndongo, 41, became Foreign Minister. Then, unhappily, the Fangs fell out.

Macias, a sleepy-eyed, impetuous demagogue, noted that Spanish officials in Bata, the capital, had had the temerity to fly three Spanish flags over official buildings--one beyond the quota. Late in February, he sent his personal guard to haul one flag down. When the Spanish ambassador dropped by to discuss the matter, Macias ordered him out of his office and cabled Madrid to demand that he be recalled. A few days later, Foreign Minister Ndongo and U.N. Ambassador Ibongo (also a Fang) arrived in Bata and the situation deteriorated still further.

Ndongo tried to mount a golpe (coup) against Macias, who, at the time, was out of town delivering a series of tirades against Spanish "exploiters." Well aware that without Spanish financial aid (which runs to nearly $8,000,000 a year), Equatorial Guinea would find itself in serious difficulty, Ndongo moved into the President's office, after doing his best to assure himself of military support. The assurances proved illusory. As Macias now tells it, Ndongo became so frightened when Macias returned that he leaped from the office's window and broke a leg. Ibongo, also in the office, was arrested. The coup, without a leg to stand-on, collapsed.

The political unrest, combined with Macias' increasingly anti-Spanish attitude, was enough to persuade more than 2,000 Spaniards to flee the country. According to Macias, Ibongo poisoned himself in prison, though some Spaniards maintain he was beaten to death in his cell. Spokesmen for Macias said Ndongo was being treated in a Bata hospital. The 260-man Spanish garrison still remains. Macias, after first ordering them to leave, seems to trust his own troops no longer.

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