Limited distribution: GQLeaks (120 GB)

Emails from Equatorial Guinea's government, with new research from Diario Rombe

The CCEI Bank GE building in Malabo, Teodoro Obiang (L) and his son’s father in law Florencio Maye Ela (R). Photo via Diario Rombe

GQLeaks, named after Equatorial Guinea’s top level domain, consists of 120 GB of emails hacked from the Centro Nacional de la Informatización de la Administración Pública de Guinea Ecuatorial (CNIAPGE), the National Center for the Computerization of Public Administration. These emails belonging to key members of the Teodoro Obiang administration are dated between 2017 and early 2022. Obiang has been in power in Equatorial Guinea since 1979, and is one of Africa’s longest serving dictators.

Due to the presence of sensitive medical data, these emails are being released in our Limited Distribution section. They were provided under embargo to Diario Rombe, who have begun to publish their research.

Diario Rombe found evidence of a large real estate loan to a family member of Obiang, Florencio Maye Ela, guaranteed by a state-owned bank in 2012. Maya Ela’s daughter is married to Teodoro Obiang’s son Gabriel Mbaga Obiang, the current minister of Mines and Hydrocarbons in the Obiang government. The equivalent of US$3.5 million, Rombe reports the 2012 loan was to build a 4-story building in Bata. At the time, the Equatorial Guinean state owned 34% of CCEI Bank GE, which has been found to have been used extensively by members of the Obiang family to offshore their wealth. Three years later, in 2015 CCEI Bank GE declared bankruptcy.

Diario Rombe also reports that since 2020, Equatorial Guinea has failed to pay its yearly quotas to OHADA, the intergovernmental treaty organization they joined with 16 other African states. Equatorial Guinea’s debts to OHADA add up to the equivalent of US$2 million. OHADA did not reply to Diario Rombe’s requests for comment on the current status of Equatorial Guinea’s payments.

Limited distribution

Researchers and journalists with a background in publishing can get in touch via email. Please include in your request enough information to verify your research background, such as links to previous research. We give priority to requests from researchers who publish without a paywall, and who have a history of studying leaked datasets.

In request emails, we will look for you to:

• Explain why access to the material is needed and what you intend to do with it.

• Include enough information to verify your credentials or purpose.

• If you intend to reproduce any data, explain how it will be reproduced and who it will be shared with

We may not be able to respond to rejected requests. Diario Rombe has also included this information about our request process in their publication, in Spanish.