Obiang's eldest son, Teodorin, aspires to succeed his father and serves as minister of infrastructure. He sold a Beverly Hills home in October for $7.7 million and spends much of his time in Paris, where he lives in a luxury hotel and owns a small fleet of sports cars.
In May, the Treasury Department's Office of the Comptroller of the Currency fined Riggs $25 million in connection with its handling of accounts controlled by Equatorial Guinea, saying the bank had failed to report suspicious transactions as required by the Bank Secrecy Act.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Wednesday December 22, 2004 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 2 National Desk 2 inches; 85 words Type of Material: Correction
Equatorial Guinea -- An article in Saturday's Section A included Noble Energy Inc. in a list of companies under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission for their operations in Equatorial Guinea. Noble has a minority stake in an energy project in Equatorial Guinea but has not been contacted in regard to the investigation, a company spokesman said. The project operator, Marathon Oil Corp., said in a public filing that it was contacted by the SEC and that it was "cooperating fully" with the inquiry.
The money trail from the Riggs accounts led investigators to extensive Obiang business holdings in energy, construction, hotels, supermarkets, cocoa, farming, pharmaceuticals, telecommunications and real estate, records show.
Teodorin who previously was minister of forestry and the environment, owns a company that has exclusive rights to export timber. That business netted him $26.8 million in 1999, according to a Riggs memo.
Obiang and family members were involved in joint ventures and contracts with U.S. oil companies, often on highly favorable terms, according to information in the Senate report.
Exxon Mobil's internal guidelines on the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, a copy of which it provided to the Senate, say a foreign partner with no expertise or apparent qualifications other than the ability to influence government policy should be viewed as a "red flag."
Asked during testimony in July to the Senate Permanent Subcommittee whether Obiang's holding company brought any technical "assets" to the partnership, Exxon Mobil Executive Vice President Andrew Swiger replied: "I'm not aware of any." Obiang's official biography on his country's website does not mention experience in the oil industry or a business background of any kind.
Exxon Mobil also paid Obiang and his wife a total of $366,000 on leases of land for its business operations, according to the Senate report.
Other transactions under federal investigation:
* Exxon Mobil and Amerada Hess paid about $1 million to Sonavi, a private security firm headed by Armengol Ondo Nguema, Obiang's brother and the country's security chief. State Department reports have identified Nguema as a torturer.
* Amerada Hess paid government officials and their relatives more than $2 million for building and office leases. About a quarter of it was paid to Obiang's 14-year-old son. Marathon Oil has paid or agreed to pay Obiang more than $2 million for land purchased to expand its business operations in Equatorial Guinea.
