Frederik Potgieter and Peter Huxham were arrested on drug charges just two days after South African courts seized the yacht of Equatorial Guinea’s vice-president, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue.The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has declared the detention of two South African engineers in Equatorial Guinea as arbitrary and illegal.
Equatorial Guinea signed the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which prohibits arbitrary detention – holding individuals without due process or legal protections, constituting unlawful imprisonment. Following a court ruling in South Africa on an unrelated matter, authorities seized these assets. Although the super yacht has been released, the villas remain impounded. Frik and Peter remain imprisoned in Equatorial Guinea. They are caught in the diplomatic and political conflict between South Africa and Equatorial Guinea.Their court case, which took place in June 2023 in Equatorial Guinea, lacked credible evidence, witnesses, or expert testimonies presented by the State, reads the statement.