Families of 2 SAns detained in Equatorial Guinea pleading for clemency
The families of South African engineers Frik Potgieter and Peter Huxham said they've written to President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo pleading with him to release the pair, who have been detained on alleged drug trafficking charges.
FILE: South African engineers Frik and Peter have been detained in Equitorial Guinea. Picture: Free Frik and Peter/Facebook
CAPE TOWN - The families of two South Africans detained on alleged drug trafficking charges in Equatorial Guinea are pleading for clemency.
The families of South African engineers, Frik Potgieter and Peter Huxham, said they've written to President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo pleading with him to release the pair.
Both men, in their mid-fifties, have been in an Equatorial Guinea prison for more than two years now, following their arrest in February 2023.
However, their families believe the pair was arrested on trumped-up charges in retaliation against legal action being taken in South Africa against Equatorial Guinea's vice president.
It's understood that before the arrest of the two men, South African courts impounded the vice president's yacht and two luxury villas in Cape Town.
The spokesperson for both families, Shaun Murphy, said the situation had been tough on both families.
"I always ask people to try and put themselves in the shoes of the families. If you've got a loved one who has been detained in a foreign country for something which they haven't done and you've got minimal contact with them, you can imagine the anguish these families are going through. Their partners, brothers, sisters, daughters, sons, and grandkids are so used to a routine where they would go out of country, they would go work offshore and they would come back again, and it just hasn't happened for the last two years."