August 5 – Freedom Day in Equatorial Guinea

Posted on August 5, 2019

August 3 used to be Armed Forces Day in Equatorial Guinea. Even though this small African nation didn't have very large or well-equipped armed forces, I read, the people were enthusiastic about celebrating them, and schools, banks, and businesses were closed for this public holiday.

However, somewhere along the line, the holiday got a name change; now August 3 is Freedom Day in Equatorial Guinea.

Any-who...why am I telling you all of this stuff about an August 3 holiday...on August 5?

You may have guessed that, in Equatorial Guinea (as in many other societies) public holidays are moved to the nearest Monday when they fall on a weekend, so people will still get their day off of work or school!

Equatorial Guinea is a very small nation on the west coast of Africa. It will not surprise you to learn that it lies on / very near the equator. It is the only African nation in which Spanish is the official language; that's because it was once colonized by Spain.

A few people in Equatorial Guinea have become extremely rich from oil found underground, but unfortunately, most of the people don't benefit from this industry, and less than half of the population even has clean drinking water!

More bad news: the government is authoritarian. Even though the name of the top official is "president," and even though the nation is supposed to be a multi-party democracy, in reality the president is a dictator and the elections are shams. The government has one of the worst human rights records in the world, so the nation is ranked one of the "worst of the worst" in Freedom House's list.

In other words, I'm sorry to say that the people celebrating Freedom Day aren't all that free.

Because of that, I wouldn't choose to spend my tourism dollars there, even thought the nation has lovely scenery: