Son of Equatorial Guineas president, Ruslan Obiang Nsue, has been arrested and placed under house arrest on suspicion of selling a plane belonging to the country’s national airline.

At the end of November, the authorities had opened an investigation “after noticing the disappearance of the ATR 72-500 aircraft belonging to the national company”, Ceiba Intercontinental, sent to Spain in 2018 on a routine maintenance.

It is thought Obiang Nsue “sold the ATR aircraft to the company Binter Technic”, which specializes in aviation maintenance and is based in Las Palmas, on the Spanish island of Gran Canaria.

Ruslan Obiang Nsue, Vice President Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue former secretary of state for sports and youth, and current director of Ceiba Airport was first deputy director of Ceiba Intercontinental and then its managing director.

His half-brother and Vice President Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue tweeted: “Ruslan Obiang has confessed that he was the person who sold Ceiba’s ATR, I have ordered his immediate arrest and handing him over to justice.”

Teodorin Obiang, whose rap sheet around the world on corruption charges is inexhaustible from his three years sentencing in Franc in July 2021 and “ill-gotten asset” confiscation. Frozen asset in London and ban from the UK following anti-corruption investigations.

Last December, news of the plane’s disappearance and its alleged sale by Obiang Nsue sparked national outrage.

Equatorial Guinea has been ruled for more than 43 years by President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, who has just been re-elected for a sixth seven-year term and holds the world record for longevity in power for a living head of state, excluding monarchs.

Equatorial Guinea is the third richest country in sub-Saharan Africa in terms of GDP per capita in 2021 according to the World Bank, but ranked 172nd out of 180 countries in the Transparency International corruption barometer