By Charles Pemu 
MALABO — A court in Equatorial Guinea has sentenced a senior official, Baltasar Ebang Engonga, to eight years in prison for embezzlement. Engonga, who gained notoriety for appearing in a series of sex tapes with other officials’ wives, was also fined $220,000.
The Bioko provincial tribunal convicted him of diverting hundreds of thousands of dollars claimed as professional travel expenses for his personal use.
The former head of the national financial investigation agency, nicknamed “Bello,” was accused alongside five other senior officials of the financial crime. The sex tapes, some of which were filmed in his office, were published on social media in November while he was in detention.
The clips went viral and spawned numerous online parodies, songs, and posts about a spoof virility drug. The conviction and sentence underscore the government’s crackdown on corruption in the oil-rich Central African nation.