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José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

english.elpais.com

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Re: José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

#11

Post by enriquto »

fcatalan wrote: post #8
enriquto wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is still de facto a colony, conveniently ruled by a spanish-supported dictator.

Ummm no. In fact the relationship between Spain and Guinea is surprisingly tenous considering the colonial past. Guinea hardly makes it to the news and it isn't in the "national conscience" at all. The average educated spaniard would have to be reminded of the whole story. Diplomatic relations are somewhat cordial, probably protecting some remaining economical interests, but a bit at "an arms length", as with other d…

> Opposition politicians routinely seek refuge or meet in Spain without any trouble. If anything they decry the "hands off" stance of Spain, hardly the same as a "de facto colony" situation.

And care to hear what do they have to say? There's hardly any journalists willing to interview them. Mostly Xavier Montanyà that I know of. When asked "what could Spain do more for Guinea?" they invariably answer "to begin with, they should do less, offering less support to the current dictatorship". If you want a somewhat mainstream source that talks about this situation (which is rare), look here: https://elcultural.com/espana-en-guinea-ecuatorial-del-expol...

Basically, the support goes in the form of Spanish politicians of all parties receiving "prizes" from the Guinean dictatorship with the tacit implication of leaving them alone.

Re: José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

#14

Post by MrBuddyCasino » 

  “I can’t say for sure, but it is likely that he participated in all that,” says his grandson, Yvan Mbomo, who has formed a picture of his grandfather as a communist of such firm convictions that he put the fight for his ideals before his family’s safety and his own.
I guess we should celebrate that he was a fan of the right kind of murderous authoritarian ideology.

Re: José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

#15

Post by mcosta »

enriquto wrote: post #11
fcatalan wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ummm no. In fact the relationship between Spain and Guinea is surprisingly tenous considering the colonial past. Guinea hardly makes it to the news and it isn't in the "national conscience" at all. The average educated spaniard would have to be reminded of the whole story. Diplomatic relations are somewhat cordial, probably protecting some remaining economical interests, but a bit at "an arms length", as with other d…

> Opposition politicians routinely seek refuge or meet in Spain without any trouble. If anything they decry the "hands off" stance of Spain, hardly the same as a "de facto colony" situation. And care to hear what do they have to say? There's hardly any journalists willing to interview them. Mostly Xavier Montanyà that I know of. When asked "what could Spain do more for Guinea?" they invariably answer "to begin with,…

So Spain should mess with its old colonies or not?

Re: José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

#17

Post by eyko »

enriquto wrote: post #11
fcatalan wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ummm no. In fact the relationship between Spain and Guinea is surprisingly tenous considering the colonial past. Guinea hardly makes it to the news and it isn't in the "national conscience" at all. The average educated spaniard would have to be reminded of the whole story. Diplomatic relations are somewhat cordial, probably protecting some remaining economical interests, but a bit at "an arms length", as with other d…

> Opposition politicians routinely seek refuge or meet in Spain without any trouble. If anything they decry the "hands off" stance of Spain, hardly the same as a "de facto colony" situation. And care to hear what do they have to say? There's hardly any journalists willing to interview them. Mostly Xavier Montanyà that I know of. When asked "what could Spain do more for Guinea?" they invariably answer "to begin with,…

My late grandmother worked with Atanasio Mdongo as part of his inner circle before his assassination, and later had to work for Macías Nguema. She was Bubi, working for a dictator that was carrying out a Bubi genocide. My mother escaped death a few times and eventually was smuggled out of the country to Spain. From what I know, journalists were indeed interested (in the 80s and 90s) but trauma and fear of repercussions meant few if any were willing to publicly share the kinds of stories they'll share on the dinner table. You also have to understand that most Bubi people in Spain are surrounded by Fang relatives and there's usually, even today, animosity towards each other. The diaspora basically hate each other and there are wounds that never healed.

Our most recent family table-top arguments on this "taboo" topic was triggered by the recent movie "Palm Trees in the Snow". I do think that these stories will eventually be written by people from my generation (born in the diaspora).

Re: José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

#18

Post by iagovar »

Mediterraneo10 wrote: post #9
iagovar wrote: post #3

Nice story. To this day many Spaniards are unaware that Ecuatorial Guinea is a former colony. My memories from High school are that we glanced over it.

The rest of the Spanish-speaking world is unaware, too. I am foreigner who learned Spanish of Spain, and when traveling in Latin America the locals have often made fun of me for using the vosotros form of verbs. "There are umpteen Spanish-speaking countries, and only one says vosotros ," they'd say. "Not true!" I would try to defend myself. "They use vosotros in Western Sahara and Equatorial Guinea, too!" (On my firs…

My guess is that because E. Guinea wasn't given much attention until very late in the colonial Spain, it didn't really leave much footprint in the spanish society.

Anyway, there are some documentaries about it in the Internet (in Spanish), also from La 1. IIRC they had some ecuatorial guineans in the comment sections with interesting insight.

I also follow https://twitter.com/ccemalabo/ so it appears in my feed from time to time, and refreshes my curiosity.

Re: José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

#19

Post by iagovar »

eyko wrote: post #17
enriquto wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Opposition politicians routinely seek refuge or meet in Spain without any trouble. If anything they decry the "hands off" stance of Spain, hardly the same as a "de facto colony" situation. And care to hear what do they have to say? There's hardly any journalists willing to interview them. Mostly Xavier Montanyà that I know of. When asked "what could Spain do more for Guinea?" they invariably answer "to begin with,…

My late grandmother worked with Atanasio Mdongo as part of his inner circle before his assassination, and later had to work for Macías Nguema. She was Bubi, working for a dictator that was carrying out a Bubi genocide. My mother escaped death a few times and eventually was smuggled out of the country to Spain. From what I know, journalists were indeed interested (in the 80s and 90s) but trauma and fear of repercussio…

Thank you for the insight, much appreciated. Do you or anyone in your family keep in touch with E. Guinea in any way?

Re: José Epita Mbomo, a Spanish electrician who sabotaged the Nazis

#20

Post by capableweb »

MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #14

“I can’t say for sure, but it is likely that he participated in all that,” says his grandson, Yvan Mbomo, who has formed a picture of his grandfather as a communist of such firm convictions that he put the fight for his ideals before his family’s safety and his own. I guess we should celebrate that he was a fan of the right kind of murderous authoritarian ideology.

We shouldn't celebrate any particular ideologies but we should celebrate the fact that José Epita had peoples best interest at heart and tried to change it for the better.

Please note that nowhere in the article communism is actually celebrated, not even in the snippet you posted. So not sure why you got that takeaway.

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