Pope Leo XIV arrived in Malabo on Tuesday for the final stop of his four-nation African tour, bringing his first papal visit to Equatorial Guinea in 44 years — and his most diplomatically sensitive to date. The small former Spanish colony on Africa's western coast, home to roughly two million people, is governed by President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, 83, who has held power since 1979, making him Africa's longest-serving head of state. The visit marks the 170th anniversary of Catholic evangelisation in the country.

Equatorial Guinea presents a stark paradox. The discovery of offshore oil in the mid-1990s transformed it into one of sub-Saharan Africa's wealthiest economies per capita, with oil now accounting for nearly half of GDP and over 90% of exports. Yet more than half the population lives in poverty. Rights organisations including Human Rights Watch, along with court cases in France and Spain, have documented how oil revenues have flowed to the ruling Obiang family rather than to ordinary citizens. The country consistently ranks near the bottom of Transparency International's annual corruption perception index. Adding to the controversy surrounding the papal visit, the government in February deducted salaries from civil servants and military personnel to help fund the visit, provoking domestic protests.

The pope arrives with a clear record of candour toward authoritarian hosts. At the presidential palace in Yaoundé, Cameroon, earlier in the trip, Leo stood beside 93-year-old President Paul Biya — the world's oldest sitting leader and himself accused of decades of authoritarian rule — and declared that "the chains of corruption, which disfigure authority and strip it of its credibility, must be broken." Similar words are anticipated in Malabo. In Angola, Leo also condemned "tyrants" who exploit their populations, leaving little ambiguity about his willingness to speak plainly.

The Catholic Church occupies a central position in Equatorial Guinea, where roughly 75% of the population is Catholic — among the highest proportions in Africa — and the Church has expanded from three to five dioceses in recent years, running hospitals and universities across the country. Yet activists note that Church leadership is deeply entangled with the government, a product of both financial ties and the climate of fear that permeates public life. Vatican officials have acknowledged the tension, arguing that the Church must neither wage open war against the government nor silently normalise injustice, but continue advocating for human dignity and the common good.

Leo's schedule in Equatorial Guinea is packed: meetings with Obiang and the diplomatic community, an address at the national university, visits to a psychiatric hospital and a prison, and a Mass. Before departing Thursday, he will pray at a memorial to the more than 100 people killed in a 2021 explosion at a military barracks in Bata, caused by the negligent storage of dynamite near residential areas. Observers and rights groups, while noting the risk that the government could exploit the visit as a signal of papal endorsement, say the attention a papal trip brings to a largely overlooked country outweighs that danger — and may offer its long-suffering citizens a measure of hope.