On Monday December 4, a Nouakchott Court sentenced former Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz to five years’ imprisonment. He has been on trial since January 2023 for abusing his power to amass a huge fortune.
Mr. Aziz had been on trial since January 25, along with ten other personalities, including two former Prime ministers, former ministers, and businessmen, on charges of “illicit enrichment,” “abuse of office,” “influence peddling,” and “money laundering.” The court found against him only illicit enrichment and money laundering.
The court ordered the confiscation of the assets acquired through actions falling under these two qualifications and declared Mr. Aziz stripped of his civil rights. Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz accepted the ruling without flinching.
Mr. Aziz, 66, becomes one of the rare ex-heads of state to be convicted of illicit enrichment while in power. His peers tried by national or international courts are mostly convicted of blood crimes, such as, elsewhere in West Africa, former Guinean dictator Moussa Dadis Camara, who has been on trial since September 2022.
With this conviction, Mr. Aziz, detained since January 24, 2023, after spending several months in detention in 2021, continues his descent into hell under his successor, Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani, one of his most loyal companions in the past.