MONGOMO, Equatorial Guinea (AP) — Pope Leo XIV urged Equatorial Guinea on Wednesday to work for justice and to close the gap “between the privileged and the disadvantaged” as he opened a day drawing attention to the vast income inequalities and human rights abuses in the Central African country.

Leo began the day with Mass in Mongomo, an eastern city on the border with Gabon that has experienced major development since Equatorial Guinea’s oil boom in the 1990s. President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, who has been accused of widespread corruption and authoritarianism in his four-decade rule, comes from Mongomo and the city has benefited from government investment and infrastructure, even though no official institutions are located here.

While more than half of Equatorial Guinea's population lives in poverty, Mongomo boasts opulent buildings, curated gardens behind gilt-tipped gates, an 18-hole golf course and is the starting point of the lone highway in the country, linking the city to Bata on the west coast.

Obiang and his wife were on hand for Leo's Mass, as was their son, Teodoro “Teddy” Nguema Obiang, the country's vice president who was convicted of embezzling millions of euros by a French court, which handed him a three-year suspended sentence, a 30 million euro ($35.2 million) fine and ordered the seizure of his luxury homes and cars in France worth tens of millions of euros. The country has protested the seizures at the International Court of Justice.

Last year, the United States gave the younger Obiang a temporary waiver on U.S. corruption sanctions so he could travel to a U.N. gathering and visit other American cities. Obiang also met with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau.

The Vatican said an estimated 100,000 people attended the Mass, most standing in the grand entryway to Mongomo's Basilica of the Immaculate Conception. The monumental church was consecrated in 2011 and is modeled on St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican.

Before Mass, Leo greeted the crowd and the presidential family. With the Obiangs by his side, he blessed the cornerstone of a future cathedral to be built in the country's new capital, Ciudad de la Paz, or City of Peace.

In his homily, Leo urged all citizens to work together to build a society “capable of engendering a new sense of justice,” where there is “greater room for freedom” and where “the dignity of the human person always may be safeguarded.”

He urged everyone, according to their roles, to work to “serve the common good rather than private interests, bridging the gap between the privileged and the disadvantaged.”

Later in the day he was to visit a prison in the port city of Bata, continuing the tradition of Pope Francis, who made such visits a priority of his pontificate. Francis’ aim was to give prisoners hope and to remind them the church was with them, while also shining a spotlight on judicial abuses, overcrowding and other injustices.

Source: WPLG