"Fey Me No More?" Donatien Koagne, the King of "Feymania", Allegedly Dies in a Yemeni Prison

According to newsreports, "King" Donatien Koagne, Cameroon's most notorious conman and the "father of Feymania" died in Yemen a couple of weeks ago. In the 1990s he conned many African Heads of State such as Mobutu and Eyadema out of millions of dollars before finally falling into the dragnet of Yemeni authorities who threw him in jail. In a fantastic twist to this already incredible story of crime, greed and duplicity, the French secret service tried unsuccessfully to rescue him from his Yemeni hell hole ostensibly in a bid to lay hands on his famous "black book".

One of the most definitive works on Feymania in Cameroon and on Donatien Koagne was written by Domique Malaquais titled "Anatomie d'une arnaque" Feymen et Feymania au Cameroun". An abridged english version titled "Death, Douala Style" is available online. (See excerpt below)

The King's New Clothes
 
Pretoria, 1994.   Cameroonian journalist Pius Njawe is in South Africa to interview members of Nelson Mandela's fledgling cabinet.  First stop, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.   Njawe is no novice:  he expects little assistance; a secretary, an aide to an aide perhaps, will present him with a general interest press release, answer a question or two, then send him on his way.   So it is with some surprise that he finds himself ushered in to see the Minister himself. 
 
The Minister has a problem.   He has just received a fax from one of the poshest hotels in Sandton.  A guest is announced, the hotel's manager writes, whose rank poses questions of diplomatic protocol:   the King of Cameroon.  Who, the Minister inquires of Njawe, might this monarch be?  The journalist explains that there is no such thing as "the king of Cameroon."   Puzzlement all around. 
 
Njawe decides to investigate.   Countless calls later, he is granted an interview with the alleged king.  At the latter's hotel, he is directed to the presidential suite.  He is greeted at the door by a stunning young woman, "covered," he recalls, "in gold."  Entering the suite, he sinks into four inches of plush rose carpet.   Ahead is cavernous room furnished in gold and pink and white.  Young men in dark suits lie about.  One wrestles with a remote control, attempting to open at a distance a set of floor-to-ceiling drapes.   Success:  the drapes part, revealing a mezzanine.  On this, a man stands, covered also in gold – slippers and robe of gold silk, gold chains, bracelets, rings.  
 
The man on the mezzanine is not a king.   He is, however, le king, one of Cameroon's most notorious gangsters.  Donatien Koagne is his name.   Njawe has never met him, but like most of his countrymen has heard much about him.  He is a multimillionaire, his fortune born of illegal activity.  
 
Forty-five minutes of questioning lead nowhere; Njawe leaves knowing little more than he did coming in about what Koagne is doing in South Africa.   Further research proves more fruitful.  The journalist learns that his fellow-Cameroonian has established close ties with members of the Mandela team.   The great man himself may have been taken in:  one of the gangster's proudest possessions is a series of photographs of himself posing side by side with Mandela.   Worse, Koagne, it seems, was a guest of honor at Mandela's inauguration …
 
Mandela was not the only head of state taken in by Koagne.   In a photo album he took great relish in showing acquaintances, le king kept snapshots of himself with many a man of power, among them Mobutu Sese Seko and Denis Sassou Nguesso.   There is no evidence that his relations with Mandela, whatever they were, became at any point unpleasant.  Not so his ties to Mobutu and Sassou.   And with good reason:  Koagne did both men, and others too, gloriously wrong.  He took Marshal Mobutu for fifteen million dollars.   Blaise Compaoré of Burkina Faso lost forty million dollars to him.  Sassou, Etienne Eyadéma of Togo, several high officials of Gabon, Tanzania and Kenya, a member of the Spanish government and an ex-operative of the Israeli Mossad were bamboozled as well.  
 
Koagne has been linked to a wide range of illicit practices – drug dealing, money laundering and trade in controlled substances (blood diamonds, uranium), among others.   The means he used to defraud Mobutu and his colleagues, however, were something else altogether.  The modus operandi was a fabulous con job, a sham money-multiplicatio n scheme involving a top-secret potion allegedly concocted by the United States Department of Treasury for use in the manufacture of dollar bills.
 
Eventually, Donatien was caught.   He fell prey to the Yemeni police, following yet another con in which he took a high-ranking member of the local police for two million dollars.  While the story of his arrest is an extraordinary one, the tale of manifold attempts made to extract him from Yemen is still more remarkable.   The identity of his would-be rescuers is telling.  First among them were the French secret service, which, at one point, devised a plan oddly reminiscent of the Rainbow Warrior affair:  a high-speed boat disguised as a tourist's yacht, from which frogmen would emerge and make their way, surreptitiously, to Donatien's gaol. Paris, it seems, was interested not so much in Donatien himself as in a little black book he kept, in which were listed the names of all the prominent men he had bilked, the amounts he had taken them for and the dates on which he had done so.   The Quai d'Orsay had been contacted by representatives of several African governments – clients, all, of the infamous Réseau Foccart, by way of which France in the 1980s and '90s maintained its stranglehold on the Francophone sub-continent.   Some of the petitioners wanted the book out of circulation, lest it fall into the hands of opponents who might make use of its contents to ridicule their regimes; others hoped it would provide them with evidence, should they seek redress from banks in which Donatien was known to keep accounts.   There was much to be gained, Paris concluded, in assisting in the con man's release.
 
The rescue attempts failed.   Donatien apparently remains in Yemen.  Of his little black book, there is no news.  Enough time has passed, however, for it to be of little concern anymore.   Why then this overview of the man's career in crime?  Because Donatien was one of many, the standard-bearer for a generation that played a key role in Cameroonian and Franco-African politics at the dawn of the twenty-first century – a generation whose existence paved the way for the Operational Command.

Click here to download article.

And here is an excerpt of a French TV report on Donatien's modus operandi.

KOAGNE DONATIEN "THE KING"
Uploaded by APTEL92.

 

Comments

[Wanky]

Holy cow! Always heard the name Donatien Kouagne in the "background" and remember the royal treatment that he was given (with the PM welcoming him at the airport like a foreign dignitary) in the run up to the 1994 world cup when he donated 10 Million FCFA to the Lions. Never knew of all these details. What a story!!!

[Son of the Soil.]

Thank God, this crook never came near the doors of Etoudi. That is how sane and devoid of criminal activities our regime is. We do not associate with small minds.Etoudi has no place for such twisted characters.

This is a call to those who globetrotter and in the false illusion that they belong outside Cameroon. What a lesson to all.

[Father of the Soil]

Son of the soil aka "AL DIP", I guess you missed the statement before yours where it is stated that Donatien Kouagne was received at the airport by the Prime Minister of Cameroon like a foreign dignitary, feted by the Biya regime and then treated like royalty in the corridors of power and on CRTV where he was called the most patriotic Cameroonian after he donated 10 million francs of his ill-gotten wealth to the lions; money which regime officials swindled during the infamous "operation coup de coeur". Massa, from all indications, you don't know the faintest thing about Cameroon. You better focus on your menial job in Minesotta.

[Son of the Soil.]

THE MANY SHADES OF FEYMANIA UNDERTAKEN BY CAMEROONIANS.
(1) the buying and selling of fake drugs.
(2) The having of more than 3 names and several dates of birth.
(3) Filing for fake asylum status.

Dear Father of the Soil, which do you belong? I read everything. The PM received Donatien as a private citizen. Donatien as a Cameroonian, had as his right to go to CRTV or even Etoudi but as a private citizen doing sight seeing. People go to Buckingham Palace for sightseeing also.

Did our man receive him? The answer is NO; Father of the Soil. Talk is cheap. Some of you will look at the sun only to try and find stains on it. What has the CPDM done? Not a single posting is done without the writer doing CPDM bashing. I detest that.

[Get out of my soil]

Son of the Soil, previously known as D'poko. So far so good. Continue to keep it clean.

[solomonsydelle]

wow, had never heard of this character until today.

[Gan Charles]

For whom the illgotten gain? What Donatien did was con the con. My only regret is that he did not perform more Robin Hood like act with the loot.
What I do not understand is why Heads of states with all the monies would want to engage in money doubling and counterfeiting.
GREED.
Hope there were more Donatiens out there coning the cons.
Peace!

[Che Sunday]

Well Spoken Gan Charles
When the greedy become too greedy, here comes a dirtier version of their kind and they fall for him.Lets pray for a dirtier Donatien and let the French keep trying to cover up their rear-ends. Someday, we will have our revenge.

[The Observer]

Roommates charged in Minneapolis homicide
Victim was kicked, strangled and stabbed before he was tossed in snow

By ABBY SIMONS, Star Tribune

Last update: February 12, 2010 - 7:42 PM
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An argument between crack-smoking roommates resulted in the beating, strangling and stabbing death of a Minneapolis man whose body was found in the snow last week, according to criminal charges filed Friday.

Alfunda Scruggs, 50, was charged with first and second-degree murder. His girlfriend, Hope Christina Jackson, also known as Hope Cook, 38, was charged with being an accomplice after the fact.

The body of 45-year-old Michael Moulion Fonta was found behind his home Feb. 4 in the 300 block of 8th Street SE.

According to charges against the couple:

• Police found Scruggs and Jackson in the dead man's apartment. Scruggs said that he'd lived with Fonta about a month, and Jackson joined them about two weeks ago, but he had not seen Fonta since Feb. 2.

• Jackson told investigators that she, Scruggs and Fonta had smoked crack in the apartment and Fonta had started calling her "bitch." She said Scruggs got angry, punched Fonta several times and said, "She's my bitch, and I am the only one that can call her that."

• Jackson told police that Scruggs threw Fonta to the floor, kicked him and told Jackson that they'd have to put Fonta on "house arrest because if we let him go, we're going to jail."

• Jackson said her boyfriend grabbed a black strap, sat on Fonta and strangled him, then stabbed him in the neck with a knife or screwdriver until he was motionless.

• Jackson told police that they cleaned the apartment and Scruggs took the body outside.

• In the apartment, police found traces of blood, residue from bleach, a black cord and knives. A dumpster behind the apartment contained garbage bags with bloody sheets, braids of hair and Fonta's wallet.

Scruggs was in the Hennepin County jail on $2 million bail. Jackson's bail was set at $1 million.

Abby Simons • 612-673-4921

[vallyshaqing]

its a pity cameroon has lost a great brain.anyway the legacy continues

[Mbella Anderson]

Everything that goes up must come down;its just a matter of time

[Sean Blaise]

THAT WAS A HERO WITH BRAINS.
ONLY A GREEDY MAN FALLS VICTIM TO SUCH.
LET US ALL STOP CONDEMNING DONACIAN AND INSTEAD LEARN TO BE SATISFIED WITH WHAT WE HAVE BECAUSE IT IS WHEN WE SEEK FOR MORE THAN WHAT WE DESERVE THAT WE FALL VICTIM. WHAT HE DID IS NOT RIGHT BUT THAT IS NOT ENOUGH REASON FOR US TO CRUCIFY HIM BECAUSE SOME OF US ARE NOT ANY BETTER THAN HIM. ITS NOT BECAUSE HIS CASE HAS BEEN MADE KNOWN TO THE PUBLIC. SOONER OR LATER WE SHALL HEAR OF YOURS TOO.

[eric peter]

donatien is a grear man.we need people like him to punish our greedy leaders.at list he will never allow them to use the money to buy arms to kill innocent citizens.thank you donatien may your soul rest in perfect peace.we miss you so much.