The five men given a full pardon
President Teodoro Obiang Nguema on Monday gave the five men "a full pardon for humanitarian reasons" for their participation in the 2004 coup plot.
The South African department of international relations and co-operation confirmed the men's release into the custody of the South African embassy in the Equatorial Guinea capital, Malabo.
Briton Simon Mann and his co-defendants were convicted in a trial that aired a plot in which well-connected Britons and others sought to install an exiled opposition figure as president of the oil-rich nation.
The coup unravelled before it began, when Mann and a plane-load of other mercenaries were arrested in Zimbabwe, where they were to buy assault rifles, grenades and anti-tank rockets.
Mann, 57, was serving a 35-year sentence in Equatorial Guinea for the 2004 plot.
The case ensnared Mark Thatcher, son of former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher. Mann implicated him as chief bankroller of the plot, along with Equatorial Guinean-based Lebanese businessman Eli Calil.
Thatcher pleaded guilty in a South African court to unwittingly helping fund the operation. He was fined and given a suspended sentence.
Mann and his accomplices were freed yesterday, Obono said.
The four South Africans are Nicolaas du Toit, Sergio Cardoso, Jose Sundays and George Alerson.
Alerson's wife, Lucia, said she had not known of the amnesty .
"How is he . do you know? Is he in good health?" she asked anxiously. "Where is he now?"
Alerson, who has eight children, said she had had only a few phone conversations with her husband during his imprisonment.
Equatorial Guinea attorney-general Justice Obono Olo, who prosecuted the coup plotters, denied rumors that Mann was unwell, saying he was "fine, fit".
He also denied that pressure had been brought to bear by foreign governments.
The Equatorial Guinea ministry of justice, culture and prisons proposed the pardon to the president, who granted it on the grounds of "compassionate forgiveness''.
Members of Mann's family said they were "overjoyed at the prospect of finally welcoming Simon home after five and a half long years away.
"Everyone is profoundly grateful to the president and the government of Equatorial Guinea.''
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