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Renowned Cameroonian singer Wes Madiko dies at 57

27, June 2021

Renowned Cameroonian singer Wes Madiko dies at 57 0

Cameroonian singer Wes Madiko, better known as Wes, died on the night of Friday, June 25, his family said in a statement. Aged 57, the artist was admitted to a hospital in Alençon, Orne, his relatives told the newspaper L’Orne Hebdo. According to the Cameroonian media The Bled Speaks, Wes died from surgery due to a nosocomial infection.

“A legend has passed away, leaving us a final message of peace for humanity on his hospital bed which will be communicated to you in the days to come,” said his family and his friend and co-producer Djily Smith.

 Arrived from Cameroon in 1987 and living in Orne since 2006, Wes became a world star with his hit “Alane” in 1997. Sold over ten million copies worldwide, the title was number one radio station when it was released and won it a diamond disc in France and Germany. In Cameroon, he was also presented as the “King of World music”. Another of his titles, “In Youpendi”, was also famous for being heard in the Disney movie. The Lion King 2.

Source: News-in-24

Mali: Protesters call for French troops to leave, some call for greater Russia cooperation

27, June 2021

Mali: Protesters call for French troops to leave, some call for greater Russia cooperation 0

Activists in Mali stage protest against French military presence in Bamako, calling for the total withdrawal of French troops from the country.

Some waved Russian flags and held banners calling for greater cooperation between Mali and Russia.

The demonstration organised by political fringe group ‘Yerewolo Debouts sur les remparts’ was relatively subdued.

Numbers were lower than organisers had hoped for after heavy rains earlier in the day.

The demonstration came as Germany’s defence minister announced that 12 German troops and a soldier from another country were wounded following an attack on soldiers taking part in a United Nations mission in Mali.

“I would be so happy, like at a party, if France quit Mali today. Really. Ever since we trusted them with our security, everything has become worse.” stressed Bakary Coulibaly, a local resident.

The U.N. mission in the country, MINUSMA, had earlier said that 15 peacekeepers were wound ed when a temporary operational base in the Gao region was targeted with a vehicle bomb.

German y has hundreds of troops taking part in U.N. stabilization and European Union training missions in the West African nation.

“There are injured Germans, that has saddened us because Germany here is not seen as an occupying force. But they are being manipulated by the French, in fact. Germany came here with good intentions to protect us from terrorists, but today they find themselves inside the Machiavellian schemes of France,” according to Pape Diallo, spokesman for protest platform ‘Yerewolo – Debout sur Les Remparts’.

Mali has been trying to contain an Islamic extremist insurgency since 2012.

A military coup last year in Mali has complicated matters further, and the junta’s leaders have faced criticism from France and the African Union.

Source: Africa News

UK: Health Secretary Matt Hancock quits amid row over clinch with aide

27, June 2021

UK: Health Secretary Matt Hancock quits amid row over clinch with aide 0

Britain’s health minister Matt Hancock quit on Saturday after he was caught breaking Covid-19 rules by kissing and embracing an aide in his office, enraging colleagues and the public who have been living under lockdown.

In the latest scandal to rock a government that has overseen one of the highest official death tolls from the pandemic, Hancock wrote to Prime Minister Boris Johnson to resign, saying he had let people down.

An increasing number of his fellow Conservative lawmakers had privately called for him to go after the Sun newspaper published photos on Friday of the married minister embracing a woman whom he had appointed to a taxpayer-funded role to scrutinise his department.

“Those of us who make these rules have got to stick by them and that’s why I’ve got to resign,” the 42-year-old said in a video on Twitter.

Hancock had been at the centre of the government’s fight against the pandemic, routinely appearing on television to tell people to follow strict rules and to defend his department against criticism of its response to the crisis.

He will be replaced by Sajid Javid, a former finance minister with widespread government experience but new to health. Javid was forced out of the Treasury in early 2020 when he lost a power battle with Johnson’s then most senior ally, Dominic Cummings.

He will be tasked with helping the state-run health service recover from the pandemic and to deal with any future infection waves. Cases have started to rise in the last month.

Hancock’s departure also marks an embarrassment for Johnson after he said on Friday that he had accepted Hancock’s apology and considered the matter to be closed.

He said on Saturday he was sorry to receive the resignation.

“You should be immensely proud of your service,” he wrote in reply to Hancock. “I am grateful for your support and believe that your contribution to public service is far from over.”

The Sun had shown Hancock kissing the aide in his office last month, at a time when it was against the rules for people to have intimate contact with a person outside their household.

Time to go

Conservative lawmakers said many of them had told the party they could no longer support him.

The opposition Labour Party had also questioned whether Hancock had broken the ministerial code: the woman, a long-time friend, was appointed as a non-executive director to scrutinise the running of his department.

Media reports said on Saturday she had now quit.

Labour leader Keir Starmer said on Twitter that Hancock was right to resign, but added: “Boris Johnson should have sacked him.”

With 128,000 deaths and one of the deepest economic contractions on record, Britain has been convulsed by the pandemic and Hancock had been heavily criticised. In the early months his department struggled to deliver testing and protective equipment for hospital staff treating patients.

However, the government has been boosted by a rapid rollout of vaccines, with 84% of adults having had one dose and 61% both, well ahead of most countries.

While cases have started to rise – up 18,000 on Saturday – vaccines appear to have weakened the link between infections and deaths and most restrictions could be dropped by July 19.

Despite the improving situation, the revelations around Hancock had sparked accusations of hypocrisy. They also reignited the charge that Johnson’s government is beset by cronyism.

Hancock had last year welcomed the resignation of a senior scientist who broke restrictions in a similar manner. He had also been faulted for awarding Covid contracts to companies with close ties to government. He had said there was a need to act fast.

His case also had echoes of an incident last year when Cummings broke lockdown rules. Johnson’s decision to retain him sparked fury across the country and damaged the government’s standing.

On that occasion, ministers and lawmakers voiced their support for Cummings in a coordinated effort. In contrast, few if any defended Hancock on Saturday.

A source in Downing Street said Hancock had not been pressured to resign. He said in his letter to Johnson he wanted to apologise to his family and spend time with his children.

(REUTERS)

CPDM Crime Syndicate embraces China and pays price with Australia’s Sundance Resources

27, June 2021

CPDM Crime Syndicate embraces China and pays price with Australia’s Sundance Resources 0

Cameroon signed a deal on Friday with two China-linked companies to construct a railway from the coast to a large cross-border iron deposit, the state broadcaster said, even as it faces legal action over the project from Australia’s Sundance Resources.

Sundance has filed for international arbitration and billions of dollars in damages, saying Cameroon and Congo Republic have violated contracts by developing the Mbalam-​Nabeba project with Chinese investors.

Cameroon’s mines minister and transport minister signed the memorandum of understanding to construct the rail link from Mbalam to the southern port of Kribi with representatives of Aust-Sino Resources and Bestway Finance, the state broadcaster CRTV said in a post on Twitter.

The ministries did not respond to a request for comment.

Bestway Finance is registered in Hong Kong. Mining company Aust-Sino is based in Australia, but some of its board members have close links to China, according to its website.

Aust-Sino, which was a major backer of Sundance until last year, did not respond to a request for comment. Bestway could not be reached.

Congo Republic revoked Sundance affiliate Congo Iron’s permit for the Congolese part of the project in December and awarded it to little known company Sangha Mining Development Sasu, which is backed by Bestway.

Mining has yet to start at Mbalam-​Nabeba, which has an estimated 775 million tonnes of iron ore. Over 500 kilometres (310 miles) of rail needs to be built to transport the ore to the coast.

Projects requiring significant infrastructure investment have become more viable due to a surge in iron ore prices, which hit a record high in May as a rebound in demand for the key steel-making ingredient from top consumer China outpaced supply.

Source: Reuters

Biya regime told to stop the ban on vital medical services in Southern Cameroons

27, June 2021

Biya regime told to stop the ban on vital medical services in Southern Cameroons 0

International medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has called on the Cameroonian government to lift the ban on providing free, essential medical care in the restive Anglophone North-West region of the country after they were blocked more than six months ago. The government had accused MSF of being too close to separatists in the area.

“That is clearly ungrounded,” says Emmanuel Lampaert, MSF Operations Coordinator for Central Africa, talking about the government’s justification for pulling MSF’s authorization to work in the region.

“Whatever there may be in terms of perceptions or accusations or grievances, what rationale can justify this ongoing suspension and this blow for vital support? Access to care should not be denied,” he tells RFI.

The numbers of people treated in 2020 underlines the importance of their free services to the North-West Region: MSF teams provided more than 42,500 medical consultations, performed nearly 3,300 surgeries, and dealt with at least 4,400 patients who had been referred to MSF’s free, 24/7 ambulance service.

“Our ambulance call center continues to receive emergency requests, which they are forced to decline,” he says.

MSF is one of the few medical NGOs in the region, a conflict zone since late 2017. Described as the “Anglophone crisis”, fighting kicked off after peaceful protests by teachers and lawyers in Bamenda, the capital of North-West Cameroon. Demonstrations were violently quashed by Cameroonian security forces.

Protests sparked over anger about the perceived marginalization by the Francophone ruling majority, especially over the use of French in the legal and education systems.

The violent quelling of demonstrations propelled some Anglophone separatists to take up arms against the security forces, later making a self-declaration of independence for so-called Ambazonia. Fighting continues between separatists and government security forces, with civilians caught in the crossfire and accusations of human rights abuses committed by both sides.

Healthcare and medical training impacted

In a conflict zone like North-West Cameroon, the lack of basic health services, such as treatment for diarrhea, respiratory tract infections, and malaria, has contributed to a major health crisis.

Additionally, MSF treated 180 survivors of sexual violence last year, and helped more than 1,000 women with obstetrical emergencies. Many residents are living in the bush, because they fear for their lives, forced to flee their homes. Unsanitary conditions in the bush have also exacerbated health issues.

Part of MSF’s remit in the region is the training and equipping of community health workers, which has also been halted by the government, says Lampaert.

Health workers, both local and foreign, have been subject to attacks, as both the government and separatists accuse people who are trying to provide healthcare of taking sides in the conflict.

“Where is the interest? What justifies all of this?” says Lampaert, exasperated, adding that people in the region describe ongoing harassment.

“It’s continuing, and at moments, it’s increasing with high insecurity, regular attacks and intimidation against medical staff… and meanwhile the humanitarian and health needs have surged during the past years due to this armed violence, so there is a difficult equation there,” he adds.

Lampaert says MSF has made an effort to respond to all accusations of bias and has presented this to the government in Cameroon.

“But in the end, there’s been no clear signal, and access is still denied. At six months, suspension [of MSF’s activities] is ongoing and we ask for it to be lifted,” he says.

Source: RFI

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Kumba gendarmerie station bombed in Amba attack

26, June 2021

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Kumba gendarmerie station bombed in Amba attack 0

Ambazonia Restoration Forces have attacked a gendarmerie station in Kumba the chief city in Meme Division. According to witnesses, Amba gunmen surrounded the station threw homemade bombs into the station and fired guns into the building.

No Southern Cameroons group has claimed responsibility for the attack, which followed the pattern of others carried out by Ambazonian fighters, including the use of improvised explosives in Bui and Ndian.

Cameroon Concord News Meme Bureau Chief who contributed to this report said blood could be seen on the floor of the captain’s office. The Ambazonia Restoration Forces were heard chanting anti French Cameroun songs and saying that they would kill any gendarmerie or police officer in Meme.

Ambazonia is the indigenous name of the former United Nations trust territory of the Southern Cameroons under United Kingdom Administration for close to half a century, excluding the period of British connection with the territory from 1843 to 1887. When Republique du Cameroun took control of the territory, it split it into two parts and designated them as “northwest and southwest provinces/regions of Republique du Cameroun.” This was rejected and continues to be rejected by the people of the former British Southern Cameroons. The people of the territory insist on the indigenous name of their Homeland which is Ambazonia. This is consistent with a 1978 recommendation of UNESCO that African countries should call their countries by the name they wish to be known. Here, the designations ‘Ambazonia’ and ‘the Southern Cameroons’ are used interchangeably.

Cameroon’s weak central government has been unable to stop Ambazonia increasingly bloody attacks.

By Fon Lawrence in Kumba

Southern Cameroons-Biya-Dangote Meeting: Saying nothing can be riskier than saying something

26, June 2021

Southern Cameroons-Biya-Dangote Meeting: Saying nothing can be riskier than saying something 0

Except for the Igbos, all big businesses in Nigeria have political backing and many Nigerian political elites have been urging business tycoons to weigh in on politics and make huge campaign contributions.

This situation is also true in Cameroon where all CEOs running major corporations are chartered members of the ruling CPDM party also known as the crime syndicate.

The recent meeting between the 88-year-old President Paul Biya and Nigerian billionaire Aliko Dangote in Yaoundé, heralded the view that businesses have a right to participate in the political process.

Aliko Dangote’s trip to Cameroon was to weigh into a highly incendiary issue-the war in Southern Cameroons. To be accurate, it was a mission designed to placard the international business community that Cameroon is stable and that the war-torn country is still attracting prominent investors.

Dangote finally met the man that the French government has been using to fight against his cement empire in Francophone Africa and of course the Unity Palace meeting will invite serious consequences in the long term.

There is no African leader alive who’s benefited more from corporations’ spending money on politics than President Biya who continue to receive millions of US dollars from Elf, Exxon, Brasseries, and Euro-Oil in corporate donations to guarantee his stay in power.

It was stupid for Mr. Dangote to say the things he said about the butcher of Yaoundé which revealed that he (Dangote) was playing a key role on the divisive political issues in Cameroon. A growing number of consumers of Dangote cement in Cameroon are demanding that Dangote and his brands stand up for human rights whether the issue is controversial or not. Mr. Dangote avoided this area during his conversation with Biya.

Correspondingly, Cameroonian consumers want Dangote to be more human, to have a social conscience, to care about the Southern Cameroons refugees living under horrible conditions in Nigeria, Southern Cameroons women and children displaced by the fighting, and the poor in the country and so on and this requires him to follow the example of Mo Ibrahim and take a stance on political and social issues.

So our Cameroon Concord Group warning to Aliko Dangote is to stay out of Cameroon. The meeting with Biya was very irritating and Dangote’s reckless and tactless comments to the French Cameroun media must be condemned. The French Cameroun genocidal campaign going on in Southern Cameroons has put Dangote on the spotlight for the wrong reasons- In Cameroon today, saying nothing can be riskier than saying something.

English speaking Cameroonians were not expecting a business magnet of Dangote’s pedigree to receive an award or state honour from a man with so much blood in his hands. Dangote should instead join forces with Mo Ibrahim and campaign for multinationals to stop making political donations to dictators like Biya.

It is regrettable that the sense of urgency on Dangote’s Cameroon visit came only after the EU and US business regulators hinted that Cameroon was no longer safe for foreign investments.

This begs the question: What role, if any, do you think Dangote’s expressed interest in Cameroon’s oil and gas sector would play in the divided nation’s political discourse? Both French and British Southern Cameroonians don’t separate individuals from businesses anymore and consequently, Dangote’s statement on CRTV has damaged his business in Cameroon.

We of the Concord Group believe and fervently too that Aliko Dangote whose fortune has been linked to the military dictatorship in Nigeria for more than three decades, should concentrate on buying Arsenal Football Club than investing in Cameroon’s oil and gas.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Bundes: Several killed in knife attack in Wuerzburg

26, June 2021

Bundes: Several killed in knife attack in Wuerzburg 0

Several people were killed and others injured on Friday in the southern German city of Wuerzburg, police said, with media reporting a knife attack.

“The attacker was overpowered after the police used firearms. There are several injured as well as fatalities,” said police on Twitter, without giving details on the suspect’s motives.

German news outlets reported that the suspect had attacked people in the city-centre with a knife.

Police were able to arrest the man after shooting him in the leg, the Bild newspaper reported, adding that at least three people were killed and six others injured.

While the motive and full identity of the perpetrator have not yet been established, Germany has been on high alert after several deadly Islamist extremist attacks.

Suspected Islamists have committed several attacks in Germany in recent years, the deadliest being a truck rampage at a Berlin Christmas market in December 2016 that killed 12 people.

The Tunisian attacker, a failed asylum seeker, was a supporter of the Islamic State jihadist group.

More recently, one man was killed and another seriously injured in an Islamist knife attack in the city of Dresden in October.

A 20-year-old Syrian jihadist in May received a life sentence for the homophobic attack.

In August, six people were injured in a series of motorway accidents in Berlin in what prosecutors described as a suspected Islamist attack.

The number of Islamists considered dangerous in Germany rose sharply between 2015 and 2018, according to security services.

But numbers have declined since then, with just 615 considered dangerous by the latest count — compared with 730 in January 2018.

On top of that, there are also 521 people “who have attracted the attention of the security services but have not yet reached the stage of being considered dangerous”.

Chancellor Angela Merkel has allowed in more than one million asylum seekers since 2015 — a decision that has driven the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which charges that the influx spells a heightened security risk.

But beyond Islamist attacks, there have been other assaults by knife-wielding people.

In October 2017, a knife-wielding man randomly attacked passersby in central Munich, lightly injuring eight people. Police excluded terrorism as a motive after detaining the suspected perpetrator.

(AFP)

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Washington blocks Yaoundé from acquiring patrol boats

25, June 2021

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Washington blocks Yaoundé from acquiring patrol boats 0

The Cameroonian navy has embarked on a search for patrol boats after its attempt to acquire two Bollinger vessels from Washington was blocked as a sanction for abuses committed by the army in Southern Cameroons.

Source: Africa Intelligence

Runway lights malfunction disrupts operation at Douala International airport

25, June 2021

Runway lights malfunction disrupts operation at Douala International airport 0

Air travelers have been warned that a “technical issue” affecting lighting at Cameroon’s largest airport, Douala International Airport, will affect their journeys, a government official said on Thursday.

Cameroon’s Minister of Transport, Jean Ernest Massena Ngalle Bibehe said, there had been a problem with the lighting on the runways.

“The malfunctions are linked to an insulation fault of cables,” Ngalle Bibehe said in a statement on Thursday.

“This situation had as a direct consequence the postponement of certain flights departing from this airport and the unfolding of other flights which were to land there, thus causing disruptions in the operating programs of the airlines,” he added.

The minister assured that competent authorities were actively working to ensure normal activities resume at the airport in the shortest possible time.

Source: Xinhuanet

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