A statement attributable to Cameroon’s Minister Delegate at the Presidency of the Republic in charge of Defense says Friday’s fire outbreak at the Command Post of the Bamenda Territorial Gendarmerie Unit was the result of an electrical accident.

In a press release Monday, October 19, 2020, Commander Atonfack Guemo Cyrille Serge, Head of Communication Division at the Ministry of Defense dismissed allegations that the fire incident may be related to the ongoing socio-political unrest in Southern Cameroons.

 Atonfack Guemo says preliminary results of the investigations carried out by the competent services suggest that the fire outbreak developed from the electricity meter supplying the building.

“The Minister Delegate at the Presidency in charge of Defense informs as follows: In the afternoon of Friday, October 16, 2020, at about 4:30 pm, a fire broke out in the building hosting the Command Post of the Bamenda Territorial Gendarmerie Unit, located at Up-Station,” Atonfack Guemo said in a press release. “The quick intervention of firefighters together with the combined effort of elements of the National Gendarmerie and residents of the locality made it possible to contain the flames and bring the fire under control at about 7:00 pm.”

From the first indications of the investigations that have been launched, Atonfack Guemo went on, it appears that the fire was an accident caused by the sudden return of electric power in Bamenda after a power outage that led to a shock on the electricity meter supplying the building.

Source: Cameroon Info.Net

Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch, HRW, says as further opposition-led demonstrations are expected across Cameroon in the coming months, the AU and the ECCAS should press President Paul Biya to end the wave of repression and promote respect for human rights.

She is quoted in a HRW dispatch today that condemns the arrest and detention of political leaders and their supporters in Cameroon.

“African and regional bodies should not remain silent in the face of escalating repression and should rally support from within their institutions to hold Cameroonian authorities to their human rights obligations, including by calling for the immediate charge or release of all arrested demonstrators and political opponents,” Allegrozzi said.

The international human rights NGO holds that Cameroonian security forces fired tear gas and water cannons and arrested hundreds of people, mainly opposition party members and supporters, to disperse peaceful protests across the country on September 22, 2020.

Many peaceful protesters were beaten and mistreated while being arrested and in detention. Cameroon’s authorities should immediately release all those held for their political views or for exercising their right to peacefully assemble, said today’s release.

HRW calls on the African Union (AU), the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR), the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) and Cameroon’s other regional and international partners to publicly denounce the crackdown on Cameroon’s political opposition and other dissenters. These groups should press the Cameroon government to hold to account those responsible for violations of the rights to assembly, to liberty, and to freedom from inhuman and degrading treatment, it said.

“African and regional bodies should call out Cameroon’s government for its repression and rampant abuses,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. “As the end of the AU’s 2020 theme, ‘Silencing the gun,’ approaches, it’s crucial for these institutions to send strong messages to President Paul Biya’s administration that flagrant violations of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and other human rights treaties are unacceptable.”

According to the opposition party Cameroon Renaissance Movement (Mouvement pour la Renaissance du Cameroun, MRC), over 500 people were arrested on September 22, only 155 of whom have been released. Lawyers for the party say that 21 were taken before a civilian court on various charges, including rebellion and participating in an illegal demonstration; 107 have been taken before a military court on various charges including terrorism and insurrection; 63 others continue to be held without charge, while the situation of others still in custody is unclear. In a statement on October 14, Cameroon’s communications minister said that 294 people were arrested on September 22, of whom 176 have been released.

Human Rights Watch, between September 22 and October 10, says it interviewed ten leaders and members of the opposition party MRC, five lawyers, three journalists and four relatives of men who were arrested and beaten by the police on September 22. Human Rights Watch also reviewed photographs and video footage showing the September 22 demonstrations and the security force response.

HRW notes that in early September, Cameroon authorities banned demonstrations across the country after the MRC encouraged people to take to the streets over the government’s decision to call regional elections in December. The party has said the government should revise the electoral law and resolve the crisis in the Anglophone regions – where violence has been acute since late 2016, as separatists seek independence for the country’s minority Anglophone regions – before holding these elections.

The territorial administration minister then announced that anyone organizing or leading demonstrations would be arrested, claiming that protests would endanger lives during the Covid-19 pandemic. The communications minister warned political parties on September 15 that protests could be considered “insurrection” and that illegal demonstrations would be punished under the anti-terror law.

The wife of a 32-year-old MRC member who was arrested in Yaoundé, the capital, on September 22 told Human Rights Watch: “I went to the central police station where my husband is being held. His eyes were red and swollen. He told me that the police beat him up when they arrested him.” A party member who visited his 36-year-old friend at the Yaoundé central police station after his arrest, said: “Policemen beat him so savagely that his wrist is now dislocated. He’s being held in a small dirty cell with 20 other people with no light and a non-functioning toilet.”

At least eight journalists were among those arrested on September 22, and it appears that at least some were deliberately targeted. Radio France Internationale (RFI)’s correspondent in Yaoundé, Polycarpe Essomba, told Human Rights Watch: “I had finished covering the demonstrations, and I was in a hairdresser shop preparing my radio show when six policemen came in and pointed at me. One said: ‘That’s him whom we are looking for. That’s him who’s spoiling Cameroon’s image abroad.’ They put me in their truck and forced me to lay down. Then they kicked me, and one hit me with a truncheon.” The reporter, who was taken to the central police station in Yaoundé, was released three hours later. The other seven journalists were also released over the course of that day and the following day.

Maurice Kamto, the MRC leader, who had been arrested in January 2019 after countrywide peaceful protests and released following a presidential decree in October 2019, has been held under de facto house arrest since September 22. Dozens of police and gendarmes surround his residence in Yaoundé, refusing to allow him to leave. On October 5, his lawyers filed a request before the Yaoundé Court of First Instance seeking to free the leader, but the court rejected the request the following day “for lack of urgency.” On October 11, Kamto’s lawyers filed a complaint against the state of Cameroon, accusing the authorities of holding the leader under house arrest illegally. The first hearing, scheduled for October 15 before the Yaoundé Court of First Instance, was postponed until October 29.

Two other prominent MRC leaders – its treasurer, Alain Fogue, and its spokesperson, Bibou Nissack – were also arrested, on September 21 and 22 respectively. They are being held at the State Defense Secretariat (Secrétariat d’Etat à la défense, SED) without charge. While their lawyers and family members can visit them, their lawyers say they cannot talk to their clients privately and that visits are only allowed for less than 10 minutes. Nissack is being held in solitary confinement and is not permitted to have reading material, reports HRW.

On October 1, following the announcement of a protest, policemen and gendarmes surrounded the headquarters of the opposition party Cameroon People’s Party (CPP) in Yaoundé and the residence of its president, Edith Kahbang Walla, known as Kah Walla. “Police initially informed me that I was under house arrest, but then backed down when I demanded to see the court judgment authorizing such an arrest,” Kah Walla said in an October 9 statement.

The right to peaceful protest is guaranteed by Cameroon’s constitution and international human rights law. Arbitrary arrests, mistreatment in detention, and unnecessary use of force to disperse protesters violate those guarantees and Cameroon’s international obligations. Protesters should instead be protected by the authorities.

While the authorities used the Covid-19 pandemic as an excuse to ban the demonstrations, HRW said, detaining hundreds of people in cramped conditions poses serious risks to public health and could be considered a right-to-health violation.

Human Rights Watch has urged governments around the world, including Cameroon, to reduce their jail and prison populations, given the heightened risk of Covid-19 for detainees and staff. For the same reason, authorities should only make custodial arrests when strictly necessary. Especially given that those arrested during the September 22 protests were not engaged in violence and presented no immediate threat to commit violence, there was no justification for custodial arrests.

HRW regrets that Cameroonian authorities have arbitrarily arrested critics of the government and political opponents on multiple occasions, and security forces have used excessive and indiscriminate force to stifle other opposition-led demonstrations. In late January, Kamto, the MRC leader, and some of his closest allies were arrested alongside another 200 party members and supporters after they held countrywide protests.

In June 2019, security forces arrested at least 350 MRC members and supporters across the country as they tried to hold demonstrations. Some, including the party vice-president, Mamadou Mota, remain in detention on politically motivated charges.

“We feel as if there’s a normalization of repression,” a Cameroonian human rights lawyer, Michelle Ndoki, told Human Rights Watch. “The international community should know that the political space for opposition groups to express themselves freely is getting smaller every day.”

On October 12, 14 United Nations independent human rights experts called on Cameroon to release Kamto and others arrested during peaceful protests and to stop the intimidation of political activists. On October 14, the communications minister said that the UN human rights experts’ statement is “partial and biased” and “based on false information.”

Source: Cameroon Info.Net

The managing director of Icrafon in French Cameroun has regained his freedom after he was reportedly kidnapped by unknown gunmen on his way back from a golf game in Kribi in the South region. The Biya Francophone regime noted in a statement that the French citizen was freed thanks to an operation carried out by the Rapid Intervention Battalion.

Patrice Laporte, the director of Icrafon, travelled over the weekend with his wife to Southern seaside town of Kribi. After a game of golf, the couple, accompanied by another Frenchman, fell into a trap set by three armed men as they were leaving the town.

The French nationals were trying to rescue a man posing as a motorist whose bike had broken down on the road and was asking for help while his accomplices, who were all lurking in the surrounding area, quickly came out with guns and took Mr Laporte away.

According to Radio Balafon, the kidnappers are well known to the French Cameroun security forces. Their gang leader- a convicted criminal and members of his gang were actively sought for numerous burglaries and robberies in the town of Kribi, which is very popular with tourists.

According to the prefect of the Ocean Division, cases of armed attacks have exploded in Kribi in recent weeks. These acts have relegated the seaside town once reputed to be quiet and peaceful among the most dangerous in Cameroon. 

By Rita Akana

Boko Haram fighters killed three villagers and abducted five children in the far north of Cameroon, where jihadist groups are increasingly active, local officials said Saturday.

The attack took place overnight Thursday to Friday in the village of Oudal, six kilometres (four miles) from the country’s border with Nigeria, where the jihadist group is based, local mayor Boukar Medjeweh told AFP.

The victims were all men and the abducted children were between the ages of three and 15, Medjeweh said.

Mahamat Chetima Abba, traditional chief of the nearby Mozogo commune, confirmed the attack and also attributed it to Boko Haram.

Attacks in this border region by members of Boko Haram and a dissident branch, the Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP), have become increasingly frequent in recent months, as they have along Nigeria’s borders with Chad and Niger.

Civilians, particularly women and children, are frequently abducted.

The Boko Haram insurgency originated in 2009 in northeastern Nigeria before spreading to neighbouring countries.

Since then, more than 36,000 people have been killed, mostly in Nigeria, and 3 million have been forced to flee their homes, according to the UN.

Source: AFP