Created with great pomp in 2017 and presented as a solution to the socio-political crisis shaking Cameroon, the ‘Commission pour la Promotion du Bilinguisme et du Multiculturalisme’ [Committee for the Promotion of Bilingualism and Multiculturalism] is struggling to bring a deeply divided country together.

Peter Mafany Musonge slowly made his way to the Yaounde Convention Centre. On 21 January, the former prime minister of Cameroon attended a meeting there along with the other 14 members of the Commission pour la promotion du bilinguisme et du multiculturalisme [National Committee for the Promotion of Bilingualism and Multiculturalism] (CNPBM), an institution he has headed since its creation in 2017.

As he settled into meeting room “A”, where the biannual session took place, Musonge was aware that his citizens have a long list of demands. Especially since, for the year 2021 alone, its budget amounts to about 3bn CFA francs (€4.5m) – a substantial budget in a context of crisis, in which resources are scarce. The adoption of this package is, moreover, the main item on the agenda.

“This budget will allow us to carry out our three main programmes,” said Musonge in a brief statement to the media at the end of the session. “The programme on bilingualism, which is to be extended and implemented throughout the country, the programme on multiculturalism and living together and, finally, the one on governance and institutional support.”

“No effects on the ground”

A plan of action that should give a boost to activities in the field and silence criticism. There are indeed prominent public voices denouncing the organisation’s wait-and-see approach, given the fact that the social climate is deteriorating as the days go by. The events that occurred during the 2018 presidential election were a continuation of the problems that have affected the country since the Anglophone crisis began in 2016.

Musonge himself acknowledges a resurgence of “intra-community stigmatisation.” “In the political field, frightening expressions such as ‘supremacists’ or ‘ethno-fascists’ are used to label certain individuals or groups […] On the economic front, odious rhetoric is directed against certain tribes that are depicted as ‘land thieves’ and ‘invaders.’ This worrying phenomenon can lead to uncontrollable acts of violence,” he said in a forum at the end of 2020.

Civility

Presented three years ago as the solution to these divisions, the CNPBM is struggling to break a cycle that has plunged the country into a climate of anxiety and where violence is ongoing. “We don’t feel the effects of this committee on the ground,” says Peter O., a resident of Yaoundé. “Since its members were installed, hate speech between communities has increased. Even the Anglophone crisis, which was at the origin of its creation, is still ongoing.”

No reforms, no sanctions

The controversy over the purchase of company cars, which tainted the institution in August 2018, is still fresh in many people’s minds. The revelations surrounding a public contract of 700m CFA francs – awarded by mutual agreement and intended for the purchase of 15 Toyota Prado V8 vehicles for members of the committee – had shocked public opinion.

However, according to several observers, the committee’s apparent inertia is above all due to its structure and prerogatives. “It is difficult to expect anything from such a consultative body. Resolving the socio-political crises that undermine the country is a matter of governance, but this commission does not have the power to implement reforms,” says Franck Essi, a consultant for the think tank Strategies Consulting Firm.

“Its members took part in the major national dialogue [held in early October 2019], but they had no decisive role in organising and facilitating discussions. Nor does the commission have the means to track down and punish the abuses observed in society.”

Criticism that CNPBM members reject, highlighting their contribution to the adoption of laws promoting official languages and on hate speech. “The committee is not in hibernation,” said Musonge. “We are doing conceptual work for the head of state. Sanctions are not a priority for the committee” said George Ngwane, one of its members. “The important thing is to push people to adopt good practices.”

Will this be enough? Only time will tell.

Culled from Africa Report

There is an African proverb that says that only a fool tests the depth of a river with both feet. Despite the availability of wisdom to help many in society, there is always a fool who, out of greed, will want to test the fury and frustration of a people impoverished and emasculated by corrupt authorities. The latest tragedy of a man attempting to rewrite history is a certain scum journalist who is vertically and horizontally challenged and goes by the name Ashu Nyenty. To seek relevance, political and career promotion, he took to Cameroon’s national broadcaster, CRTV, recently to insult the sensibilities of 25 million Cameroonians by uttering insulting flattery upon a public failure and a monument of embarrassment. Ashu Nyenty spewed that Paul Biya, a man responsible for running a prosperous nation to the ground, is a blessing to his people and Cameroonians are lucky to have him as their head of state.

In the video, which is now viral, Ashu Nyenty justified his qualifications as a half-baked clown on a national platform with a megaphone and nothing constructive to say. Because Ashu Nyenty only cares about himself and represents such falsehood and shameless political and career ambition at a time when the Butcher of Mvomeka is killing thousands of Southern Cameroonians, we, of the Cameroon Concord News Group will focus on his person. He must know that his sycophancy and disgracefully deranged support and flattery of a first-rate criminal is intolerable.

Cameroonians hardly suffer fools gladly and their reaction towards the Ashu Nyenty Comedy of helplessness speaks to the anger in many Cameroonian minds. The current anti-Ashu Nyenty alliance now in Cameroon is a remarkable testimony to his capacity to inspire revulsion from his words of dishonesty, absurdity, and flattery. He is a disgrace and has irresponsibly and purposefully put the lives of his family members in the county of Manyu in the Southern Cameroons at risk. Ashu Nyenty is also now an embarrassment to all GHS Mamfe alumni and he must be treated as such.

Even if one concedes Ashu’s right to free speech and opinion, one must marvel at his motive for such carelessness in act and repugnance in words considering he suffered the ignominy of being expelled from the University of Yaoundé for deception and delinquency. His subsequent mutation and reappearance at the University of Buea with an alteration to his name did not safe him as he was apprehended and expelled again. His deception, as witnessed in his now famous video, is not a fluke but a character flaw. His dismissal from The University of Buea was reported in the Weekly Post by Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai who is now Cameroon Concord News Group’s Editor-in-chief and Chairman.

Cameroonians are cursed to have such inept calamities passing as PhDs and journalists.  It is entirely clear that Ashu Nyenty possesses a questionable intellect and a warped mind. He counts his English during his boring shows on CRTV and presents with neither finesse nor  structure and has set the record for having videos on YouTube with less than 20 views after ten months.

Ashu Nyenty, one way or another, will go down in infamy as a man who took flattery to the gutters and septic tank of journalism for calling a dying diaper-wearing demagogue a blessing. If any doubts were left about Ashu Nyenty’s place of dishonour in history for his sightless surrogacy, they have now been erased. The video is an almost unimaginable buffoonery and inexcusable idiocy in insinuating that Cameroonians are blessed to have a stationary and brain-dead clown as their leader.

Many journalists and critics in Cameroon have all but abandoned their professional standards because the CPDM poison has spread far beyond their ability to ignore. Journalism and standards in public office and the truth in Cameroon are in intellectual and moral life support. Several distorted and stunted Anglophone comedians are holding briefs for the CPDM crime syndicate. They have popped up around Yaoundé and on social media in recent years, each seemingly more irritating than the other but this intellectual lilliputian called Ashu Nyenty is fast becoming the worst of them all.

Today, in what is meant to be a channel for candour and facts to the people of Cameroon, CRTV is a shameless public relations department of the CPDM crime syndicate. It is a dull caricature of twenty-first century broadcasting, characterised with mediocrity and rotten to the core with criminality, meaninglessness, and incompetence. Unfortunately, in a country where the best brains have been killed, are in prison or in exile, one must accept the reality that the chaffs are now running the show with astonishing ineptitude. And so, we are cursed with the Ashu Nyenty(s) of this world.

Media illiteracy in Cameroon is a huge problem but the media’s ability to inspire disgust by airing absurdity, falsehoods, CPDM nonsensical adulation is curiously astonishing. How many killings of Southern Cameroonians can people like Ashu Nyenty tolerate, excuse, and ignore? How much injury by Biya and his thugs to the Cameroon political space does he quantify and qualify as a blessing?

Cameroonians watched in disbelief and horror as the pint-sized so-called journalist inspired revulsion in his short video of feigned flattery of a monster whose own close collaborators agree in private that he is an abject failure. Calling his sickening utterances in the video intellectual and professional is grossly immoral and irresponsible.

Is his goal to speak truth to power or to flatter those in power? Is his goal to stand by the principles of the law he claims to have studied or to seek relevance and career promotion? A few hundred miles away in Accra and Abuja, journalists and the press are holding their respective governments responsible.  The Cameroon government has always been lucky that in a country where poverty has stripped nearly all its citizens of their dignity, honesty has been dumped into the latrines.

It is now painfully clear that Ashu Nyenty is seeking political favours within the high office of the CPDM crime syndicate, but he must heed the warning of Shakespeare that “this above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day”. Ola Rotimi wrote in The Gods are not to Blame “if crocodiles eat their own eggs, what would they do to the flesh of a frog?”. Let him look at the Kondengui Maximum Security Prison and reflect on those words.

It is not hard to understand why so many in the Cameroons have chosen not to go along with the CPDM’s core principles of theft, deception and flattery designed to keep a dying despot in office. Ashu Nyenty must know that a career that is complicit in undermining the values of integrity and academic uprightness does not mean much.

Unfortunately, Paul Biya refuses to accept the reality of his considerable failures and thrives on flattery and criminality. Ashu Nyenty must have been told this, so, human specimens like him are determined to create an alternate reality in which a war criminal and prolific embezzler is a blessing. 

The values of journalism and the law which he purports to represent are being undermined by Paul Biya and he will pay a steep price for his moment of madness in that video.

There are countless lessons to be learned here, including uncomfortable questions about the quality of education and persons delivered from universities in Cameroon and the place of integrity and honesty in Cameroon’s public life. Ashu  Nyenty has become a public irritant with a mind foolishly immature and incapable of sound intellectual judgment.

Ashu Nyenty’s unashamed audacity is made more painful and pathetic because this is the time Cameroon needs men and women with brains and integrity. For a man with a PhD attached to his name, he is an embarrassment. He has tested the depth of the dangerous waters of the Cameroons with both feet, the price for his ignorance, provocation and stupidity is huge and he would pay sooner rather than later.

By Isong Asu

London Bureau Chief

Cameroon Concord News Group

US President Joe Biden is aware that the Biya Francophone regime in Yaoundé has a history of reckless aggression against its own citizens and particularly the English speaking minority. Biden is also well informed of the Biya’s regime deep hatred for free speech, democracy and the rule of law and has for more than two decades helped French sponsored groups linked with French business interest to destabilize the Central African Republic.

We of the Concord News Group are of the opinion that US President Biden should begin his foreign policy project in Africa precisely in La Republique du Cameroun where an 87-year-old dictator is slaughtering his own citizens in great numbers.

President Biden should follow the George Bush example that brought freedom and dignity to the Iraqi people by issuing an ultimatum to Paul Biya and his gang of Beti Ewondo army generals to step aside within 48 hours or face military action.

A genocide being perpetuated by Mr Biya’s military is going on in the English part of the country now known as Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia. To stop it, the current US administration should be decisive. The level of barbarism by the Francophone dominated military and pro Cameroon government militias as they pursue their war and scorch earth policy to completely annihilate English speaking Cameroonians is alarming.

So far, as a result of the on-going Cameroon government military campaign in the English speaking regions, an estimated 20,000 people have been killed, over 280 towns and villages have been burnt down, over 120,000 people are seeking refuge in Nigeria and further afield, over 1million people are internally displaced or living in bushes and over 3,000 persons incarcerated in prisons and detention facilities. It is also reported that over 4.5. Million people are at risk of famine. One thing we know for sure is that Mr Biya and his military and private militia will be held accountable for these crimes.

Reacting to the sad situation in the former British Southern Cameroons, the Foreign Affairs Committee of the United States Congress introduced on 8 September 2020, Resolution 684 on the crisis in the Cameroonian regions of the North-West and South-West and was adopted on 1 January 2021.

Resolution 684 condemned the abuses committed by state security forces and armed groups in the northwest and southwest regions of Cameroon, and affirmed that the United States continues to hold the Government of Cameroon accountable for safeguarding the security and constitutional rights of all its citizens, regardless of region, religion, or political opinion. In addition, it urges all parties to the conflict in Cameroon, the Government of Cameroon, U.S. foreign relations entities, and members of the international community to take specific steps to resolve the ongoing civil conflict in Cameroon.

The U.S. Congress was also critical of France’s action in the conflict.  “…France maintains considerable interests in Cameroon, including significant economic and security cooperation, but has not sufficiently used its influence to stem atrocities committed in English-speaking regions or to support stronger international action to seek a resolution to the conflict,” Resolution 684 said.

While not exonerating Southern Cameroons Self-Defense Forces, Cameroon Concord News Group also know that Mr Biya’s government is doing everything through its private militia (popularly known as Atanga Nji Boys) to commit atrocities and link them to Southern Cameroons self-defense groups, so as to evoke international sympathy. Only an independent fact-finding mission can establish the facts and thus far, Mr. Biya’s government with French government support has resisted all requests by independent humanitarian organizations to visit English speaking Cameroon.

In passing resolution 684, the US Congress abundantly made the case for unleashing US forces against the regime in Yaoundé. Human Rights Watch confirmed that nothing has been heard from deportees that were transported by two known flights from the United States to Cameroon, on October 13 and November 11. The flights reportedly carried 57 and 37 Cameroonians respectively.   

All peaceful efforts to put an end to the crisis in the English-speaking region, which is now in its fifth year, have failed again and again and again because the international community is not dealing with peaceful men.

President Biden needs to tear down the apparatus of terror in Yaoundé that continues to kill, girls and women continue to be raped, villages continue to be burnt down, and a force of occupation continues to occupy and terrorizes a people for speaking the English language.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

On the very last day of President Donald Trump’s administration a polarised United States remains on edge over the prospect of election-related violence.

Domestically many are not just breathing a sigh of relief but screaming with happiness, and yet polls say 35% of the country believes he’s being ousted illegitimately. That illustrates just how polarising Trump has been here, and while many wonder if he’ll run for president in 2024 many others hope he is leaving public office permanently.

Trump seemed to combine Barack Obama’s skill in manipulating the media, George W. Bush’s readiness to provoke international hatred, Bill Clinton’s ability to disregard the truth and Ronald Reagan’s jingoism. He was routinely and credibly accused of conduct which degraded public service, of re-legitimising American White supremacy, of intentionally provoking societal rifts and much, much more.

Trump’s ascension provoked the greatest burst of political activity and independent journalism in the US in 50 years. Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, the importance of voting and other progressive movements seem to be in direct response to Trump’s regular use of sexism, racism, jingoism and elitism.

Internationally Trump took America’s post-9/11 “you’re either with us or against us” worldview to a new extreme. He illegally tore up international agreements, banned travel from seven mostly-Muslim countries and antagonised longtime US allies.

Trump, who switched his party affiliation five times, has successfully reshaped the Republican Party. He was the first 21st century mainstream politician to be openly anti-free trade, to voice opposition to America’s “endless wars”, to admit the national decline of the US since the Great Recession, to bring attention to the role of a “Deep State” in the US and to openly question the integrity of the nation’s corporate-dominated media.

The Trump era was truly unlike any other. His legacy will be debated, but his detractors are innumerable, intense and international.

Culled from Presstv

The killings in Southern Cameroons will not be ending anytime soon, especially as all the factions involved are determined to win on the battlefield though many experts have clearly indicated a military victory will never be possible.

For its part, the government has intensified its military efforts in the two English-speaking regions in the hope that by winning the war in those regions, it could focus on other insurgencies in the northern and eastern parts of the country.

As the world turns its focus on the Trump-orchestrated drama in Washington DC, the Yaoundé government is taking advantage of the confusion to commit heinous human rights violations in the country’s two English-speaking regions.

On Sunday, government army soldiers descended on Mautu in Muyuka in the country’s Southwest region where it gunned down some ten innocent civilians, most of whom are women and children.

Donald Trump’s political miscalculations in the United States are empowering many dictators across the globe and this is very likely to result in devastating human rights abuses in countries such as Cameroon.

The government human rights abuses are on the rise in Cameroon and with the confusion in Southern Cameroons intensifying, army soldiers are killing civilians with impunity.

The government has a lot on its hands and its frustrations are mounting by the day. Besides the crisis in Southern Cameroons, Boko Haram is wreaking havoc in the country’s northern region where hundreds of soldiers and civilians were slaughtered last week.

But it is in the Eastern region that a huge storm is brewing. Russians are determined to elbow the French out of the Central African Republic where a French-sponsored civil war is spreading death and destruction in the country.

The fighting in the Central African country is gradually spreading to Cameroon and there is growing fear that the Russians might come to Cameroon to destabilize the corrupt Yaounde government.

Last week, Cameroon’s 87-year-old president, Paul Biya, had to dispatch the Secretary General at the Presidency, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, to Equatorial Guinea to plead with Equatorial  Guinea’s president to help secure the border between the two countries, an action which clearly highlights the fear ripping the government apart.

But it is not only the government that is committing abuses. Ambazonian fighters are also guilty of heinous crimes which must be condemned by the international community.

Yesterday, the principal of Government High School Ossing in the Southwest region, Mr. Ayuk Martin, was killed by reckless and trigger-happy boys.

Though the principal is being accused of betrayal and collaboration with the government, many observers in the war-torn regions point out that nothing can justify the killing of another human being. Such killings have been counter-productive and they have given the revolution a very bad name.

Also, another principal was shot in Tinto, a town some 50 km from Mamfe. The principal was shot in the leg and is now recovering in a local hospital.

But a manager with PAMOL, a state-owned oil-producing business in Ndian Division of the Southwest region of the country was killed on Sunday for cooperating with the government. Some workers of the institution were also amputated, an act which has generated swift and open condemnation.

Last week was indeed a disaster to the country’s military. The same insurgents attacked and killed three soldiers returning from a mission in Njikwa, Momo Division in the Northwest region with the Senior Divisional Officer (SDO). The Momo Divisional delegate of Communication was also murdered and she was the only civilian killed in the ambush. The SDO, who was the target of the ambush, survived and he is currently thanking his lucky stars.

Similarly, another ambush at Matazen checkpoint in the Northwest region brought down more than five gendarmes and three civilians last Friday, making the week one of the bloodiest for Cameroon’s military.

From every indication, if the international community does not step in, the killings in Southern Cameroons might not end, especially as some military and government officials are making huge proceeds from the confusion playing out in Southern Cameroons.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Interim Government Statement; Three years since NERA10 abduction

On this day three years ago, French Cameroun and Nigerian authorities engaged in an unacceptable violation of human rights and international law. Secret Service and military personnel of both nations interrupted a meeting chaired by President SisikuAyukTabe, the leader of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, and abducted him with eleven members of his cabinet from the NERA hotel in Abuja. Our leaders were held incommunicado for 21 days in Nigeria before they were transferred to Yaoundé where they have all been sentenced to life by a military court.

Since the abduction of our leaders, the Federal High Court in Abuja, Nigeria denounced the act as “illegal and unconstitutional”. The Nigerian judge said that irrespective of whether the Southern Cameroons leaders posed a threat to the Nigerian state or not, the Federal Government did not follow due process and thus violated both the Nigerian constitution and articles 32 and 33 of the UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees. Observing that their human rights were violated, Justice Chikere ordered their return to Nigeria. He also decided that the government should pay compensation of ₦5 million each to the 12 and ₦200 000 each to the 39 other deportees.

The US Senate Resolution 684 published on 01 January 2021 must give the Southern Cameroons hope. The Resolution was unambiguous in illustrating the crimes of the regime in Yaoundé and for the first time threatened sanctions against senior members of the Biya French Cameroun regime.

The abduction of our leaders was intended to stifle the Ambazonian struggle but it has instead galvanized a great movement. 05 January 2018 remains a day that French Cameroun committed a costly political error, and we the people of Southern Cameroons must continue to make the French vassal state of French Cameroun pay for its astonishingly low sense of judgment and ruthlessness.

As French Cameroun continues to illegally confine our leaders, we must make sure that the plight of His Excellency President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and his top aides including the thousands of Southern Cameroonians currently being held in French Cameroun detention centers is articulated forcefully and accurately. The French Cameroun ruling CPDM crime syndicate in Yaoundé might ignore us for now, but the fact remains that freedom of the Southern Cameroons will be a reality. The so-called one and indivisible Cameroun is now a myth.  Yaoundé will not know peace until we are a free people.

Thousands of innocent Southern Cameroons’ lives have been lost ever since the abduction. So, today is indeed a day of sadness for every Ambazonian. As your Vice President, I am therefore calling on all the people of Southern Cameroons to put our leaders in prayer and keep the faith that, in not too distant a future, we shall overcome.

Thank You,

Dabney Yerima

Vice President

Federal Republic of Ambazonia

State of the Nation Address

Repositioning the Ambazonian Revolution

Happy New Year 2021 to all the people of the Southern Cameroons (Ambazonia). We are mindful of the difficulties that many of you are enduring back in the forests, the burnt-down villages, the deserted towns in Ambazonia, the refugee camps in Nigeria, and the strange and hostile communities in French Cameroun. We are mindful of all the families that have lost loved ones over the last four years due to the brutality of the French Cameroun regime. The thoughts and prayers of the Interim Government of Ambazonia are with you and your families at this challenging time.

Today January 3, 2021, is two days away from the 3rd anniversary of the abduction of our leader President Julius Ayuk Tabe, and 11 of his associates at the NERA Hotel in Nigeria in a flagrant disregard of international law. To our leaders in detention, our restoration forces, and all our fallen heroes, I say your sacrifice to our nation shall never be forgotten.

On 11 February 1961, our forebears were lured into a bungled decolonization process by Great Britain and the United Nations. On 1 October 2017, after 56 years of subjugation and abuse, we, the people of Southern Cameroons, under the leadership of President Julius Ayuk Tabe, made a bold step to take our destiny into our hands. This decision was met with a declaration of war from the President of Cameroun Republique on 30November 2017. Since that declaration, more than 10,000 of our citizens have been executed, over one million have been internally displaced, 120,000 are refugees in Nigeria, Ghana and the Mexico border, and 550 of our villages have been burnt down.

2020 was a challenging year. The coronavirus pandemic, Ngarbuh Massacre of 24 women and children in February by French Cameroun military, the torture, and murder of Journalist Samuel Wazizi whilst in detention in June, the beheading of Comfort Tumassang in Muyuka in August by French Cameroun militia, the October execution of seven schoolchildren in Kumba- a diabolic crime organized by the colonial SDO of Meme, the December outbreak of xenophobic violence in Fako County sponsored by rogue chief Monja Monja, were some of the low points of a gloomy year.

The question in front of our nation during our lifetime is one of independence or extinction. French Cameroun’s continuous movement of armed men, militias, and heavy weapons of war into our territory is an obvious statement of intent. Are armies, guns, and bombs needed in our villages and towns if Mr. Biya had reconciliation in mind? Are we unwilling to be reconciled that brutality and murder must be employed to win back our love? Let us not delude ourselves, these actions from Yaoundé are the instruments of war. And it is a war that if our enemy wins, our subjugation is ensured forever.

Many of you have been advocating peace and a return to the status quo. It is natural to shut out reality and indulge in illusions of optimism. One of the best ways to judge the future is by looking at the past. Looking at the past 59 years, what gives anyone any hope that French Cameroun would be able to engage in constructive discussions towards a peaceful resolution of our struggle? The regime in Yaoundé knows not peace and dialogue. Its currency is violence.

Where it is safe to do so, the Interim Government is advocating for community schooling whilst the new Secretary of state for the Department of Education will work with international partners to facilitate schooling on online educational platforms and international communities where possible.

Chiefs and Fons must know that they remain the traditional fathers of our nation and must avoid being political footballs of our enemy. As traditional leaders, Fons and Chiefs have a special standing in the Ambazonian structure. Consequently, they must now stand with their people. Many traditional rulers did not take part in the regional elections, and on behalf of the nation, I want to thank them for their wisdom and courage.

This week, President Paul Biya of French Cameroon in his speech to his nation, spoke of the Republic of Cameroun, thus confirming to the world that we are two separate nations.  Let us rise this year with greater readiness and stand with greater determination to confirm our freedom. With regards to the forthcoming Africa Cup of Nations, Ambazonia Intelligence Service (AIS) has briefed the Interim Government on sophisticated new strategies that would be employed to defend our national interest. We have informed French Cameroun and nations participating in this tournament that any attempt to bring its activities to Ambazonia would be considered a deliberate violation of our sovereignty, and our response will be prompt and definite. 

Today, I will be announcing a bold and ambitious program to deliver our freedom. We intend to restore security and confidence to our communities. If there is one message that comes through loud and clear over the last three years, it is that the overwhelming majority of Ambazonians are in support of this struggle. This plan re-strategizes and refocuses our struggle with clear actionable and achievable goals in 2021. This plan will focus on Defense, Diplomacy, Humanitarian, Finance, and Communication. Details of this plan will be made available in hard copies.

DEFENCE

The Responsibility to Protect populations from genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing has emerged as an important global principle since its unanimous adoption at the UN World Summit in 2005.This Interim Government from this day of 2021, will be rolling out an innovative and dynamic plan to ruthlessly adhere to its Responsibility to Protect (R2P) Ambazonia.

We would be bold and resolute in taking our territory by launching OPERATION CAPHOT aka THE BIG RUBBER GUN. This operation specifically provides equipment and prepares our Restoration Forces for the next phase of this revolution. The Interim Government will build the necessary capacity through training and supply of sophisticated equipment to our Restoration Forces to reclaim, defend our territory, and protect our population.

DIPLOMACY

The Interim Government must continue efforts to establish concrete diplomatic breakthroughs with friendly and sympathetic governments. On Friday, 1 January 2021, US Senate Resolution 684 was passed calling on the government of La Republique du Cameroun to respect human rights and pursue genuinely inclusive dialogue towards ending the crisis between our nations. The Resolution was robust and a move in the right direction. We shall continue to explore all diplomatic tools available to us over the next twelve months. I want to register my appreciation to our comrades in the US who worked tirelessly to get this resolution to the Senate floor.

HUMANITARIAN

To focus and bring international awareness to the plight of our refugees, we have decided to create a separate humanitarian organization to coordinate with all private humanitarian initiatives for maximum impact. I am announcing the creation of the REKINDLE HOPE OUTREACH to engage the international donor community. The Interim Government can now state without equivocation that the plight of our refugees will be on the front pages and editorial boards of mainstream media in 2021.

DEPARTMENT OF HOME AFFAIRS

The Department of Home Affairs has worked on advancing our cause by developing Data Management Portals. The CR20 – Ambazonia Citizen Registration and Census Portal aims to present Ambazonians with a user-friendly system to capture and manage the data of Ambazonians across the globe in preparation for a possible referendum. The AR21 – Ambazonia Refugee Portal has been developed to manage the records of refugees and IDPs on G0, G1, G2. The system will enhance the work of our leadership and promote the operations of civil society organizations operating in these communities to give our refugees and IDPs the dignity they deserve.

FINANCE

We have worked hard to re-establish trust with credible institutions like the Bank of Ambazonia. The Chairman of the Transitional Restoration Council announced last year that a group of patriotic Ambazonians agreed to fund a complete and independent audit of the Ambazonian Foundation and Ambazonia Consulting Inc, two organizations that were responsible for mobilizing funds since the creation of the Interim Government.

The IG, in compliance with that audit request, ordered the Secretary of State for Economy and Finance to release all the information and documents necessary to facilitate and complete this process. Mr. Tabenyang Etchu has complied and submitted all the documents and is reporting to the independent auditor. I will call on all those who were involved with these two organizations to comply with the independent auditor so we can have closure on this matter that undermined trust in our structure.

The killing of our people has not stopped because of the mismanagement of prior resources. We must continue funding the prosecution of our fight for independence. The launching of OPERATION CAPHOT and the strengthening of our payment platforms will mark a new beginning backed by thorough accountability of the funds that will be raised. We respect those who want to remain anonymous and will provide secure channels for them to continue funding the revolution. To our most loyal and committed donors, we say thank you and promise to get it right as we have learned from the past.

COMMUNICATIONS

The Interim Government has decided to bring in an external professional firm with a global presence in 2021. I am excited to announce to you that, we have engaged the Services of a Media Relations PRfirm to work with us and improve our visibility in the global mainstream media.

INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY

The Southern Cameroons (Ambazonia) is 45 000 sq km and has an estimated population of eight million people. It is bounded to the west and north by Nigeria, to the east by Cameroun, and to the south by Equatorial Guinea. This erstwhile UN Trust Territory under UK administration is the aggrieved victim of a bungled decolonization by the UN and the UK.

As a direct consequence of that incomplete decolonization, the Southern Cameroons finds itself under colonial annexation, occupation, oppression, spoliation, and a war of extermination by the adjacent French vassal state of Cameroun. This humiliation and indignity are unacceptable. The decolonization of the Southern Cameroons must be completed by the UN and the UK as a matter of international law and obligation. Decolonization is the only alternative to colonization.

The objective of the ongoing national liberation struggle of the people of the Southern Cameroons, under Cameroun’s hideous and ravaging colonial occupation and exploitation, is clear. The objective is to take back control of their territory, their lives, and their destiny.

Anything else that apologists of colonialism, propagandists, and conspirators may say is nothing but deceit, intoxication, and distortion.  If there is one permanent thing in human society, it is change. The Southern Cameroons Incomplete Decolonisation Question is not the inconsequential matter of marginalization, deprivation, neglect, or patronage sinecures. It is a political question. It is a fundamental issue that concerns the very existence of a people, their survival, their sovereignty, their territory, their identity, their dignity, and their humanity. Colonial annexation and occupation, like apartheid, cannot be reformed. It cannot be endured in whatever guise it is camouflaged. It can only be eliminated.

To end the consequences of colonial annexation and occupation, a subjugated people must first seek the political kingdom, turn the annexation inside out and take absolute control of their own state of affairs and shape their destiny. No subjugated people anywhere in the world have ever enjoyed freedom and the benefits of development. No people, not even animals, willfully subject themselves to extinction. The purpose of the plebiscite was not to procure the extinction of the Southern Cameroons through a transfer of the trust territory to Cameroun Republic, itself a trust territory barely decolonised twelve months earlier, or to any other country.

There is no warrant for that under international law. The plebiscite was primarily a vote for independence (that is, freedom from UK rule and UN international tutelage), and secondarily, a vote for federal political association with Cameroun. The territory of the Southern Cameroons was to be politically linked to the territory of Cameroun but not to become part of the territory of Cameroun. The federal political association involved the linking of the two federated states (the Southern Cameroons/West Cameroon, and Cameroun Republic/East Cameroun) at the level of the Federal Government, and not one federated state absorbing the other.  In legal terms, the Federation involved a dovetailing rather than a supersession of legal orders.

The restoration of the independence and statehood of the Southern Cameroons is legitimate and consistent with international law.  Any person, state, or organisation propagating the colonial apology and falsehood that the territory of the Southern Cameroons is part of the territory of Cameroun is hereby challenged to exhibit to the world at large the legal instrument by which Cameroun purportedly acquired title to the territory of the Southern Cameroons, when and how it did it. It is the historic duty of the people of the Southern Cameroons to leave a rich legacy for their descendants. 

No nation is born great. It is the citizens who through diligence, hard work, creativity, innovation and inventiveness, and patriotism make their nation great. All free nations and free peoples of the world are governed under a democratic constitution that they have framed and given to themselves.

TO THE PEOPLE OF LRC

Our peace is your peace and prosperity. There will be no tranquility in French Cameroun until the Southern Cameroons is free. Our quest for freedom will continue to shake the foundations of your homeland until justice emerges for our nation. Your government must commit to peace between our two nations and it must find a way to work with the constituted authority of Ambazonia.

The move that was made by the regime in Yaoundé in July 2020 by engaging with President Ayuk Tabe and other leaders in detention was commendable and a step in the right direction. We shall never negotiate out of fear but never fear to negotiate. States are made legitimate by people and the domination of La Republique du Cameroun over the Southern Cameroons ended on 1 October 2017.  As a people, we have the right to freely determine our international status and we reject the notion of returning to the status quo. 

DIASPORA

Fellow Southern Cameroonians in the diaspora, Millions of people have put their faith in the Interim Government and support our President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe, and his vision for our nation. We cannot afford to let them down. We have become the prey of a hostile nation, but we must remain masters of our own house. United, there is little we cannot do. Divided, there is little we can do. Our Defense and Intelligence community ask only for your dedication and funds. If our self-defense forces are to succeed, it is vital that their equipment and training are the best. That is why we are moving ahead with OPERATION CAPHOT aka THE BIG RUBBER GUN

The last three years have exposed the incompetence in Yaoundé. It will take more than platitudes from Yaoundé to erase the memory of years of neo-colonial vandalism and genocide upon our people. That is why we did not engage in their so-called HD initiative. Many of us were born in hardship and abuse but have been groomed in civility. We are proud of our roots and are unwilling to accept subjugation anymore. Let the regime in Yaoundé and France know that we shall pay any price and meet any hardship to succeed. This much, the diaspora must pledge.

Fellow Ambazonians, this war for independence is worth it. In the end, we intend to build a Southern Cameroons where children are given a chance to reach their full potential irrespective of their background. A prosperous and peace-loving nation is our goal. That is the future and vision that our leader Sisiku Ayuk Tabe has. I am humbled by the support that millions of Southern Cameroonians have placed in the Interim Government at this challenging moment.

If we in this generation, cannot deliver freedom for our nation, we all would be guilty of betrayal. Now the trumpet summons us again as a call to donate financially and sacrifice our energy to this struggle against tyranny and oppression.

In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the opportunity of achieving freedom. Let us welcome this responsibility rather than shrink from it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other generation.

My Fellow Ambazonians, your time to deliver freedom is now. I am ready. Are you ready?

If you are, come with me on this journey of Operation CAPHOT and Operation REKINDLE HOPE OUTREACH.

Stay safe during this pandemic.

God bless you.

God bless the Federal Republic of Ambazonia

Vice President

Dabney Yerima

Dear readers, correspondents, members and volunteers,

Another year ends today and a new one starts tomorrow. This year has been particularly challenging, but we have demonstrated the stuff we are made of.

The Novel Coronavirus also known as COVID-19 has been a huge millstone around our necks. It has not only interfered with your news platform of choice, it has also made it hard for us to obtain all the funding necessary for our operations.

However, despite the challenging times, we have used our shoestring budget to deliver to you, in real time, the news that has enabled you to have a balanced perspective of the unfortunate situations that have been playing out in our country, Cameroon.

Cameroon is faced with many challenges and most of the challenges are derived from the incompetence of our country’s authorities.

Their lack of humility and corruption has pushed our country to the brink. A once prosperous nation has been pushed to the abyss of poverty by a bunch of incompetent and corrupt individuals.

For a country to develop and avoid certain messy circumstances, its authorities must be willing to listen to the people, they must establish a good relationship with the grassroots and they demonstrate the determination necessary to address the issues in a manner that will bring total satisfaction to the majority of the population.

As you all know, the Southern Cameroons crisis is born out of the arrogance of our country’s (mis) leaders. In the process, some 6,000 Southern Cameroonians have been sent to an early grave while more than 2,000 soldiers have lost their lives.

Sources close to the country’s defense ministry say some 1,000 soldiers have either defected or walked away from the country’s military because they do not believe they must die for a man and a system that clearly belong to the past.

That tells you how things are gradually bottoming out in our country. The ministry of defense cannot account for such disappearances and instead of consoling the families affected by the chaos the government has created, it is instead threatening the families of the missing soldiers with imprisonment. That is your country. That is the place you call home. Homeland has become gangland.

In a few hours’ time, the country’s misleader and liar-in-chief, Paul Biya, will be addressing the nation again and his traditional speech will be replete with lies.

He will be telling you how the economy is at its best even when hundreds of thousands of our graduates are unemployed, with thousands seeking to quit the country for greener pastures in distant lands.

He will also mislead you on the state of our democracy by pointing to the pre-fabricated regional election results which he will consider as a mark of “Advanced Democracy “making significant progress. The recent elections should not be taken seriously. They do not deserve your time and attention. It is one more piece of evidence that Biya is not ready to change his old, bad and corrupt ways.

Don’t be fooled by those misleading stories. The elections were designed to ensure that the crime syndicate that has been ruling the country for close to four decades continues to lead you by the nose.

The liar-in-chief is simply seeking to perpetuate himself in power, but know that all what he will be spewing out will simply be the ravings of a falling king.

Cameroon will change and it will change in a big bad way in the coming days. The Russians are in the region and they are determined to change the geopolitical equation.

They are gradually rolling back the French and it is obvious that Cameroon will be the next after the Central African Republic.

Russia needs a foothold in the region and Southern Cameroonians are prepared to facilitate things for them so that they can reach the heartland of our country.

All you need to do is to keep on supporting the Southern Cameroons Interim government under the stewardship of Vice President Dabney Yerima. You must continue to mount pressure on the Yaoundé government until our president, Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe, and all the other Southern Cameroonians being held in East Cameroonian jails are set free.

Never forget that these people are in jail because they want a better Southern Cameroons. We should never forget people like Mancho Bibixy and Tassang Wilfred.

While we may disagree on the approach, we must understand that the objective is the same – making Southern Cameroons great again.

Please continue to do your part and the Cameroon Concord News Group will do its own.

Long live the Cameroon Concord News Group.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai on behalf of the Group and Board of Directors

Cameroon Concord News and Cameroon Intelligence Report

The Southern Cameroons Crisis is now in its fourth year and showing no signs of ending!! Thousands of Southern Cameroonians including women and children have died since President Biya declared his war against the English speaking people of British Southern Cameroons.

More than a quarter of the Southern Cameroons population has fled their homes. Of these, 70,000 are refugees in neighbouring Nigeria.

Even though bloodshed has receded in intensity over the last few months, violence between Cameroon government army soldiers and Ambazonia Restoration Forces remains chronic. Southern Cameroons Self Defense groups loyal to Vice President Dabney Yerima and the Ambazonia Interim Government hold sway over two-thirds of Southern Cameroons territory.

In keeping the two Cameroons together, Biya is not a cure; Biya has never been a cure. Biya was never going to be a cure. In the words of Cameroon Concord News Group London Bureau Chief Isong Asu, Biya was a French virus injected to make the peoples of the two Cameroons sick.

In this last edition of the 2020 AGBAW-EBAI DEBATE, we are asking our readers to make known their positions to the world on this very important issue:

DO YOU THINK SOUTHERN CAMEROONS SHOULD PRODUCE THE NEXT PRESIDENT IN LA REPUBLIQUE DU CAMEROUN?

In the concept of how states came into being, there is a theory of roving and stationary bandits. Whilst roving bandits stole and left, stationary bandits, stayed on by establishing a system to collect taxes which funded their criminal activities and lifestyle.  In today’s world, the curse of stationary bandits is still a sad reality. These stationary bandits have designated territories with internationally recognized borders. They have an established defense force, police force, and a system to collect taxes from their victims/citizens. From the outside, it is easy to erroneously assume that it is a functioning nation-state where all citizens are ripping the benefits that come with living beyond the state of nature. One of the most notorious of these 21st century stationary bandits is the world’s oldest dictator, Paul Biya of Cameroon.  

Cameroon is a nation in the Gulf of Guinea with a population of over 25 million according to the country’s 2018 census. It has been ruled with an iron fist by 87-year-old Paul Biya since 1982. The country is blessed with enormous natural resources but has been plagued by “Dutch disease” for over four decades. “Dutch disease” is when good news for one sector of the economy, such as the discovery of natural resources, results in a negative impact on the country’s overall economy. La Republique du Cameroun (to use the country’s real name) is notorious in international circles for constantly extending deep begging bowls to international organizations like the World Bank and IMF. Internationally, the country has been noted for being one of the most mismanaged and its annual budget is hugely dependent on foreign aid.

The country is bedevilled with extreme poverty, high child mortality, a non-existent health care system, extremely poor infrastructure, an appallingly inefficient public sector, a pathetic tax system, a fantastically corrupt police force, a brutal and repressive military, a war in the north against Boko Haram and a war in the south against Ambazonian separatists. Political commentators would not be far off the mark if they referred to La Republique du Cameroun as another basket case in a continent of many basket cases. La Republique du Cameroun is indeed the most corrupt nation in the world (See Transparency International).

Paul Biya took over in 1982 in a peaceful transfer of power. He has never won an election. He has never had a mandate from the people despite clinging on to power for four decades. His legacy is one of repression, economic mismanagement, and incompetence. A common assertion from those who know him is that he tends to agree with the last person who spoke to him. Over the last few years, as age is taking its toll on him, the person who spends more time with him now is his wife. As the “last person” to always speak to him these days, she is wielding considerable power in Yaoundé. This is a huge worry as she is ill-equipped to run a grocery shop.

The coronavirus pandemic has been a fantastic time for Mr.Biya and his acolytes. The IMF and World Bank have released emergency funds to facilitate his criminal pursuits against his people. On 21 October 2020, the IMF Country Report No. 20/294 on Cameroon read “The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) today approved a disbursement of about US$ 156 million, 40 percent of quota) under the Rapid Credit Facility (RCF). This is the second emergency disbursement to the country since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, bringing total IMF emergency support since the outbreak of the pandemic to about US$ 382 million, 100 percent of quota). The new emergency disbursement will help Cameroon meet its urgent balance of payments and fiscal needs.”

The IMF statement went on to state that “the authorities have been proactive in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic and are stepping up their efforts to contain the spread of the disease, boost health and social protection spending, and provide temporary support to affected businesses and households.” The local population has benefited from less than 1% of these funds from the IMF and other international organisations. Defense spending has been shamelessly bolstered to crush political opposition and millions of dollars have been directed to private bank accounts in Europe and other tax havens. Many dreadfully impoverished villages received single 20 litre plastic buckets, a few hand-sanitizers, and half a dozen bars of soaps as contributions from the head of state to help fight the pandemic.

The gulf between the poor and Paul Biya’s loyalists is appallingly immoral. Poverty and inflation are rife and the country’s leaders are clueless about what to do. With regards to creating an effective tax system, a manufacturing economy to wind Cameroon off IMF and World Bank loans, Mr. Biya has done zilch. He has no incentive to reform his country if the IMF and the World Bank are available to offer long term loans.  When it comes to human rights, he knows that France will shield him from international condemnation, so he has been prolific at perpetrating abuse against political opponents. 

Power without responsibility has been Paul Biya’s motto. A common excuse from his aids and apologists is that he is a good man but the people around him failed him. The principal prison in Kondengui, Yaoundé is packed with ex-ministers, amongst them ex-defense minister, Edgard Alain Mebe Ngo’o, former secretary-general at the presidency, Marafa Hamidou Yaya, and former Prime Minister, Ephraim Inoni. The list is extensive and shocking. He has shamelessly concentrated power around himself and political opponents are eliminated or imprisoned under dubious charges. A former senior member of the CPDM, his ruling party, opined recently to Cameroon Concord News Group that “the curse of our generation is that he was president during our lives.”

According to Amnesty International in a statement published on 9 December 2020, “The arrests, arbitrary detentions, and prosecutions in military courts of opposition members who were peacefully gathering are the latest example of Cameroonian authorities’ crackdown on dissenting voices since late September, Amnesty International said today.” These arrests are the tip of the iceberg. Cameroon probably has more political prisoners than North Korea. The prisons in all the regions of the country are packed with political prisoners while the corridors of power are littered with looters.

Mr.Biya somehow forgot that the gods always punish arrogance. The Ambazonian war was commissioned by the gods to expose all his flaws. Few of his strengths have been demonstrated over the last 38 years but all his weaknesses have been exposed over the last three. A man who spent his life ducking from making decisions to advance his nation has suddenly been confronted with a war against determined Ambazonians. Over the last three years, his monopoly of violence over the territory he claims to rule has been challenged by Ambazonian separatists who are giving him sleepless nights.

Anyone familiar with him knows that he is sneaky, lazy, and vindictive. It is worth asking how a man so patently unqualified for leadership managed to capture a nation for almost four decades. How can it be that in the twenty-first century, one man could be allowed to wreck so many dreams and lives? Today is 24 December 2020 and as Cameroon Concord pen these words, the thought keeps coming to us that he has contributed nothing to Cameroon except misery and embarrassment. His legacy is certain. A prominent and successful FAILURE!!!

Paul Biya, a 21st-century stationary bandit has a choice to make in 2021, he can continue to heap misery on his people with state brutality, embezzlement, and poverty or he can summon the courage and exit the stage so his country can start the long and painful recovery.

By Isong Asu

London Bureau Chief