Headline News

25, January 2017

Nigeria: Boko Haram using babies to thwart detection ⁰

Nigerian authorities have warned that female Takfiri bombers are using babies to thwart detection before their attacks. According to a new report, Nigerian officials stated that terrorist groups have been using women to carry out bombing attacks for some time but the use of babies in attacks signals a “dangerous” trend.

The report, published by the state-run BBC on Monday, called these bombings “suicide attacks,” but the fact that the innocent infants have no forethought or deliberation for killing themselves and others render the terminology null and void. On January 13, two women wearing concealed explosives managed to slip past a checkpoint in the town of Madagali and detonate their bombs, killing themselves and four other people. The assailants were able to slip past security because they were mistaken for civilians as they were carrying infants.

The main suspect for the blast is the Takfiri Boko Haram terrorist group, which is known for using women and young girls in their attacks. Boko Haram has pledged allegiance to Daesh, another Takfiri group, which has been wreaking havoc in the Middle East and North Africa over the past few years. In 2015, four women attempted to launch another attack on the town. Two were stopped at a checkpoint, but the two other, who were carrying babies, managed to pass the checkpoints and explode their explosives.

Nigeria has been at war with Boko Haram since the group started an insurgency in Borno about eight years ago. Almost 15,000 people have been killed while the violence has displaced more than two million. In recent months, army troops and civilian fighters in Nigeria have managed to foil many bomb attacks involving terrorists wearing explosive vests before the assailants were able to reach heavily-populated targets and detonate their bombs of their own accord. In response to the government’s actions, the terrorists have increased their bombing attacks.

On January 16, at least four people, including a university professor, were killed after a young girl, accompanied by a small child, detonated her explosive-laden vest at a university campus in Nigeria’s northeastern province of Borno. Meanwhile, the UN’s West African humanitarian coordinator, Toby Lanzer announced that Boko Haram’s actions in the region have put the lives of over half a million children in danger of severe malnutrition.

He stressed that if these children do not receive aid soon, they will die, adding that several communities have already lost all their infants. “If they don’t get the help they need on time, they die.” “What we have seen is extraordinary…I have seen adults sapped of all energy, who are almost unable to walk. We have had villages and towns devoid of 2- and 3- and 4-year-old children because they’ve died,” he added.

While noting that Nigeria and the Lake Chad region have been hit worst by the crisis, he stressed that there are about 11 million people there are “in desperate need” of aid while some 7.1 million more of them are “severely food-insecure.”

Presstv

24, January 2017

Anglophone Uprising: Consortium announces plans to destroy the 11th February ancestral and diabolical link ¹

The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium has made a public assessment of the strike action currently going on in British Southern Cameroons. The West Cameroon body says the struggle against Francophone marginalization and the restoration of the sate of Southern Cameroons is a winning struggle bigger than any individual.

In a statement issued from the Consortium’s European headquarters, the interim leaders opined that there is no easy walk to freedom. “Threats will come, good friends will fall off, families will be discouraged but the restoration of West Cameroon statehood is bigger than any of us.”

The leaders also called on Southern Cameroonians to remain steadfast and defiant. ‘Don’t allow any threats, friends or family deviate you from reaching our collective goal. If this happens, pluck it/them off. This is a liberation struggle and not a democratic process.”

The leaders further pointed out that in a struggle there is no second opinion. “You are either with us for the restoration of West Cameroon statehood or you are against.” The leaders expressed satisfaction and praised West Cameroonians for rallying behind the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium to get back their country. The Consortium press release reaffirmed that the civil disobedience campaign will continue for a month and will hold every Mondays and Tuesdays to send a strong message to the colonial government.

Correspondingly, schools will remain closed until all Southern Cameroonian citizens arrested are released unconditionally for genuine dialogue to take place. Southern Cameroonians have also been reminded that anyone going against the struggle will be considered a black leg and a traitor and will be treated as such.

The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium has declared 11^th of February a black day and the leaders say Southern Cameroonians should be preparing to stage the biggest boycott and ghost town in its history to finally destroy the ancestral link our parents added unto us by the fake union with La Republique.

Sonne Peter

24, January 2017

Consortium rubbishes Biya’s national commission to promote bilingualism ¹

The two interim leaders of the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium, CACSC, have rejected the National Commission to promote Bilingualism created by presidential decree saying it is an attempt to rubbish the integrity and legitimacy of “ongoing winning West Cameroon Struggle”

The interim leaders, Tapang Ivo Tanku and Mark Bara said, “By every logical implication, the decree is of bad faith. It is a lame walk to promote equality in the use of English and French languages and showcase the numerous cultures he seeks to present to his commission.”

According to a release of the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium which has gone viral on social media, the problem of an Anglophone has never been language but marginalization in areas like ENAM, ENS, EMIA, ENSET, CUSS and recently CENAJES in Bamenda where only two Anglophones were admitted in 132 candidates.

To the leaders, creating another Commission will just add to numerous others which have never worked, they cited CONAC which according to them has been a wasted body because even those who have embezzled are promoted the next day. They also said until the banned Consortium leaders are released ghost town will continue till February 23, 2017.

Cameroun Info.Net

24, January 2017

PAUL BIYA’S COMMISSION ON BILINGUALISM: THE END TIMES OF A FAILED UNION ¹

The non-respect of the bilingual, bijural and bicultural character of Cameroon presented by the Anglophone Consortium of Civil Society associations was one among a plethora proofs that a supposed union that was contemplated in 1961 between the Southern Cameroons and the Republic of Cameroun had failed. The Consortium in taking this position was merely conveying the position of a majority of the people of the Southern Cameroons who alone voted in a plebiscite to attain independence by joining the Republic of Cameroun in Federal Union founded on the equality of the two states.

Whereas the non-violability of the federal character of the country was enshrined in article 47 of the supposed federal constitution, other provisions of the constitutions protected the bijural, bicultural and bilingual nature of the federation; re-enforcing the sacrosanct character of this inviolability clause. History will hold Babatoura Ahmadou Ahidjo and Paul Biya responsible for their treasonable conduct in destroying this fundamental basis on which this experiment was anchored.

Southern Cameroonians are justified in holding firmly that with the collapse of the purported federation, the bilingual, bijural and bicultural character of the country, and a return in 1984 of East Cameroon to its name and identity at independence on January 1960, the putative union was dead. They were entitled as a matter of international law, to regain their own identity at independence on October 1, 1961.

The actions by Paul Biya in disbanding the Consortium, kidnapping its leaders and other significant Southern Cameroon leaders and charging them on spurious politically motivated charges before a Francophone court-martial for presenting the very grievances which he has trivialized by decreeing a so-called National Commission on Bilingualism are to say the least infantile and laughable. Not only are the Consortium Leaders, Barrister Felix Agbor Nkongho and Dr Neba Fontem along with Mancho Bibixy, Hon Justice Chief Paul Ayah, Mola Njoh Litumbe and hundreds of Southern Cameroonians still in detention, the perpetration of widespread and systemic crimes against humanity and genocide of the Southern Cameroons is ongoing with impunity.

In this situation, the question may be asked, for what purpose is a so-called Commission on bilingualism wrapped in the blood of Southern Cameroonians when there is an internet blockade of the territory, egregious crimes and violations against armless civilians, the continuing detention and trial of its citizens? Of what importance we may ask, is a supposed decree creating a consultative Commission on bilingualism when Mr. Paul Biya the supposed guarantor of the Constitution has over the past 34 years failed to enforce the Constitutional provision on bilingualism. So therefore, in the estimation of Mr. Biya a right which the Constitution has failed to afford at the detriment of Southern Cameroonians will be obtained by a mere decree?

So for Mr. Paul Biya has come to the conclusion that Southern Cameroonians have become so malleable, gullible and dispensable to the extent that not satisfied with the crimes that have claimed the lives of many, the impunity with which these crimes are perpetrated, he, through this ridiculous commission intends to move a step further in dancing on the graves of the slaughtered and spitting in the mouths of the kidnapped and the detained?.

This decree is a belated admission of failure and a public confession of Mr. Paul Biya’s treasonable violation of his own Constitution over 34 years for which he should be arrested and prosecuted.

The so-called Commission established by decree is a nullity and of no legal value whatsoever because it cannot and will never attain the results which the failed Constitution failed to attain. If anything, considered within the backdrop of the resistance of the Southern Cameroons against annexation and colonial rule, this decree along with the consistent pattern of crimes, systemic violations and the bastardization of our cultural values, this decree is one among many actions taken by Paul Biya to give effect to the end of the putative union as we know it.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Editor-in-Chief

Cameroon Concord News Group

24, January 2017

Technical failure blamed for deadly helicopter crash in the Far North region ¹

The Cameroon military has made public the final assessment of the helicopter crash in the Far North region late on Sunday. Cameroon Intelligence Report gathered that all four occupants – one brigadier-general, one colonel and two lieutenants – were killed in the accident that occurred at Madide, a village about 9 km from Bogo, Diamaré, Far North region.

A statement from the government confirmed our earlier report that it was a technical breakdown that caused the crash. The hypothesis of a Boko Haram attack has also been ruled out by the Yaounde regime. The officers were returning from a mission to supervise their troops on the ground, who are engaged against the Nigerian Islamist sect Boko Haram at the time of the crash.

The bodies of the four victims, namely Brigadier General Jacob Kodji, Commander of the 4th Inter-Armed Military Region, Colonel Kameni Alphonse, Commander of the 4th Gendarmerie Region, Lieutenant Chinda Brice, Helicopter Pilot and Lieutenant Ngrassou Souloukna Basile, a copilot engineer, have all been placed at the morgue of the military hospital in Maroua and will be transported to base 101 in Yaoundé.

Culled from Cameroon Intelligence Report

24, January 2017

Southern Cameroonians snub Biya, says only Consortium has legitimate authority ²

The civil disobedience campaign launched by the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium has entered its fourth day today Tuesday the 24^th 2017. Southern Cameroonians are observing the ghost town in all localities in the Northwest and South West regions, where Internet services have been disconnected by La Republique du Cameroun since last Tuesday.

Our cream of reporters all over Southern Cameroons from Akwaya right down to Kumbo and from Isangele to Wum in Menchum say schools remained closed and no one is visible either in the streets or in the offices. Commercial activity remained strongly paralyzed same as yesterday.

The interim leaders of the “Consortium” are expected to address Southern Cameroonians soonest and to extend the ghost town operation to other sectors that will hit the Francophone regime in Yaounde. Day-by-day, the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo government is losing its grip on Southern Cameroons territory. We have been reliably informed that the Francophones intend to begin trial of Anglophone leaders today in Yaounde.

On Monday, the so-called government had invited teachers, parents, students and pupils to resume classes. The Francophone authorities reassured the population that their security would be guaranteed. Some pro Biya political elites and traditional leaders were involved to convince parents to accompany their children to school. On public radio, journalists announced the resumption of classes in several schools, particularly in bilingual and francophone schools. However, it is evidently clear that West Cameroonians have gotten enough from the Francophone political elites.

Culled from Cameroon Intelligence Report

24, January 2017

Arrest of Lord Justice Ayah: Biya regime says judge did not honor a summon ⁰

The Francophone government has claimed that Lord Justice Ayah Paul Abine who also moonlights as President of the People’s Action Party (PAP) did not honor a summon from a judge who asked him to report to the Secretariat of Defense on 20th of January 2017.

The Supreme Court judge was arrested on Saturday January 21st at his home in Yaoundé and ferried by six armed men to the SED where he is still detained. The Francophone regime in Yaounde say Lord Justice Ayah is a chartered member of the Southern Cameroon National Council (SCNC), an organization now banned by the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralization.

Paul Ayah Abine was appointed to the Supreme Court in 2014. Before this appointment, persistent information declared him as the leader of the SCNC. After being a Member of Parliament under the banner of the ruling CPDM crime syndicate from the Manyu constituency in the South West region in 2002, he resigned from the party in 2011. He created PAP and was a candidate for the last presidential election.

Within the CPDM, Paul Ayah is noted for his strong positions, usually rowing against the guidelines of the party’s hierarchy. In 2008 he opposed the constitutional revision that allowed President Paul Biya to run indefinitely in the presidential elections. In June 2006, he was one of the MPs who asked for an investigation into corruption against a cabinet minister, the late Augustin Frederic Kodock, who was then in charge of the Department of Agriculture.

By Sama Ernest

24, January 2017

Biya signs Bilingual decree amid tension and ghost town ⁰

The 83 year-old dictator signed a decree yesterday creating what his Francophone regime calls the National Commission for the Promotion of Bilingualism. For the first time in his 34 years in power, a presidential decree was made public in both English and French. The decree is in line with an empty promise, the national chairman of the ruling CPDM made on the 31^st of December 2016.

Biya stated that the commission will have 15 members who will have to report to him every 6 months. With pressure mounting on Yaounde over the Anglophone problem, the General Manager of the Cameroon Radio and Television, Charles Ndongo spent time analyzing the decree which the leaders of the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society have dismissed as a non event.

Ghost town operations will continue today Tuesday the 24^th of January throughout Southern Cameroons territory. The plan by Government for school to resume in the North West and South West regions has failed to yield positive outcome after both regions observed the fourth ghost town since last January 9, 2017

The minister of Secondary Education, Jean Ernest Massena Ngale Bibehe on behalf of Prime Minister had signed a release calling on all students and pupils to go to school come Monday which is already the third week in Second term. The release also urged parents to send their children to school. The government went as far as sending communiqués to be read several times in churches and used the State Media as major tool of propagating their views.

But the observation Monday in towns like Kumbo, Bamenda, Buea, Limbe, Tiko, and Kumba among others indicated that ghost town was successful in spite the arrest of trade Union leaders. Schools remained closed, vehicles were off streets and shops remained permanently shut down. Few Francophone students could be seen in bilingual schools in Buea but classes were not effective.

The governors of the North West and South West regions who had programmed an inspection tour in some schools cancelled their trips because of the ghost town owing to the fact that no student was on campus. The government is battling for school to resume before February 11 which could be an embarrassment for the 34 year old regime.

CAMCORDNEWS/CIN

23, January 2017

Panic in Yaounde as Southern Cameroons ghost town records 100 per cent success ¹

Day 1 of the three-day ghost town campaign in Southern Cameroons has recorded a 100 per cent success, thanks to the disconnection of internet and other social media which greatly angered West Cameroonians. The interim leaders of the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society have reportedly lauded the response to the civil disobedience calls. A highly placed Francophone government official was heard murmuring privately at the Prime Minister’s office earlier today that the CPDM government did not expect the civil disobedience action of this week to be that successful.

Cameroon Intelligence Report senior political commentator emphasized that the protest action is succeeding because of the Southern Cameroon youth’s determination and use of the social media. Thirty-seven thousand West Cameroonians listened to a live broadcast by Mark Bara and Ivo Tapang on Face Book. The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society has managed to attract a large response among even Francophone citizens in Daoula and Yaounde who are now clamoring for President Biya to step down for real dialogue to begin. Today’s success has motivated even militants of the ruling CPDM crime syndicate to participate in further steps against the tyrannical regime that has ruined the country.

Last week, the so-called Minister of Secondary Education issued a statement for schools to resume in British Southern Cameroons. The call was ignored as all academic institutions in Southern Cameroons remain closed. The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium has said that the civil disobedience campaign will hold tomorrow Tuesday the 24^th of January 2017. All measures taken by the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo government to stifle the Anglophone revolution have been counter-productive. The shutting down of internet services and electricity supply has completely destroyed economic activities in Southern Cameroons with soldiers begging for food and water from the civilian population. The state daily newspaper, Cameroon Tribune attempted with a montage of photos to deceive international public opinion that schools have started in West Cameroon.

Francophone security officers have detained hundreds of Southern Cameroons activists including Barrister Agbor Nkongho Felix and Dr. Neba Fontem of the Consortium. The Yaounde regime has also arrested Lord Justice Ayah Paul Abine of the Supreme Court of Cameroon in order to prevent Southern Cameroonians from publicly protesting against La Republique du Cameroun. Amnesty International and the African Human Rights Commission have both released a call for urgent action regarding the rapes, extra judicial killings and incommunicado detention of Southern Cameroons leaders.

The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium is the most active West Cameroon group since its members began their public campaign against the government’s oppressive policies in several Anglophone towns last year. Wilfred Tassang has also lauded the response to the ghost town calls and observed that a “continuation of the policy will bring about even better results.”

The situation in the country would have been much better if the government would have listened to the voice of reason and allowed its policies and attitudes to be reviewed, instead of underestimating and ridiculing any Southern Cameroons leader. The government’s future and the unity of Cameroon are now put to the test. It will have to base its options on the broad rejection of the people of Southern Cameroons of its devastating policies.

By Rita Akana

23, January 2017

Gambia: Former President Jammeh ‘emptied coffers’ before leaving ⁰

The Gambia’s former president Yahya Jammeh, who caused a political crisis in the African country before finally going into exile, has emptied the government’s treasury, plundering millions of dollars in his final weeks in power, says an aide to the country’s new president.

“Over two weeks, over 500 million dalasi (11 million dollars) were withdrawn” by Jammeh, Mai Fatty, an aide to President Adama Barrow, said in the Sengalese capital Dakar on Monday. “As we take over, the government of The Gambia is in financial distress… The coffers are largely empty,” he told reporters.

Long-time ruler Jammeh flew out of The Gambia on Saturday and headed for Equatorial Guinea, where he is expected to settle with his family. Before deciding to leave, he pushed the country to the brink of war by refusing to concede defeat in the presidential election held in December last year. The subsequent political crisis drew in mediators from regional countries, some of which were coping with crises of their own.

Those regional mediating countries also formed up a military force to force Jammeh out of power if he did not step down voluntarily. Jammeh clung to power even for some two days after his mandate expired despite the threat of the use of force but ultimately decided to go into exile. He had been in power since a coup in 1994.

A woman celebrates after hearing about the departure of former Gambian leader Yahya Jammeh, in Banjul, January 21, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

The West African military force entered The Gambia on Sunday to provide security and allow Barrow, who has been staying in neighboring Senegal, to return to The Gambia, whose own military had sided with Jammeh. Barrow is eager to return “as soon as possible,” said his aide, warning that “the state of security in The Gambia is still fragile.”

According to Fatty, President Barrow wants the deployed West African military force to remain in The Gambia for the time being. “We want their mandate to be extended,” Fatty said, explaining that Barrow was waiting for personal assurances of loyalty from national security forces.

He said that after the full transfer of power, the new administration’s first priority will be to ensure the safe return of tens of thousands of people who have fled the country in recent weeks fearing a violent escalation.

Presstv