Headline News

30, June 2023

Yaoundé: Minister accused of corruption wants Biya to stand for re-election ⁰

Health minister Manaouda Malachie currently under investigation by the Special Criminal Court over alleged involvement in a huge Covid-19 corruption scandal has organized a meeting calling on the 90-year-old President Paul Biya to stand for re-election, two years before the next polls are due.

The move interpreted by many political commentators as a cunning manoeuvre by the politician from the Far North has also generated a lot of under-the-table talk in the nation’s capital, Yaoundé.

Investigators have been sending out new summons as part of a probe into the alleged embezzlement of IMF funds given to Cameroon to help with its Covid-19 response. Health minister Manaouda Malachie is among those on the list.

As part of the inquiry into the management of Covid-19 funds, judges at the Special Criminal Court have also issued Minister Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh with a summons. However, his high-level contacts within the security apparatus are currently offering him protection.

By Soter Agbaw-Ebai with files from Rita Akana in Yaoundé

30, June 2023

Pope Francis says Ukraine war seems to have ‘no end’ ⁰

Pope Francis said on Friday there was no apparent end in sight to the war in Ukraine as his peace envoy wrapped up three days of talks in Moscow.

“The tragic reality of this war that seems to have no end demands of everyone a common creative effort to imagine and forge paths of peace,” the pope told a religious delegation from the Patriarch of Constantinople.

The Vatican said in a subsequent statement that the pope’s envoy, Italian Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, had finished his consultations in Moscow, where he had met one of President Vladimir Putin’s advisers, Yuri Ushakov, and the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill.

“(The visit was) aimed at identifying humanitarian initiatives, which could open roads to peace,” the statement said. It added that further steps would be taken, but gave no details.

Source: France 24

30, June 2023

FIFA reveals social justice armbands for women’s World Cup ⁰

FIFA revealed eight different armbands highlighting social causes that sides will be able to wear at the women’s World Cup as world football’s governing body seeks to avoid a row that erupted at last year’s men’s World Cup.

Captains from a number of European countries, including England and Germany, planned to wear a “OneLove” armband in rainbow colours in Qatar in support of LGBTQ rights.

However, they abandoned that stance after being threatened with sporting sanctions just days before the tournament kicked off.

The armband had widely been viewed as a symbolic protest against laws in Qatar, where homosexuality is illegal.

The “unite for inclusion” armband for the women’s World Cup is similar in style to the one outlawed with the words alongside a heart shape in rainbow colours.

Other causes highlighted include gender equality, ending violence against women, hunger and the rights of indigenous people.

Captains will be able to wear a different armband for each match corresponding to the cause being promoted or support one cause for the entire tournament.

“Football unites the world and our global events, such as the FIFA Women’s World Cup, have a unique power to bring people together and provide joy, excitement and passion,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino

“After some very open talks with stakeholders, including member associations and players, we have decided to highlight a series of social causes – from inclusion to gender equality, from peace to ending hunger, from education to tackling domestic violence – during all 64 matches at the FIFA Women’s World Cup.”

The women’s World Cup, which will be hosted by Australia and New Zealand, begins on July 20.

Source: AFP

29, June 2023

Scandal: New Limo and new residence for Ayang Luc creates tension in Yaoundé ⁰

The so-called fifth personality of the state, Ayang Luc wants to increase his fleet of cars by purchasing a 120 million FCFA limo for his ceremonial outings.

To satisfy this need, described by many political commentators in the nation’s capital as”folie des grandeurs“, the Minister of State, Secretary General at the Presidency of the Republic, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, requested the Minister of the Economy, Planning and Regional Development, Alamine Ousmane Mey, to finance the acquisition of the limo.

Cameroon Intelligence Report gathered that the all-powerful Ousmane Mey blatantly refused to comply and in a correspondence on June 20, 2023 told Minister Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh to seek the approval of President Paul Biya.

The Ousmane Mey letter has further fuelled the debate on who actually has legitimate authority deep within the ruling CPDM crime syndicate.

Just last month, the 76-year-old President of the Economic and Social Council, Ayang Luc signed an agreement with a Yaoundé-based company for the construction of a new residence for him and his family at a projected cost of two billion FCFA.

By Rita Akana in Yaoundé

29, June 2023

Madonna in hospital due to ‘serious bacterial infection’, tour postponed ⁰

Madonna is recovering after falling ill with a “serious bacterial infection” that landed her in an intensive care unit for several days, her manager Guy Oseary said in a statement Wednesday.

“Her health is improving, however she is still under medical care,” he said. “A full recovery is expected.”

Oseary said the 64-year-old pop icon’s “Celebrations” tour, due to start July 15 in Vancouver, Canada, was postponed until further notice.

The New York Post’s Page Six website said the pop star was taken to a hospital in the city after becoming unwell.

Her global, nearly sold-out tour was billed as paying homage to Madonna’s more than four-decade long career, and according to her website boasted 84 concert dates.

Stops in the United States were to include Detroit, Chicago, Miami and New York, the city where her storied rise to superstardom began.

She was then slated to continue in Europe, with dates in London, Barcelona and Paris, as well as four dates in Mexico City.

The Grammy-winning megastar behind classics including “Like a Virgin” has asserted incalculable influence over her stellar career as one of music’s top stars.

In his statement on social media, her manager vowed to provide more information when available, including a new start date for the tour and for rescheduled shows.

In 2020 Madonna underwent hip replacement surgery following an injury sustained on her “Madame X” tour.

‘Material Girl’

Born in 1958, the Catholic-educated artist headed to New York in the late 1970s with just 35 dollars in her pocket.

She scraped a living through everything from nude modeling to selling donuts.

Her first big single was “Everybody” in 1982, followed by a string of hits including “Lucky Star,” “Borderline,” and “Holiday.”

The 1984 release of “Like A Virgin” propelled Madonna onto the international stage.

She followed up in 1985 with another disco anthem, “Material Girl.”

Madonna hospitalized for several days, tour postponedThe early 1990s saw her don infamous pointy cone-shaped bras on her “Blond Ambition” Tour in 1990.

She also released a racy book called “Sex,” filled with photographs of sexual acts that was released to accompany her 1992 album “Erotica.”

In the late 1990s her music took off in a new direction, thumping to a new dance-flavored beat on her multi award-winning 1998 album “Ray of Light.”

In 2003 she grabbed the showbiz world’s attention by clinching pop princess Britney Spears in a lingering kiss on stage at that year’s MTV Music Video Awards.

And she still displays the provocative streak for which she is both beloved and notorious.

In January, news dropped of her forthcoming tour in a video nodding to her 1991 documentary “Truth or Dare.”

In the clip, the Queen of Pop plays the classic sleepover game with fellow celebrities, all with risque undertones.

“I am excited to explore as many songs as possible in hopes to give my fans the show they have been waiting for,” she said when announcing the tour.

Source: AFP

29, June 2023

CNPS joins Africa Finance Corporation as shareholder ⁰

The Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) has two new shareholders, including Cameroon’s public pension fund, the CNPS. The Pan-African Corporation announced the news on June 20, 2023.

“We warmly welcome CNPS and SBM Capital Market Securities as investors in AFC. This step is evidence of AFC’s role as a preferred partner for infrastructure investment on the continent, to deepen economic integration, enable import substitution, and develop Africa’s manufacturing and industrial capacity,” commented Samaila Zubairu, CEO of AFC.

While the investment’s amount and the stake acquired by the CNPS are yet to be known, the move should, according to the pension fund, help it achieve its goal of bringing its annual return on financial investments to around XAF40 billion by 2026. “For the next five years, we intend to double the [financial investment income from 2021],” said CNPS boss, Alain Olivier Mekulu Mvondo Akam, in an interview with Cameroon Tribune, a state-owned newspaper. He referred to the increase in return on investments from only XAF7 billion in 2017 to XAF20.5 billion in 2021.

Last year, gains from financial investments stood at XAF24.2 billion, thus up by 18% YoY, according to official data from CNPS. They are expected to increase further in 2023 following CNPS’s recent participation in the capital of Chanas Assurances Vie, another public pension fund investment. CNPS has joined the insurance company’s shareholding alongside the National Hydrocarbons Company (SNH), the state’s entity responsible for oil and gas exploration and production. These two state-owned enterprises have also recently offered to buy the assets of British investment fund Actis in ENEO, Cameroon’s power utility.

Established in 2007, the Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) is a pan-African financial institution that addresses the continent’s infrastructure deficit.

Source: Business in Cameroon

29, June 2023

Yaoundé: Treasury earns CFA51 billion in tax revenues from Guinness deal ⁰

The Cameroonian public treasury earned 51 billion FCFA from taxes during the acquisition of Guinness Cameroon by the French group Castel. This comprises 36 billion FCFA from capital gains tax and 15 billion FCFA from registration fees, according to Cameroon’s Minister of Trade, Luc Magloire Mbarga Atangana.

The official revealed this to the parliament on June 23, 2023, while answering concerns voiced by one of the deputies, Daniel Ngalle Etongo, who feared Castel’s domination of the local market (80%) and the deal’s impact on consumers (price hike). The deputy also feared that the transaction violated antitrust laws. In response, Minister Atangana said the acquisition was in line with the Central African Economic Union’s common market rules.

“Notwithstanding the strengthened dominant position of the acquiring company, the acquisition of Guinness Cameroon SA by the Brasseries et Glacières Internationales SA (BGI, parent company of the Castel Group) is in line with the common market rules within the Central African Economic Union. This is subject to the involved companies’ adherence to the commitments they have made,” Atangana said.

Investment program

“This acquisition operation was not within the national jurisdiction of the State of Cameroon but fell exclusively under the Community Council of Competition and the CEMAC Commission. It is now up to Cameroon, in perfect understanding with the CEMAC Commission, to ensure strict compliance with the commitments made, particularly in terms of planned investments in production tools, expansion and improvement of the distribution network, preservation and creation of jobs, and consumer rights protection. The Ministry of Commerce has ensured this, especially as beer is one of the products whose prices are subject to prior approval,” he added.

Announced on July 14, 2022, by both brewers involved, the purchase of Guinness Cameroon by Castel was approved on March 28, 2023 by the CEMAC’s Competition Community Council.

The CFA300 billion includes a 200 billion FCFA investment program to boost Guinness products in Cameroon over 5 years. This involves building three new production lines in Yaoundé, Garoua, and Bafoussam. These lines will have an annual production capacity of 2.1 million hectolitres. The details were revealed to the press on December 13, 2022, by Stéphane Descazeaud, MD of Société anonyme des boissons du Cameroun, a local company controlled by Castel. The Cameroonian government will see to it that these commitments are implemented.

Source: Business in Cameroon

28, June 2023

French Cameroun agents, Anglophone traitors can never feel safe anywhere in Ambazonia ⁰

The Vice President of the Ambazonia Interim Government has warned that all French Cameroun agents and Anglophone traitors will never feel safe anywhere in the Federal Republic of Ambazonia because restoration forces will not tolerate any schemes to undermine the independence of British Southern Cameroons.

Vice President Dabney Yerima made the remarks in a town hall meeting in Belfast city on Tuesday as he addressed Southern Cameroonians as well as a number of Anglophone Cameroon elites in the UK.

“Even after Biya, the Federal Republic of Ambazonia will not allow La Republique agents and Anglophone traitors to conspire against the independence struggle of the Ambazonian nation. Our fighters in Ground Zero will make sure that there will be no safe place for anyone pursuing anti-Ambazonia plots,” Yerima told the sell-out crowd in Belfast.

The exiled Ambazonia leader highlighted that pro Yaoundé Anglophone leaders like John Fru Ndi waged several conspiracies and seditious plots against the people of Southern Cameroons using his so-called SDF party but quitted the political stage in French Cameroun with very negative ratings due to his incestuous relationship with the ruling CPDM party.

“Yaoundé wants poverty and the collapse of everything in Southern Cameroons. This is the sinister scheme that men like Atanga Nji, Victor Mengot, Paul Tasong, Philemon Yang, Peter Musonge have been chasing in Ambazonia, and they will fail” Yerima observed.

Dabney Yerima also pointed to Yaounde’s anger at the unity which now reigns among Southern Cameroons restoration groups, saying Biya regime has been employing all their political and strategic means as well as divisive and destabilizing mechanisms in order to keep Southern Cameroonians divided and underdeveloped.

By Isong Asu, London Bureau Chief Camcordnews

28, June 2023

US President says Putin ‘clearly losing’ Ukraine war ⁰

US President Joe Biden said Wednesday that “pariah” Vladimir Putin is “losing” the war in Ukraine, but it is too early to tell whether the Russian president has been weakened by the mercenary Wagner group’s aborted rebellion.

Asked by reporters at the White House whether Putin is now weaker, Biden said: “It’s hard to tell, but he’s clearly losing the war” in Ukraine and “he’s losing the war at home.”

Putin is now “a pariah around the world,” Biden added.

In his brief remarks, Biden mistakenly referred to Russia “losing the war in Iraq” — a gaffe he also made late Tuesday when he told a group of re-election campaign donors that he’d united the West in opposing Moscow’s “onslaught on Iraq.”

The White House remains cautious on interpreting the fallout from last week’s extraordinary events in Russia where the forces from the Wagner group — one of the most capable parts of the Russian military in Ukraine — mutinied and threatened to attack Moscow, before reversing course.

Biden, 80, is leading a Western drive to support Ukraine’s resistance to the Russian invasion launched in February last year.

Source: AFP

28, June 2023

France braces for protests as Macron slams ‘unforgivable’ police shooting of teen driver ⁰

France braced for more angry protests Wednesday after the killing of a teenager by police during a traffic stop that President Emmanuel Macron called “unforgivable”.

The government said it would deploy 2,000 riot police to deal with any unrest, a day after a 17-year-old was shot in the chest by a police officer who then appeared to lie about the circumstances of the killing.

The shooting had already sparked unrest in several Paris suburbs overnight.

Celebrities and politicians expressed outrage and grief at the death of the teenager, with Macron calling it “inexplicable” and “unforgivable”.

The teenager, named only as Nael M., was pulled over by two policemen on Tuesday for breaking traffic rules, prosecutors said.

Police initially reported that one officer shot at the teenager because he was driving his car at him, but this version of events was contradicted by a video circulating on social media and authenticated by AFP.

The footage shows the two policemen actually standing by the side of the stationary car, with one pointing a weapon at the driver. A voice is heard saying “You are going to get a bullet in the head.”

The police officer then appears to fire point blank as the car abruptly drives off.

The car moved a few dozen metres before crashing. The driver died shortly after.

His death sparked immediate protests in Nanterre, a western Paris suburb.

Bins were set alight and a fire broke out at a music school, while police tried to disperse the protesters with tear gas.

Protests then broke out in some neighbouring suburbs.

Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said Wednesday that 31 people had been arrested overnight, 24 police slightly injured and around 40 cars torched.

Darmanin added that 2,000 police would be deployed to deal with any further violence later Wednesday.

‘Revolt for my son’

Government spokesman Olivier Veran told reporters that Macron had expressed “emotion” at the shooting during Wednesday’s weekly cabinet meeting, and called for “calm” on behalf of the government.

Source: AFP