Headline News

4, May 2020

Global coronavirus cases top 3.5mn ⁰

At least 3,566,201 people are now infected with the new coronavirus and some 248,285 others have succumbed to the respiratory illness COVID-19, data from Johns Hopkins University shows.

The United States still stands on the top of the list of countries affected by the virus, with 1,118,122 known cases and 68,598 deaths.

While many countries have brought the epidemic relatively under control and eased stay-at-home restrictions, some nations have just started to register what looks like a second wave of infections.

Second in population only to China, India reported 2,600 new infections on Sunday — the country’s highest single-day jump, yet.

The Indian Health Ministry has reported 40,263 confirmed cases of infection and 1,306 deaths as of Sunday evening.

The ministry said that the government was set to impose another two weeks of extended lockdown for a second time. The country’s population of 1.3 billion has already been under a three-week complete lockdown since late March.

This time, however, some restrictions would be eased in districts that have a low risk of spreading the virus.

In Afghanistan’s capital Kabul, a third of the 500 people selected in random testing came out positive for the new coronavirus.

The results of the random tests in Kabul are “concerning,” said Public Health Ministry spokesman Wahid Mayar on Sunday.

Afghanistan has reported 2,700 confirmed cases and 85 deaths.

The true figure of cases could be much higher as officials have so far tested only 12,000 people in the nation of 36.6 million.

China, the first ever country to report the virus, reported only three new cases and no additional deaths on Monday.

China’s death toll stands at 4,633, with a total number of 82,880 cases.

Source: Presstv

4, May 2020

Race for the White House: Trump promises Covid-19 vaccine by end of the year ⁰

President Donald Trump relaunched his election campaign Sunday with a live television event inside the iconic Lincoln Memorial, promising an early coronavirus vaccine and urging Americans to put the pandemic behind them to embrace an “incredible” future.

With the two-hour long Fox News “town hall,” Trump sought to wrap himself in the mantle of America’s arguably greatest president — and to persuade a nation battered by death and mass unemployment to look ahead.

“We can’t stay closed as a country, we’re not going to have a country left,” he said on the show, where two moderators, as well as ordinary citizens via video, put questions to him in front of the monument.

“We’re going to have an incredible following year,” he said.

To a woman who called in expressing fear of financial ruin and eviction, Trump said her job would come back.

“You get a job where you make more money,” he said.

Saying Americans should start going back to beaches this summer and recommending that shuttered schools need to reopen in September, Trump forecast good news on the hunt for a vaccine.

“We are very confident that we’re going to have a vaccine… by the end of the year,” he said, admitting he was getting ahead of his own advisors with the prediction. “I’ll say what I think,” he said.

Saving his reelection

The businessman Republican is doing poorly in most polls ahead of the November presidential contest against Democratic challenger Joe Biden, who remains shuttered in his Delaware home.

Trump faces criticism for his bruising, divisive style during a time of national calamity. He is also accused by some of botching the early response to the COVID-19 virus.

Worse, the previously booming US economy, which was seen as a golden ticket to his second term, is now in dire straits due to the nationwide lockdown.

With officials saying the viral spread has begun to taper, Trump is itching to return to the campaign trail.

However he faces new criticism that he is trying to declare premature victory, even as the illness continues to kill thousands of Americans every week.

Having repeatedly minimized the death toll, claiming it will end at around 60,000, Trump conceded that now “I’m saying 80 or 90 and it goes up.”

His emphasis, however, was not on the dead, but on resurrecting his image as a can-do leader who can end the skyrocketing unemployment caused by the lockdown.

That audacious shift began Sunday at possibly the most hallowed monument in the country — the statue of Abraham Lincoln, who led the country through civil war, urged reconciliation, and was assassinated in his moment of triumph.

Trump, who calls himself a “wartime president” denied that the election will turn into a referendum on his handling of the crisis.

But he added: “I hope it does because we’ve done a great job.”

In the next few days, Trump will follow up by breaking months of self-quarantine with long-distance trips to the key electoral states of Arizona and Ohio.

It’s a play that will emphasise Trump’s massive visibility advantage over Biden and, the White House hopes, rewrite the public relations script after gaffes including the president’s suggestion that coronavirus patients ingest disinfectant.

Greater than Lincoln?

Lincoln gambled in 1861 that only war could preserve the United States by ending slavery and restoring the nation’s ideals of freedom. He won, becoming a national hero.

But Lincoln is remembered as much for reaching out to former foes — something Trump did not seek to emulate as he spoke at the foot of the iconic statue.

Previous presidents, he said, were “stupid” to allow reliance on foreign manufacturers for US medicines.

The Democrats, he said, are “radical,” claiming they would prefer to see people get sick than see him succeed.

Trump pronounced that he had “done more than any president in the history our our country in the first three years.”

His self-declared greatness is questioned by many Americans.

FiveThirtyEight’s latest tracking poll showing only 43.4 percent approving Trump’s performance and 50.7 percent disapproving.

Trump even got in an online tussle with former president George W. Bush earlier Sunday, after the fellow Republican posted a video filled with the kind of empathy and solidarity that many accuse the current White House occupant of failing to show.

Trump responded by complaining that Bush was “nowhere to be found” when he was battling off an impeachment attempt in Congress last year.

(AFP)

4, May 2020

The multi-national force established by Cameroon, Nigeria, Chad and Niger has not been able to defeat Boko Haram ⁰

For years, Nigeria has been caught in the web of terrorism. Regrettably, the nation’s military, which has won many accolades at the United Nations Peacekeeping Operations and at the regional level, has not been able to restore peace especially to the North-East where the terror groups operate.

Book Haram launched a full-scale attacks on Nigeria following the killing/death of its commander, Mohammed Yusuf, in a controversial circumstance. The dreaded Boko Haram which was regarded as a ragtag army of youths has continued to give the Nigerian military as well as the military of some neighbouring nations a serious headache, killing scores of troops and carting away their weapons on some occasions.

Although the insurgents have also had many casualties, their ability to recruit more fighters, resilience, arms cache and capability to get intelligence reports, which they often deploy in attacking the soldiers, have been worrisome despite many claims that they have been technically defeated.

The terrorists became very emboldened before the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), came to power in 2015 to the extent that the United Nations Office in Abuja was bombed while the Police headquarters was also bombarded, among other places.

However, the devious attacks were not limited to Nigeria as the terror group also carried out attacks in Chad, Niger and Cameroon. These deadly attacks and the push by the insurgents to establish their government in these countries accounted for the reorganisation of the Multi-National Joint Task Force in 2015.

This was why the headquarters of the regional force was moved from Baga, Borno State, to N’Djamena, Chad Republic, and their mandate was to end the Boko Haram insurgency in the Lake Chad Basin.

Despite the reorganisation, the terrorists have continued to carry out attacks especially on military bases just to show that their alleged ‘technical defeat’ as claimed by the Federal Government was a ruse.

In March, Boko Haram inflicted a heavy blow on the Nigerian military by killing about 47 troops in a deadly ambush while the troops were moving around Alagarno in Yobe State.

The insurgents also killed 92 Chadian troops when they carried out an attack on a base in Bohoma, Chad. The attack is still being regarded as the worst military loss in the history of Chad.

Infuriated by the heavy defeat, the Chadian President, Idriss Deby, vowed that Chadian troops would deal with the insurgents. A few days after and in a surprise move, he actualised the threat as his troops launched a full-scale attack on the stronghold of Boko Haram killing hundreds of them and taking control of their arms store.

However, after the onslaught, the president who is a retired military officer, was quoted by Aljazeera as saying that Chad would no longer be part of any regional force in the Lake Chad region and the Sahel.

He said, “Our troops have died for Lake Chad and the Sahel. From today, no Chadian soldier will take part in a military mission outside Chad. Chad is alone in shouldering all the burden of the war against Boko Haram.” But the Nigerian military downplayed the statement, saying Chad had not pulled out of the regional force.

Nonetheless, investigations by our correspondents revealed that rivalry, lack of commitment and underfunding of the regional force were some of the reasons the MNJTF had not been able to defeat the insurgents completely.

Military sources noted that some of these reasons were also responsible for the inability of the Nigerian armed forces to end the Boko Haram terrorism within the states of Borno, Yobe and Adamawa since 2009.

A top military source in Borno, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said chief among the reasons for the slowdown over the years was an unwritten rivalry and controversy over funding among the countries, with Nigeria and Chad in the forefront.

The source said, “When the MNJTF was in Baga, Borno State, between 2009 and 2015, Nigeria provided much of the funding and supplied the most troops with little or no contributions from the three other countries. Nigeria still does. But then, the Boko Haram struck Baga and ruined the MNJTF headquarters in one of the most devastating attacks of that year on our troops.

“There was suspicion that the attack on Baga came because of unspoken bitterness from the other countries. So, the headquarters was moved to Chad in 2015. Yet, it was agreed that a Nigerian officer would be the Force Commander, a Cameroonian as a Deputy Commander and a Chadian as the Chief of Staff. Again, the Commander position was not rotational and this is another problem.

“It is difficult, even if I become the commander, to get the allegiance of the Chadian troops, where the MNJTF is headquartered, to commit more to the MNJTF than to their nation. They will naturally owe allegiance first to their army chief and the President than to a Nigerian commander. Chad just feels they are not in charge and that in a way affects the military cooperation.”

Despite operating from Chad and being a regional force, the choice of who becomes the MNJTF commander has always been done almost solely by the Nigerian Chief of Army Staff (currently Lt Gen Tukur Buratai), whom military sources believe should not be making such decision without the input of other army chiefs in the joint military force.

In the latest appointment in November 2019, Buratai in a press release named Maj Gen Ibrahim Yusuf as the MNJTF commander, replacing Maj Gen Chikeze Ude, the hitherto head of the force.

“This kind of choice of the MNJTF leadership is very faulty, if you ask me. The four countries have Chiefs of Defence Staff and at worst, the Nigerian Chief of Defence Staff is supposed to make such appointment and seek approval from the other three countries’ heads of military to show they are in the decision making channel,” a captain in the Nigerian Army explained.

It was not surprising therefore when Chad, in the first week of April 2020, hinted that it might no longer be taking part in any regional force. Although the announcement looked unclear as it houses the MNJTF, the Chadian president lamented that the country’s troops had died in droves for Lake Chad and the Sahel and they might no longer be taking part in a military mission outside his country.

Analysts believe that the message was subtly targeted at Nigeria to show that Chad wanted some more leverage in the force, than for its troops to await orders from Nigerian commanders.

It was learnt that Niger Republic and Cameroon were not in contention for such prominence in the MNJTF with their troops not being able to stop the terrorists from coming into their respective territories, most times after escaping heat from Nigeria and Chad.

“The funding of the MNJTF has therefore been a major challenge, with most resources lopsided and coming from Nigeria and Chad, which again limits the penetration of the regional force into the two other countries,” a top military source in Abuja said.

On April 10, 2020, the operations of the MNJTF were reviewed at the Ministry of Defence building in Abuja, but only the Ministers of Defence from Nigeria and Chad, Maj Gen Bashir Magashi (retd.), and Mahamat Salah, respectively were at that meeting where tactical decisions were taken.

The Chadian defence minister had come to Abuja to review the MNJTF. He came in company with the Chief of Staff to the Chadian President, the Chadian Ambassador to Nigeria and the Chadian Director of Military Cooperation.

Meanwhile, Boko Haram has managed to keep its fangs alive in the Lake Chad region, partly due to the emergence of its deadlier faction, the Islamic State West African Province, and the recruitment and indoctrination of thousands of youths across the four countries to fight in the sect under the guise of religious and ideological war.

On April 27, the MNJTF itself raised the alarm that it had obtained information regarding a plot by the insurgents to carry out an “aggressive recruitment in the coming weeks.” It said the forced recruitment was expected to target young and adult males. However, the sect’s backup plan was to kidnap unwilling targets.

The MNJTF Chief of Military Public Information, Col Timothy Antigha, therefore urged youths in the North-Eastern states of Nigeria, Lake Province of Chad, Diffa Region of Niger and Extreme North Region of Cameroon to be vigilant and shun all promises of opportunities for quick money and misguided teachings about jihad.

On the whole, military sources agree that the MNJTF needs to first win the confidence and trust of its four member countries and their armed forces before tangible successes can be recorded against the Boko Haram and its affiliates.

A former Director-General, Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, Prof Bola Akinterinwa, in an interview with Sunday PUNCH, identified poor funding, poor equipment and logistical problems as some of the factors incapacitating the MNJTF.

Akinterinwa said the MNJTF was established in the 1990s for economic reasons but its mandate was changed to security when it was reorganised.

He said, “You know the countries funding the MNJTF but you don’t know the financiers of the Boko Haram. I will like to remind you of what late Muammar Gaddafi of Libya said and what a former President of Ghana, Jerry Rawlings, also said and you will know why the task will be very difficult for any joint task force whether national or multinational.

“Gaddafi made it abundantly clear that Nigeria could not have peace unless the country was divided into Muslim North and Christian South. Now the Boko Haram wants to establish an Islamic State particularly in the North.

“In this case, the powerful Muslim states appear to be funding them, aiding and abetting them. Nobody is talking about which countries are involved but accusing finger is pointing at Iran for supporting the Shiite; accusing fingers are pointing at Saudi Arabia and other countries. But the issue is that Boko Haram cannot have the kind of sophisticated weapons they are using if they are not being supplied from outside the country.

“In this case, when you have an opposition like Boko Haram that is heavily funded and equipped fighting against the MNJTF that is poorly equipped, how can they succeed?

“Also, some Nigerians went to protest at the French Embassy in Abuja accusing France of aiding and abetting Boko Haram. Jerry Rawling said the solution to Nigeria problems was to kick out all new-colonialist leaders in Nigeria. When you look at this also, you will see that it is very difficult for the joint task force because there may be colonial support for Boko Haram as well. This is a fundamental issue.

“Multi-national joint task force means the troops there are from different countries with different cultures. They do not use the same type of weapons and their military training and doctrines are not the same. Yet they are brought together under one commander who is expected to harmonise their activities. In terms of signal and strategies, they may not be the same. There is logistical problem and above all who is the leader? “

A former Nigerian President, Olusegun Obasanjo, said in February at the first public lecture in honour of the late founder of Oodu’a Peoples Congress, Dr Fredrick Fasehun, that Nigeria had not been able to defeat Boko Haram because the terror group was getting support from outside. He, however, did not reveal where the external support for the jihadists was coming from.

But, a fellow of the International Institute of Professional Security, Mr Jackson Ojo, in an interview with Sunday PUNCH, said despite the fact that the terror group’s activities affected Nigeria more than the other three nations in the region, Nigeria had been lackadaisical in its approach to the force.

Ojo said, “There is a lot of unserious mess on the side of Nigeria despite the fact the counrty can be regarded as the epicentre of Boko Haram activities. Apart from this, I believe there are many saboteurs in Nigeria and even in the military. Boko Haram has a lot of sympathisers even among those in government. Some are sympathetic to the group based on ethnic, religious or just emotional sympathy.

“Boko Haram fighters do not fly to their bases, they come through our land borders with their supplies and security agents are supposed to be there. Nigeria has not queried that. These are some of the signs that we are not very serious about it. Our Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen Tukur Buratai, just relocated to the North-East after the Chadian troops led by their President had routed the Boko Haram in an offensive battle.”

Proffering solution to the challenges, Akinterinwa said the MNJTF should re-strategise to end the insurgency. He explained that the troops of all the countries in the regional force should fix a particular day and a particular time of the day and encircle the whole area where “the Boko Haram fighters are and advance.”

He said with this, they would be able to neutralise the insurgents and there would be no need for the Joint Task Force to continue to play preventive role.

Culled from PUNCH

4, May 2020

Yaounde: Journalists Protest Harassment, Abusive Arrests ⁰

Cameroonian journalists are marking World Press Freedom Day with protests against abuse from the government as well as from rebels fighting for an independent English-speaking state. Reporters Without Borders, in its 2020 World Press Freedom Index, ranks Cameroon 134th out of 180 countries in the World Press Freedom Index. Some Cameroonian journalists have been detained for their reporting or are on the run from the military or separatists.

This message from the Cameroon Association of English Speaking Journalists, that journalism has rules, regulations and professional ethics, is broadcast on television and radio, and shared on social media platforms by journalists in Cameroon as a sign of protest against the abuses they face. The message insists that journalists be allowed freedom to practice.

“We say no to the constant harassment and haphazard arrest of journalists in their line of duties,” the message said.

Journalists did not organize popular celebrations and public protests as in the previous years because of the more than 2,000 cases of COVID-19 in Cameroon.

They said, however, they shared the pain of peers who have been in detention, such as Mancho Bibixy and Tsi Conrad, arrested and charged with insurrection against the state of Cameroon and who have been in detention since 2017, Samuel Wazizi arrested late last year and jailed for alleged collaboration with separatist fighters, and Wawa Jackson, who was arrested in 2019 and accused of propagating the secessionists’ agenda in the English-speaking regions where separatists are fighting to break away from the majority French-speaking country.

Ngah Christian Mbipgo, publisher of Cameroon’s lone English-language daily newspaper, the Guardian Post, said his news organ has been the victim of press abuses while covering the separatist crisis that has killed 3,000 people in Cameroon in the past three years. He said 15 of his reporters, newspaper vendors and their family members have fled from hostile areas in the English-speaking North-West and South-West regions.

“The separatists think that we have not been doing much to project their independence ideology, and that is why our reporters in the field are targeted. I have not gone out of Yaoundé [to the English-speaking North-West and South-West regions] since 2017 that [when] the crisis metamorphosed into an armed conflict because they have openly called to tell me that I am a target. We receive calls from top government officials who say we are a newspaper that is working for the separatists,” he said.

Cameroon’s government did not issue a statement on for World Press Freedom Day, as there were no public ceremonies due to COVID-19. However, the government has always maintained that there is press freedom in Cameroon and journalists are only arrested when they act unprofessionally.

Jude Viban, president of the Cameroon Association of English Speaking Journalists said the government should decriminalize media offenses and make sure abuses against the rights of journalists by government officials and separatist fighters are stopped.

“What we are doing is to inform, and we do so for the interest of the population, so a handful of people should not attack the press. When stories are not told because journalists are under attack, the population would not be informed, which, of course, is their right to be informed in a democracy like ours,” said Viban.

Reporters Without Borders says press freedom continues its long decline in Cameroon, and reporters continue to be subjected to threats, attacks, intimidation and arrests after President Paul Biya’s reelection for a seventh term in October 2018.

Source: VOA

3, May 2020

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is not believed to have had surgery ⁰

South Korea’s assessment is that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un did not have surgery, local news outlet Yonhap said, citing an unidentified senior official at presidential Blue House.

“There were speculative reports that Chairman Kim underwent a surgery citing some difference to his walk,” the official was cited as saying.

“We have reasons to believe that there was no surgery, but cannot disclose such details.”

Rumours about Kim’s health have been swirling since his conspicuous no-show at April 15 celebrations for the birthday of his grandfather, the North’s founder — the most important day in the country’s political calendar.

His absence triggered a series of fevered rumours and unconfirmed reports over his condition, while the United States and South Korea insisted they had no information to believe any of the conjecture was true.

North Korean state television showed Kim walking, smiling broadly and smoking a cigarette at what it said was the opening of a fertiliser factory on Friday.

(FRANCE 24 with REUTERS, AFP)

3, May 2020

Of Dr Fontem, PLO Lumumba and the Ambazonia Town Hall ⁰

FELLOW AMBAZONIANS,

I was in a Town Hall Meeting with Prof. Lumumba and more than 200 Ambazonians today, in which Prof gave a lot of good questions and answers for the revolution and Dr. Fontem presented the goals of SCUF, the Southern Cameroons United Front and another one presented the proceedings for the establishment of an Ambazonian National Bank. These are all very good developments into the right direction: more unity among us, more funds and power for the homeland defense & relief, and more chances to win allies or points on global political stage. I hope the moderators of the town hall meeting can publish Prof’s questions and answers and the modalities for SCUF and ANB for everybody soon! Yet let me add something I have on my heart concerning more unity among ourselves and more steady funds for our defense on GZ:

We need to ensure that it is a bottom-up-revolution and not a top-down-revolution, because top-down is easily infiltratable by the enemy. Top-down would mean that some “important” people would, like Paul Biya, just appoint people other people into power positions and that’s it. No, we have to give the people and commanders on GZ the power to vote other people into power and representation positions! That is bottom-up and the blossom of real democracy and freedom!

So, funding and uniting our defense groups is far more important than governing, especially not governing in the wrong way, like appointing people according to tribal or political party affiliation. We all need and want the strongest Ambazonian Forces possible and for that the politicking and personal cult of party leaders has to stop and the humble serving and funding for the homeland has to start. That means that the commanders and LGA-leaders from GZ shall hold Zoom Meetings among themselves in which they vote who the board members of the SCUF and ANB shall be. Also, all existing groups and IGs shall swear a public oath to the common Ambazonian rules and that their foot soldiers have to swear an oath to never attack any other Amba soldier from any group but focus on fighting the occupier altogether. What we really need most is the subordination of all leaders and activists under a common Ambazonian agreement, which says that the people and commanders on GZ have the charge over power and funds, and that political diaspora parties, which keep fighting other Amba groups shall be expelled from the funding and decision-making.

Prof. Lumumba said that we have to bury all factionalism and start speaking in one voice before the EU, AU, UN and ECOWAS, and as long as we don’t have this one voice we shan’t go to the Swiss table. I agree, although I recently recommended going to the Swiss table, but I have to confess that Prof. Lumumba is more right than me. I just wanted to pronounce that we should not run away from the task and walk proud and not fearless. And I think, the way to create this one-voice-representation goes through the united funding process for all commanders on ground zero and letting them vote who our leaders are and whom they shall vote as the supreme leader who tells the EU, AU, UN, US, ECOWAS and so on Ambazonia’s nonnegotiable position.

Of course, the more united we are, the more our enemy will try to corrupt our leadership. That’s why it is so important that we give the power to the people and the commanders, because they know best who can be trusted to lead because he/she is unbribable.

LONG LIVE AMBAZONIA!

By Christoph Messner

3, May 2020

2,000 Chadian students return home after COVID-19 spreads to Cameroon ⁰

Nearly 2000 students from Chad have returned home from neighbouring Cameroon after COVID-19 spread there.

Many reached the border on foot, crossing into the Chadian provinces of Logone Occidental and Mayo-Kebbi Ouest.

Joint initiative

They were supported in their journey home after a joint initiative from the European Union (EU) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) was launched to help them return.

The EU-IOM Joint Initiative for Migrant Protection and Reintegration is the first comprehensive mechanism to protect migrants in West and Central Africa.

The fund made a special allocation of 50,000 Euros through the EU Emergency Trust Fund for Africa that allows these students to return home.

Quarantined

Upon their arrival, the students were quarantined for 14 days along the border.

None tested positive for the COVID-19 virus. Nonetheless, most now find themselves without resources to continue their journeys to the capital N’Djamena, 450 kilometres from the quarantine centres.

IOM, at the request of the government of Chad, supported the students with transportation, chartering special buses headed back to their communities of origin.

With 46 cases of COVID-19 — yet no fatality- confirmed as of 27 April — Chad, too, has closed its land and air borders, schools, universities, religious buildings and non-essential businesses.

Enforcing curfews

Public transport is strictly limited and several provinces are enforcing curfews.

IOM said it is working closely with Chad’s government and other partners to ensure that the most vulnerable population groups are protected and assisted.

Anne Kathrin Schaefer, IOM Chief of Mission in Chad said: “Since the borders closed, we have been informed of regular arrivals of Chadian nationals in the country.”

She continued: “This worries us as most here have no opportunities to safely return to their families after having used their meagre resources to purchase food, water and other essentials during their quarantine period.”

Source: Voice-online

3, May 2020

Senior Ambazonia commander killed in Bafut ⁰

A separatist commander known simply as General Alhaji was among some insurgents who were killed on Friday in Bafut, a locality in Northwest, one of the two troubled Anglophone regions of Cameroon, the Cameroon army said Saturday.

The death of Alhaji was confirmed by Kingsley Ashu, a separatist leader, in a Facebook post.

He was killed after a week-long military offensive in the locality that also witnessed the seizure of war weapons and dismantling of several separatist camps, local authorities said.

Alhaji was commanding one of the “largest and fiercest” armed separatist groups known as “Seven Katta Bafut Defence forces” in the region, according to security reports.

He became “notorious” in 2018 after kidnapping over 80 school children and teachers and a driver of a secondary school in Bamenda, Cameroon Anglophone’s largest city, security sources said, adding that his physical elimination could prove a major blow to the rebels in that region.

Since 2017, government forces have been clashing with armed separatist forces who want the two English-speaking regions of Northwest and Southwest to secede from the majority French-speaking nation and form a new country which they call “Ambazonia.”

Source: Xinhuanet

3, May 2020

French Cameroun: Hundreds Rush for Archbishop Kleda’s herbal COVID-19 ‘cure’ ⁰

Cameroonians have been flooding into the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Douala, where Archbishop Samuel Kleda claims he has found an herbal cure for COVID-19.

The popularity of the archbishop’s alleged cure has prompted some authorities to try to make the treatment more widely available, even though medical experts have urged extreme caution about its use.

Paul Nyaga, curate of St. Paul’s Parish of the Douala Archdiocese, said through a messaging application that since information circulated a week ago that Kleda could treat COVID-19, many have been rushing to his parish for help.

He said the parish had been overwhelmed by the number of people coming from Yaounde, Bafoussam and Douala with test results showing that they were COVID-19-positive and saying they did not have access to treatment. He said he told them to go to Catholic hospitals in the archdiocese, where they would be treated when there were additional supplies of the archbishop’s herbal remedy.

Among the hundreds asking for help was hairdresser Clementine Eya, 27, who also spoke via a messaging application from Douala.

She said she had no money to pay for the hospital treatment of her elder sister, who tested COVID-19-positive in Douala and wanted to see the archbishop because she had been told his treatment was efficient and free.

Several dozen treated

Kleda told state media CRTV on April 25 that he had treated several dozen people, including eight medical staff members, for conditions affecting their respiratory systems, just like the coronavirus does.

Kleda, speaking via a messaging application from Douala, said he could confirm that his 30 years of medicinal plant research experience, especially on herbal treatment, had enabled him to find a cure for COVID-19.

He said he was very happy because everyone who had taken the herbal remedy had been cured of COVID-19. He added that that his goal as a servant of God was to help poor and suffering people, and that was why he gave away the cure, which he named Essential Oils, free of charge.

Last week, the Cameroonian government sent a team of researchers and doctors to determine the validity of Kleda’s claimed cure. Public Health Minister Malachie Manaouda said the government’s support would be determined by the outcome of the investigation. He said if Kleda was proven to be right, the government would make it more widely available for COVID-19 patients.

The Cameroon Medical Council and the Cameroon Academy of Sciences have both called for research to determine the efficiency of Essential Oils.

Advice: Rely on hospitals

Dieudonne Kameni of the Cameroon Medical Council said that for now, COVID-19 patients should count only on treatment at authorized government hospitals.

He said by telephone from Douala that medical practice has rules, regulations and professional ethics that must be observed before drugs can be used in patients, but that the archbishop’s collection of herbs was still at a preclinical testing stage and could not be scientifically called a cure for COVID-19. He said he was asking patients to go to hospitals, which for now were the only sure places COVID-19 could be treated.

Kleda said he would continue administering the treatment to patients who sought help from him while waiting for scientists to complete their findings. Many patients have, however, complained of the difficulty of obtaining Essential Oils because of high demand.

Cameroon has been hit harder by the coronavirus than any other country in Central Africa. As of Saturday afternoon EDT, the country had recorded 2,077 confirmed cases, with 64 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University statistics.

Source: VOA

2, May 2020

Spain eases strict lockdown as US approves virus drug ⁰

Spaniards were allowed out of their homes to exercise and walk freely after 48 days of confinement on Saturday as some European nations began cautiously easing virus lockdowns while others like Russia faced a spike in new infections.

As governments across the globe balance lifting restrictions to restart economies against the risk of new infections, US authorities brought some hope by approving an experimental drug for emergency use on coronavirus patients.

The measure was the latest step in a global push to find viable treatments and a vaccine for the coronavirus, which has left half of humanity under some form of lockdown, hammered the world economy and caused more than 3.3 million confirmed infections.

The virus has killed nearly 239,000 people since it emerged in China late last year.

With signs the pandemic in their hardest-hit nations is slowing, European countries and some parts of the US have begun to lift restrictions and to try to inject life into economies battered by weeks of closure.

In Madrid and Barcelona, Spaniards took to the streets to exercise and walk freely as the government eased seven weeks of strict lockdown in a country with one of the highest number of fatalities at nearly 25,000.

“After so many weeks in confinement, I badly wanted to go out, run, see the world,” said financial advisor Marcos Abeytua in Madrid’s Chueca district who got up a 7am to enjoy some time outside. “Yesterday, I was like a child on Christmas Eve.”

In the city’s Retiro park, many residents were out to running, sometimes in groups, as a policeman used a loudspeaker to urge them to keep out of deserted avenue and on the pavement.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez however said masks would be obligatory on public transport from Monday.

Spain, Germany, Austria and Scandinavian nations are all slowly easing lockdowns as the virus cases slow though they will keep in place social distancing measures, demand the use of masks or increase testing to try to track infections.

France on Saturday decided it would extend a health emergency, in place since March 24, by two months until July 24, Health Minister Olivier Veran announced after a cabinet meeting.

Italy is preparing to ease restrictions in coming days while British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who spent time in intensive care with the virus, said Britain had past the peak of its outbreak.

Ireland extended its lockdown by two weeks to May 18, with Prime Minister Leo Varadkar saying the nation will reopen “in a slow, phased, staged way” after that.

In Russia, though, authorities reported the largest increase in coronavirus cases with the new infections rising by nearly 10,000 in a single day.

In Moscow, the epicentre of Russia’s outbreak, around 2 percent of the population is infected by COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus, officials said.

“The threat is apparently on the rise,” Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, said on his blog earlier Saturday.

– Treatment hopes –

More than 3.3 million cases of infection have been officially diagnosed in 195 countries, including 1.5 million in Europe alone. That number is likely only a fraction of true cases as testing is still limited.

The United States has the most deaths with more than 65,000, followed by Italy with 28,236, the United Kingdom with 27,510, Spain with 25,100 deaths and France with 24,594 fatalities.

US President Donald Trump on Friday announced that Remdesivir, an antiviral drug initially developed to treat Ebola, was given the green light for use after a major trial found that it boosted recovery in serious COVID-19 patients.

“It’s really a very promising situation,” Trump said on Friday at the White House.

The drug incorporates itself into the virus’s genome, short-circuiting its replication process.

Its approval came as the US leaders struggled with growing pressure from citizens wearying of stay-at-home orders.

Trump is keen for a turnaround as the world’s largest economy reels with tens of millions left jobless.

Texas became the largest US state yet to ease curbs, while anti-lockdown demonstrations were held in several states — including California, where officials had re-closed beaches beginning Friday to avoid a repeat of last weekend when crowds flocked to the shoreline.

In Huntington Beach, about 35 miles (55 kilometers) south of Los Angeles, several thousand people rallied to denounce Governor Gavin Newsom’s beach shutdown order.

“Open California!” chanted protesters near the closed beaches, carrying signs that read “All jobs are essential” or “Freedom is essential”.

– Hong Kong shops opening –

In Asia, India announced that the lockdown on its 1.3 billion people — the world’s biggest — would continue for two more weeks from May 4.

And in Singapore, the government said Saturday that pet food stores and hair salons will be allowed to reopen on May 12.

Most of the city-state’s infections have been detected at dormitories housing migrant workers, and their confinement was extended to June 1.

Hong Kong recorded zero confirmed case of coronavirus on Saturday, the sixth day within a week.

The city’s social distancing regulations including limits on gathering of more than four people are due to expire on May 7, but authorities have not decided whether to extend them.

The city’s chief executive has said that civil servants will return to work in the office starting from May 4.

During the long weekend with public holidays to celebrate Buddha’s birthday and Labour Day, residents flocked to country parks and the city’s outlying islands to get some fresh air.

Shops and restaurants started to resume business in normal opening hours with more consumers going out to streets and shopping malls.

The virus restrictions put a damper on May Day celebrations worldwide on Friday as many labour unions delayed their rallies and some held online events, while a determined few hit the streets in face masks.

May Day carried extra significance this year because of the staggering number of people put out of work by the pandemic, with the global economy in a tailspin and facing its worst downturn since the Great Depression.

Stock markets tumbled again on Friday after Trump’s unproven allegation that the virus may have come from a lab in Wuhan — the central Chinese city where the disease first emerged.

Source: AFP