Despite claiming to organize elections across the entire country, the Yaounde government is in panic mode.

The country’s president, Paul Biya, has convened an emergency meeting of his cabinet. The meeting is scheduled for 5pm Yaounde time.

The items on the meeting’s agenda are unknown, but a source at the Unity Palace in Yaounde has hinted that despite the drama ruling party members have been staging across the country, the government is aware of the truth.

The election might have been organized and the CPDM has won the majority it wants, but the president is aware of the growing anger and frustration in the country’s streets.

The president, our source said, will be calling on his cabinet ministers to exercise caution in the way they address issues facing the country.

The source added that the Southern Cameroons crisis that has put the country in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons will be top on the agenda.

The government, the source said, is taking a look at its strategy and it is probable that the president might yield to international pressure.

The source insinuated that the government might be accepting the Swiss initiative and Mr. Biya might caution his ministers to collaborate fully with any initiative that might bring peace to the country.

The source also said that the president was aware that the results of its military actions had been mixed and the president was mulling the possibility of letting the UN to come in and play a greater role in the aftermath of the fighting.

The source assured our Yaounde correspondent that though the cabinet meeting would hold under tight security, much will filter out and Cameroon Concord News Group will be promptly advised of all what will be discussed at the meeting.

By Rita Akana in Yaounde

Police in Kampala have arrested four Cameroon nationals and three Ugandans for allegedly printing and dealing in counterfeit notes.

The group was arrested in operations conducted in different areas of Kampala such as Cham Towers, Crystal Valley Hotel in Mengo, Nsambya and Mpererwe.

Addressing journalists in Kampala on Monday, February 10, 2020, Mr Fred Enanga, the police spokesperson, said the operation was conducted following intelligence gathered in the last two months

Mr Enanga further revealed that the four Cameroon nationals are international fraudsters known in Mexico, Nigeria and Austria. He said they were found with forged documents, fake dollars, Black dollars and chemicals.

He named the Ugandans as Mugume Wilson aka Mugisha arrested from Crystal valley Hotel in Mengo, Behangana Geoffrey, alias Kazungu, arrested from Nsambya, Nakiggudde Amina, a resident of Mpererwe and Masagazi Tom, a boda boda rider, working at Mini price helping her in transportation and distribution of the counterfeit notes.

Criminal Investigations Directorate (CID) records of 2018 show Ugandans lost 11 billion shillings to land and property fraudsters. People were duped with fake money making deals, fake land titles, and duplicate foreign currencies.

Police cautioned public against being lured into illegal businesses that excite them thinking they would accumulate wealth in hours. The public has also been warned to be careful with fraudsters with swift profit-making deals yet their target is to defraud unsuspecting people.

Source: PML Daily

Tuesday February 11, 2020 marks 30 years since the late South African President Nelson Mandela was released from prison.

Madiba, as he was affectionately called walked free to become South Africa’s first elected black president.

“Whites are fellow South Africans and we want them to feel safe and that we appreciate the contribution they have made towards the development of this country’‘, the late South African icon said at a press conference in Cape Town, Western Cape shortly after his release.

When Madiba walked out from the Victor Verster prison in 1990, he said ‘‘As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison.’‘

The anniversary also marks the end to a ban on political parties in South Africa and the formal end of apartheid.

The anniversary comes two days before President Cyril Ramaphosa delivers the State of the Nation Address.

Liberian Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Leyma Gbowee will also deliver a lecture at the Cape Town City hall on Tuesday.

Ramaphosa is expected to conclude this with an address titled ‘’ The speech that Birthed a Nation, 30 years on.’‘

“Education is important, because if you are not educated, you can’t be a leader.”

AFP

At least four civilians were killed in incursions by the terror group Boko Haram that took place Saturday in Cameroon’s Far North region, according to local sources on Sunday.

Three villagers were killed in Tagawa locality and another civilian was killed in Dzamazaf locality after militants of the group raided the localities, according to several security sources.

The group also torched many houses in Dzamazaf, rendering close to 500 villagers homeless, local authorities said.

Officials said, many people in the affected communities who had registered to vote in Sunday’s municipal and legislative elections in Cameroon will not be able to vote because of the attack.

It is unclear if the group intended the raids to disrupt the general elections in the region.

More than 2,000 people have been killed since Boko Haram launched attacks in the Far North since 2014, according to security reports.

Source: Xinhuanet

At least two armed separatists and one Cameroon soldier were killed on Sunday in the country’s restive Northwest region as the polling of municipal and legislative elections is underway, according to local authorities.

“They (killed separatists) attempted to stop people from voting and were gunned down by security forces,” a security officer who asked not to be named told Xinhua, adding that the incident took place in Babungu.

A member of security was also killed by separatists in Befang in the Northwest, according to the same source.

Local media reported clashes between government forces and armed separatists mainly in rural areas where the militants barricaded the roads to prevent voters from going to polling stations to vote.

Separatists have vowed to disrupt the elections in the two Anglophone regions of Northwest and Southwest where they want to establish an independent state.

Local authorities said, in spite of the tense atmosphere, the polls were unfolding as planned.

Over 6,800,000 people were registered to vote in Sunday’s general elections, about 14% of them are from the English-speaking regions, according to the latest numbers published by Elecam, Cameroon’s electoral body.

Culled from Xinhuanet

Fighting between government troops and anglophone separatists in parts of Southern Cameroons Sunday disrupted voting in legislative and municipal elections, local officials and other sources said. The authorities issued no details on casualties.

Sunday’s clash was in Muyuka, a rebel stronghold, although fighting takes place almost daily in both English-speaking regions: Northwest and Southwest, which border Nigeria.

 “There were exchanges of fire between separatists and soldiers,” said a witness contacted by telephone.” An election committee official who asked not to be named told AFP: “I called our superior in Muyuka and he said that there had been shooting early this morning, but that the situation was calm now and the electors were voting.”

 But an opposition candidate in the region, who also requested anonymity, said: “The secessionists and the soldiers clashed. There was no election.”

 Speaking by phone, a senior member of a non-governmental organisation in the region said the shooting had started early in the morning and continued until at least 11:00 am. And a senior official in the region’s administrative acknowledged that “there was practically no way of voting” in Muyuka.

 There had also been shooting at Buea, the main town in Southwest region and in Kumba in the same region, he added. But he thought it was mainly to warn off the rebel fighters and avoid a battle, she added. She too asked not to be identified.

Turnout in the troubled anglophone regions of Cameroon has been very weak, according to AFP’s correspondents at Buea, which has seen the least of the recent fighting. The three-year conflict between anglophone forces seeking to break away from French-speaking Cameroon has claimed more than 3,000 moves and forced more than 700,000 local people to flee their homes. The separatists, who declared independence from Cameroon in 2017, had made it clear that they would disrupt the elections.

Source:  VANGUARD