After more than two years of violent confrontations in Cameroon, the world is gradually taking note of the ferocious brutality that is playing out in the country. The Southern Cameroons crisis that has been unfolding for two years spiraled out of control in 2018 as many armed groups in the two English-speaking regions of the country threw their hats into the ring.

During this period, some 5,000 Cameroonians – both civilians and soldiers – have met their death as the government pursues its policy of collective punishment. Many civilians have seen their homes burnt down by government forces which have opted for a “scorch-earth” policy that is hurting many vulnerable people who have nothing to do with the conflict.

For some time now, there has been some silent diplomacy behind the scenes and Americans have been working hard to ensure the Biya regime caves in. The US embassy in Cameroon needs to be credited for all the diplomatic efforts it has made to ensure that government forces do not kill innocent civilians with impunity. The US administration has been urging the government to comply with the Geneva Convention. It even reduced its military aid to Cameroon as a first and serious step toward demonstrating that it will not tolerate impunity and human rights violations.

With the Biya regime still insisting that state authority must be respected and that Southern Cameroonians must be made to regret their decision to kill some 2,000 troops, the country’s military has continued to unleash the full spectrum of its anger on a population it accuses of supporting the separatists.

This ferocious violence has caught the attention of many and this time around, the Swiss have also decided to play a key role in efforts aimed at restoring peace in Cameroon.  The Southern Cameroons crisis which started in October 2016 has finally caught the attention of the world and some steps are being taken to alleviate the pain and suffering of the people of Southern Cameroons. Many around the world are hoping that his visit will lead to a ceasefire that will enable the United Nations (UN) to deploy its staff in the troubled regions.

It should also be underscored that in January 2018, a Swiss delegation, led by Nicoletta Mariolini, was in Cameroon where it had a long discussion with members of the Musonge bilingualism commission on the possibilities of cooperation with a view to enhancing national unity and peaceful co-existence between the various linguistic groups of the country.

The President of Switzerland, Ueli Maurer, has joined the ongoing efforts to end the brutality. He is expected to be in Cameroon in the coming days where he will be meeting Cameroon’s President, Paul Biya, where their discussions will focus on ways and means of putting an end to the brutality.

For two years, Southern Cameroonians have been longing for the UN to come in and save lives, but the global body which does not have a standing army was caught up in a cobweb of negotiations with the Yaounde government that is wary of the global body.

Despite pressure from powerful nations like the United States and Canada, the Yaounde government has continued to play ball with the UN and this has resulted in many people losing their lives. Things have been complicated by the fact that the UN lacks the resources to carry out a peacekeeping mission in many parts of the world.

Currently, the UN needs USD 15.2 million but has only succeeded to mobilize USD 5.1 which has enabled it to send some international staff to Buea and Bamenda and there is a huge recruitment campaign going on in those two cities. The various UN humanitarian bodies need local staff to help them deliver humanitarian assistance to those who need it the most.

In a report published in January 2019 on the situation in Cameroon, the UN highlighted the need for a prompt and urgent response to ensure things do not further deteriorate.

“Insecurity in the affected regions remains high, with continuing armed attacks and confrontations between the military and armed groups. The crisis further worsened from mid-2018 onward due to increased hostilities ahead of the presidential election. Movements continue to be restricted in the two regions due to a curfew in the North-West, a “No Movement” declaration by non-state actors and the increase of both official and informal checkpoints,” the report says

“In the South West, on 3 January CDC workers of the Rubber Plantation in Tiko, Fako Division while at work were attacked by Non-state armed men (NSAG). They were tortured, and their toes and fingers cut off for working in the Plantation against the policy of armed groups. In January, troops clashed with armed groups across the two regions with ensuing fatalities and destroyed properties and vehicles. Military operations increased in both regions to counter armed group plans for February ‘lockdown’. Preventive displacement and stockpiling was ongoing at the time of writing of this report. Declining security situation during the month is expected,” the report says.

“Hostilities have continued to claim civilian lives, from indirect fire and from disturbing reports of targeted killings. Urban attacks have resulted in deaths from cross-fire and civilian casualties have been reported as a result of raids on villages. In late January, large scale military operations were launched in the Bafut area resulting in numerous casualties for both combatants and civilians. On 25 January, the military killed 11 people they suspected of being armed separatists in Mpundu-Balong in the Southwest region. Incidents were also reported taking place in Marumba and Tiko amongst others. Abductions continue to be an ongoing concern,” the report reveals.

“The violence has uprooted 437,500 people from their homes and forced over 32,000 to seek refuge in neighbouring Nigeria. Humanitarian organizations are striving to scale-up their presence in the conflict-hit regions. Shelters, NFI and Education have been identified in the North-West and South-West regions as the most urgent needs. Almost 50 per cent of the displaced have settled in rural areas and have an increased need for shelter and non-food items. More than 80% of girls and boys no longer have access to schooling on a continuous basis because of the crisis,” the report says.

“The outlook for 2019 is one of emergency response as displacement continues due to the ongoing conflict. Vulnerability is compounded as services deteriorate and resilience is eroded. Access remains challenging as poor levels of understanding of humanitarian action persist and infrastructure is damaged in armed conflict related operations to deny mobility to opposing forces. Armed fighting and insecurity continue to be the principal impediment to the provision of assistance as well as a barrier to those in need in terms of reaching areas where they can receive aid,” the report points out.

The majority of those displaced are women and children. Protection is the principal humanitarian concern as the ongoing conflict is the main cause of human suffering. Food and shelter are also of concern as displacement continues. Needs across all sectors are high and are being further compounded as the conflict deepens.

Of particular concern is access to water for areas requiring water transportation during days when movement is limited. Many of the conflict-affected populations are growing more vulnerable as the violence persists and humanitarian assistance remains inadequate, the report stresses.

“The deployment of humanitarian actors to the field continues. A further allocation of CERF to Cameroon will in part support humanitarian activities in the North-West and South-West regions. As of 7 January, donors had provided 35 per cent of the US$15.2 million required as per the emergency response plan, according to the Financial Tracking Service (FTS). This amount constitutes the US$5.1 million CERF allocation under the rapid response window. Additional contributions were received by other donors but not yet reported on FTS,” the report says.

For almost three years after the conflict started, the international community has been calling for inclusive dialogue, but its passivity and lack of interest in the whole situation have led many Southern Cameroonians to accuse it of connivance with the Biya region to decimate the indigenous people of Southern Cameroons. The international community is now coming out of the “Omerta” it imposed on itself. This will surely enable Southern Cameroonians to stop seeing it as an accomplice in the genocide that is currently playing out in their country.

Now that the government is listening, it is time for the international community to get tough on a government that is considered by its own citizens as a crime syndicate. Its corruption has robbed its own people of happiness and prosperity.  Today, it is fiercely promoting the principle of political tribalism as a means of sustaining itself in power.  The market-dominant minority that has enriched itself through unorthodox means has brought untold hardship to Cameroonians. It has to go and Cameroonians in general hold that the intervention of the international community will be a welcome relief. Turning a blind eye to the problem will not make it go away. The international community must step in to restore peace in a country that is anything, but democratic.

By Kingsley Betek in Yaounde and Irene Nanyongo in North America

A four-day international agro-pastoral summit organized by the Cameroonian government in partnership with the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) opened in the capital, Yaounde, on Thursday.

The opening ceremony was attended by local and foreign government officials and agricultural investors.

“We need to trust the land, to trust agriculture. And importantly, employment is now possible with agriculture,” Cameroon’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Gabriel Mbairobe who chaired the opening ceremony told reporters.

According to the ministry of agriculture, 500 participants from 35 countries are attending the summit which runs from Thursday to Sunday.

“We expect this summit to be a game changer especially for young people in Africa. Africa can lead the world in agriculture if we have the needed support from our governments,” Rose Bole, a 35-year-old participant from Nigeria observed.

“We hope to share experiences and create a veritable synergy for the promotion of agriculture the world over during this summit,” Emmanuel Kofi, a participant from Ghana said.

Cameroon hopes to tap into its agriculture potential in a bid to attract investors during the summit, Mbairobe said.

Xinhuanet

Journalist Macmillan Ambe Awa was covering the unrest in western Cameroon when he became part of the story.

He was kidnapped by armed men and held for 24 terrifying hours before being released, physically unhurt but shaken.

“They accused me of making programmes that say children should go back to school,” Ambe Awa told AFP by telephone, referring to an educational boycott by the region’s anglophone separatist movement.

Traumatic as the ordeal was, such experiences are almost routine in Cameroon’s English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions.

Insurgents have staged hundreds of kidnappings, both for ransom and as a political message — alongside ambushes targeting soldiers and police, and arson attacks on buildings symbolising the central government, including schools and hospitals.

Their armed uprising began in October 2017 following years of simmering anger at perceived discrimination by the country’s French-speaking majority.

Since then, at least 500 civilians and more than 200 members of the security forces have died in clashes, attacks and a government crackdown, the International Crisis Group (ICG) says.

‘Scared to go out’

Many residents of Buea, capital of Cameroon’s Southwest region, say they are in despair over the ongoing violence. By MARCO LONGARI (AFP/File)

Earlier this month, almost 170 pupils were abducted from Kumbo in the Northwest and freed after a day in captivity. The kidnappers demanded the closure of the high school, which has not opened its doors since.

And in November, another 90 students were kidnapped and held for five days, again on grounds that their school be closed.

“It’s shameful that the separatists should have adopted this strategy,” said a resident of Buea, capital of the Southwest region.

The separatists justify their boycott on grounds that the French system discriminates against anglophone pupils.

Witnesses said the army raided searched dozens of homes in and around Kumbo after the latest mass kidnapping, with soldiers torching several of them in retaliation.

The ministry of communication denied such reports when they appeared in the press, but it was not the first time the security forces had come under fire for such actions in anglophone areas.

‘Opportunistic’ kidnappings

The violence and abductions have created a real climate of fear.

Earlier this month, Buea hosted the annual “Race of Hope” to the summit of Mount Cameroon, an active volcano which rises 4,040 metres (13,250 feet) and is the highest peak in the country.

But this time, Sports Minister Narcisse Mouelle Kombi turned up in a bullet-proof vest and a helmet, and dozens of armed men were deployed at Buea stadium.

Map of Cameroon locating English-speaking regions and their capitals, Bamenda and Buea.. By Valentina BRESCHI (AFP)

In both regions, the insecurity caused by frequent clashes between troops and the separatists has also led to a steady increase in activity by criminal gangs.

And such gangs have realised that kidnapping is lucrative.

“About a third of abductions are the work of opportunistic armed bandits,” said Hans de Marie Heungoup, a Cameroon researcher for the ICG.

And efforts to differentiate between separatist attacks and those motivated by criminal interests has become ever harder due to the splintering of separatist groups.

But in the eyes of Yaounde, there is no difference. Agitators are all “terrorists”.

Burden of history

Divisions between the anglophone regions and Cameroon’s authorities date back a century to when Britain and France occupied Cameroon, taking over Germany’s principal colony in West Africa.

France was given the greater part of the territory, which became independent in 1960.

A year later, the British colony also gained independence, with some of the English-speaking areas choosing to join newly-formed Nigeria, while others opted to become part of the federation of Cameroon.

In the following decades, Cameroon’s anglophone minority routinely complained about unequal treatment in areas like education, the law and the economy.

Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes in Northwest and Southwest regions — more than 30,000 have sought shelter in neighbouring Nigeria. By PIUS UTOMI EKPEI (AFP)

But demands for greater autonomy were repeatedly rebuffed by President Paul Biya, and eventually the campaign became radicalised.

On October 1 2017, an anglophone group symbolically declared the independence of the “Republic of Ambazonia” in the two regions, triggering a crackdown that saw the separatists responding with violence.

Since then, at least 437,000 people have fled their homes, according to UN estimates, with another 32,000 fleeing across the border to Nigeria.

“We’re trapped,” a Buea resident said.

“We’re scared to go out, we’re scared to take the bus,” he told AFP.

“For a long time, I thought things would calm down so we stayed, but I’ve started to call the family in Douala to tell them we’ll be coming,” he said of Cameroon’s economic capital, which lies on the coast.

“There’s nothing more for us here.”

Source: Ghana News

The battle lines of the conflict in this central African country are drawn by language. About 80 per cent of the country speaks French; the rest speaks English. For decades, Francophones and Anglophones lived in relative harmony. But over the past two years, violence spurred by this linguistic split has brought Cameroon to the brink of civil war. Hundreds have died, close to 500,000 have been displaced, and activists have been rounded up and jailed. The government claims armed English-speaking separatists who want to create a new nation called Ambazonia have terrorised civilians and attacked government forces, prompting the military to retaliate against them. But in more than a dozen interviews, English speakers displaced by military raids on their villages recounted how Cameroonian troops opened fire on unarmed civilians and burnt down their homes. Soldiers often arrived to Anglophone villages early in the morning, they said. But instead of looking for armed independence fighters, they fired indiscriminately, at times leaving the bodies of young men piled in the streets.

Witnesses and victims say the government’s use of force has driven a growing number of moderate Cameroonians to throw their support behind the armed separatists, a shift that threatens to intensify the government crackdown and deepen divisions between French and English speakers in the once-peaceful nation. If this conflict spreads beyond the Anglophone regions, it could destabilise the whole country.

“I don’t want Cameroon anymore,” says Daniel, a civilian who fled to Dschang, a French-speaking city close to the border of one English-speaking region, after government forces attacked his village and shot an old woman dead. He asked for his last name not to be used out of fear of retribution for his comments, as did the other English-speaking Cameroonians in this story. “I want to fight for a new country.” Late last year, the United Nations warned there had been a surge of violence on both sides. At least 400 civilians were killed in the preceding year, Amnesty International reported in September. Colonel Didier Badjeck, spokesperson for Cameroon’s military, disputed that estimate and said that around 170 Cameroonian troops had been killed as of November 2018. Among the hundreds of thousands of Cameroonians displaced are about 30,000 who fled to Nigeria as refugees, according to United Nations estimates.

Human rights groups have also accused separatists of attacking security forces and burning down schools, among other abuses. The African Union has called for dialogue but affirmed its “unwavering commitment to the unity and territorial integrity of Cameroon”.

Commander Candice Tresch, a spokesperson for the US Defence Department, said that the United States has received assurances from the Cameroonian government that US assistance will not be diverted from its intended purpose, which includes fighting Islamist extremists in the north. She says the United States closely monitors “units serving in the northwest and southwest against whom credible allegations of gross violations of human rights have been lodged, to ensure they do not receive additional training or equipment if and when they are transferred to areas dealing with the Boko Haram menace”. “We will consider suspending or reprogramming additional assistance when and as necessary,” she said. Tibor Nagy, US assistant secretary of state for African affairs, said the United States takes allegations of human rights violations in Cameroon seriously. “The last thing we would want is [if] units that we were training to fight against terrorism are then used against populations in the Anglophone regions,” Nagy said.

The Cameroonian government denies that it is targeting civilians or burning down Anglophone villages. Issa Tchiroma Bakary, who served as communications minister until January, said that the military is defending civilians from the secessionists and that most Cameroonians living in English-speaking regions “are hostages of the separatists”. Badjeck said the military is burning only secessionist camps, not civilian villages.

Civilians who have fled Anglophone areas and advocates working with them tell a different story. Survivors and advocates say violent government attacks on villages have prompted an exodus from Cameroon’s two English-speaking regions in the northwest and southwest of the Anglophone region.

As with other countries in Africa, Cameroon’s modern-day, bilingual identity was shaped by European colonial powers. Even its name, a derivative of the Portuguese camarões or “shrimp”, hints at Europe’s centuries-old control over the country’s identity.

In 1916, France and Britain seized the territory from Germany, and it was later divided between them. Then, in 1960, French-speaking Cameroon won independence and established a new nation: La République du Cameroun. The following year, English speakers in part of the British territory opted to join Cameroon, and a bilingual country was born. Cameroon is home to more than 200 local languages, making it one of the most linguistically diverse countries in Africa. But French and English are its official languages, unifying its many ethnic groups.

French speakers largely control Cameroon’s government and its elite circles, and some Anglophones have long felt marginalised by the central government. President Paul Biya, a Francophone, has held office since 1982 and was re-elected for another seven-year term in October, after a widely contested election. Many English speakers did not participate in the vote.

Today’s conflict can be traced to late 2016, when English-speaking lawyers and teachers organised peaceful protests, a movement born of frustrations that the government had assigned French-speaking judges and teachers to English-speaking courts and schools. English speakers claimed that officials in Yaounde were essentially forcing the minority Anglophones to assimilate into Francophone legal and educational systems.

The government claims to have initially agreed to some reforms but also cracked down on the activists, jailing a number of moderate leaders and killing some protesters. The original activists watched from prison as more-extreme voices, those calling for full separation from Cameroon, drowned out what had started as less-aggressive demands.

Those arrests were “the turning point in the struggle”, says Felix Agbor Nkongho, an Anglophone human rights lawyer who helped organise protests and then was jailed. “The movement now had to fall in the hands of people who were more extremist, who were not only clamouring for the rights but wanted independence.”

Fighting escalated in spring 2018. Separatists ramped up their attacks against the military, and the Cameroonian troops retaliated, leaving civilians caught in the crossfire, according to English speakers who fled from the military during that period.

Early on a clear April morning last year, Amkemngu, a local government official from the southwestern village of Azi, woke to the sound of heavy machine-gun fire. Government troops had come to the village, he says, to look for armed separatists. He fled to the top of a hill, clambering through thick brush until he found a clearing. It was from there that he watched as soldiers below opened fire on an elderly woman who was trying to escape.

Hours later, Amkemngu, 64, softly trudged down the hill to dig a hole and bury the woman’s body.

“You can only ask [President] Biya why he is sending his army to come attack his own people,” he says. A member of Cameroon’s ruling party, he even decorated his home with photos of the leader whom his brother, a soldier, died protecting decades earlier.

Now, he’s willing to fight and die for Ambazonia. “There’s no turning back,” he says.

Amkemngu is one of a growing number of English-speaking Cameroonians who, after surviving government attacks on their villages, have grown disillusioned with a unified Cameroon and believe the separatist cause is the only path forward. Akole, a 45-year-old father from Menji in the southwest, says that when the government “realises that you are from the English-speaking part of the country, you don’t deserve being alive”.

He says one of his nephews was shot dead by the military, and two of his sons went missing after troops opened fire on their village in April. In the chaos, soldiers set fire to houses and shops, he says. Losing family members during the military attacks made him lose all faith in the government and pushed him into the arms of the separatists, who he says do not target innocent people.

“Civilians love the way the Amba-boys are behaving with them,” he says, using a local nickname for the secessionists. Aaron, who retired to his village, Oshie, in the northwest, was living quietly, tending to his small cocoa farm for a modest living. Then, in June, soldiers opened fire on his village, and Aaron hid in a hole behind his house.

When the 76-year-old emerged close to dusk, the home he had spent his life savings to build was on fire. Nearby, a relative, a young man with disabilities, had been shot dead. He took one look at his surroundings and fled on foot, eventually reaching the French-speaking port city of Douala. The military crackdown has caused so much damage, he says, that he now sees no future for a unified Cameroon. If he goes back to his village one day, he wants it to be in Ambazonia.

“I don’t want to be here,” he says about Douala. “I don’t feel free here.”

Witnesses to government attacks say the military’s aggressive approach to the conflict, including indiscriminate violence against civilians, has eroded English speakers’ trust in the government and made them fearful of military intervention.  Monique, a seamstress who also fled to Douala, says that troops reached the village of Angwi in April and ordered everyone in the main square to lie flat on their stomachs. When her pregnant friend said she couldn’t, a young soldier lifted his rifle and shot her dead.

The soldier who shot her friend was wearing a black vest emblazoned with the letters BIR, she says, the French acronym for the Rapid Intervention Battalion, an elite unit that US troops have trained to fight the Boko Haram extremist group in the country’s far northern region.

Badjeck, the military spokesperson, denied allegations of human rights abuses in these villages, saying the accounts amounted to “propaganda”. In an earlier interview, he acknowledged that there have been cases of human rights abuses but said that they are appropriately investigated and that misbehaviour is “not our code of conduct”. He also acknowledged that troops have faced difficulties distinguishing civilians from separatists. “The enemy is inside the population,” he said. “They go in one door and they’re normal citizens, they come out the back door and they have an arm and are secessionists. That’s what makes this combat difficult.”

Many English speakers who fled the military still live in fear that they will be targeted in the French-speaking areas where they sought refuge. In Dschang, Daniel, 40, who fled from Azi in April, is sharing two small rooms with a dozen family members. His house in Azi was burnt, and he ran through the bush with his children, avoiding the military along the way.

“Even now,” he says, “the military is searching for us, the youths.”

© Washington Post