Life

10, March 2018

‘Trump sent personal letter to invite Putin to Miss Universe pageant in 2013’ ⁰

US President Donald Trump had sent a personal letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin inviting him to the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow, a new report says.

Citing sources familiar with the content of the letter, The Washington Post reported that Trump, who at the time owned the Miss Universe pageant, was so eager to have Putin attend the event, which was being held in Russia for the first time.

The sources, who saw the letter, said it shows how interested Trump was in attracting the personal attention of the Russian president. Trump wrote the note at a time when he was looking to expand his brand to Russia, according to the report.

At the bottom of the typed letter, the estate magnate also added a postscript saying he looked forward to seeing “beautiful” women during the trip to Moscow.

A White House spokesman and attorneys for the Trump Organization declined to comment on the report. John Dowd, an attorney for the president said he was not familiar with the letter, calling it “all nonsense.”

Trump,however, made no secret at the time about his enthusiasm for meeting Putin. In a June 18, 2013 tweet, he wrote, “Do you think Putin will be going to The Miss Universe Pageant in November in Moscow — if so, will he become my new best friend?”

US President Donald Trump (R) and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin talk as they make their way to take the “family photo” during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders’ summit in the central Vietnamese city of Danang on November 11, 2017 . (Photo by AFP)

The Russian president did not go to the event but sent a “sealed letter “and a Russian lacquered box instead, according to a former report by The Post. What the letter said has never been revealed.

Special counsel Robert Mueller, who has been investigating alleged collusion between Trump’s Presidential campaign and the Russian government, have asked witnesses questions about the Miss Universe pageant and Trump’s interest in having Putin attend the event, according to the report.

Allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election that have gripped Trump’s administration prompted his legal team to pursue negotiations with Mueller to end the probe in exchange for an interview with the president, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday. Muller declined to comment on the report.

Trump has so far made contradictory stories about whether he met Putin before he became president. During a Republican primary debate in November 2015, he claimed that he knew Putin “very well.” But the next year, he said in an interview with CBS that he has “nothing to do with Russia, nothing to do, I never met Putin, I have nothing to do with Russia whatsoever.” Both Moscow and Washington have consistently denied the allegations of collusion.

Source: Presstv

10, March 2018

CPDM Crime Syndicate: Fame Ndongo appoints another corpse in Maroua University ⁰

It appears there is no limit to the odium Cameroonians will suffer at the hands of Paul Biya and his “untouchable” Higher Education Minister, Fame Ndongo. After the scandal involving Biya’s laptop computers, Fame Ndongo, in a communique signed and published March 7, 2018, appointed Prof Teyabe Marcelline née Dama to head the Language Sciences and Communication Dept of the University of Maroua.

The only problem here is that the said varsity don died on Oct 31, 2017 and was buried on Nov 11, 2017 in her native Kaélé. In this era of information and communication technology, the cavalier management of something as basic as human resources by the Biya regime speaks to an incompetence that goes beyond carelessness and poor judgment. But the buck of all the carelessness stops at the president’s desk.

Biya must take responsibility for the actions of those he appoints into positions of authority and power. Clearly, there have been daily indications that there are far too many of them who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.

By Ekinneh Agbaw-Ebai

6, March 2018

Nigeria: Medecins Sans Frontieres suspends work in Rann ⁰

Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said it had suspended work in the Nigerian town Rann and evacuated national and international staff after a deadly raid.

Suspected Boko Haram militants killed at least 11 people including three aid workers in an attack on a military barracks in north-eastern Borno state on Thursday, according to two security reports.

“Following a violent attack in Rann, Borno state, on Thursday March 1, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) suspended medical activities in the town and evacuated 22 national and international staff,” MSF said in a statement.

“It is unclear how many people were killed and injured but before leaving, MSF medical staff treated nine wounded patients,” it added.

Source: Reuters

2, March 2018

Teachers detained in Cameroon over pay protest ⁰

More than 200 Cameroonian teachers demanding back pay and allowances have been arrested and detained in police stations across the capital Yaoundé after attempting to hold street protests on Tuesday.

Their family members say they have not had any contact since.

The leader of group, Samuel Ekoto, told BBC Afrique that plans to resolve the pay dispute last year weren’t honoured, adding:

We demand the release of our colleagues. Some of us have been waiting one, two, three years [for a resolution over pay] but there’s a lack of commitment from the authorities.”

But some teachers disagree. A spokesman for another teacher’s body, Jacques Bessala Ngono, told BBC Afrique it believed progress was being made in talks with the authorities and so had cut ties with those who protested.

Culled from the BBC

1, March 2018

Ambazonia Crisis: CRTV Buea begs for more security after threat ⁰

State-owned Cameroon Radio Televison (CRTV) in the restive South West region has reported of security threats from persons believed to be separatists.

According to a letter written by CRTV regional station manager, workers needed reinforced security especially in the wake of a threatening call to an official at Mt. Cameroon FM.

The letter addressed to the Governor of the region said an anonymous person believed to be a member of the separatists group was behind the call. Titled “Telephone Threats from Ambazonia elements,” the letter dated February 26, 2018; read as follows:

His message was frightful; that they were coming to Buea to kidnap, the Divisional Officer for Buea, the Governor and take over CRTV.

“I wish to draw your attention to the fact that an unidentified person called my collaborator Mme Charline Flore Demgne, Chief of Service for Programmes and Information at Mt. Cameroom FM on Monday, February 26, 2018 at 7am.

“I, therefore appeal to you to reinforce security at CRTV South West and put the whole city on alert,” it concluded.

Separatists under the banner the so-called Ambazonia Republic have abducted two government officials in February 2018. First a divisional commander and more recently an administrative official in the North West region also affected by what is referred to as the Anglophone crisis.

The kidnapping is a new trend in the activities of the armed wing of the separatists – the Ambazonia Defense Force (ADF). They have in the past months used guerilla style attacks on security forces killing over twenty officers at last count.

Government insists that there is durable peace in the two regions despite deadly attacks on the security forces. Curfews have been slapped on the two regions in the wake of the attacks. There has also been reports of military reprisals on locals.

Thousands of Cameroonians have fled into neighbouring Nigeria to escape the reported attacks. The United Nations refugee agency has said the numbers fleeing the crisis continues to grow. The government has been tasked to pursue dialogue but no concrete steps have so far been undertaken.

Culled from Africa News

1, March 2018

Nigeria: Death toll from Lassa fever reaches 72 ⁰

Nigeria is suffering its worst outbreak of Lassa fever, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday, as local health officials said 72 people had died since the start of this year.

Lassa fever, named after the town in northern Nigeria where it was first identified in 1969, is endemic but the number of confirmed cases “has never reached” this level before, it added.

“Nigeria’s Lassa fever outbreak has reached record highs, with 317 laboratory confirmed cases,” the WHO said in a statement, quoting figures from the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC).

On February 6, 31 people were reported to have died from the disease, which is caused by a virus of the same family as Marburg and Ebola.

But in an update, the NCDC said: “Since the onset of the 2018, 325 cases have been classified as: 317 confirmed cases, eight probable cases with 72 deaths.”

Fourteen health workers have been affected by the virus in six states.

The WHO said a total of 2,845 people who have come into contact with patients have been identified and were being monitored.

Worst-hit by the virus is Edo state, in the south, where Crusoe Osagie, a media aide to the state government, said mostly rural areas were affected.

“Edo state is the only state with Lagos to have a special treating hospital for this disease, which is in Irrua,” he told AFP. “People come here from all over. ”

The federal-owned facility usually deals with about a hundred cases each year but has already handled that number in the last two months, he added.

WHO said it was supporting the NCDC effort to contain the disease and treat those affected in treatment centres across the country.

“The ability to rapidly detect cases of infection in the community and refer them early for treatment improves patients’ chances of survival and is critical to this response,” said the world body’s representative in Nigeria, Wondimagegnehu Alemu.

Lassa fever is spread through contact with food or items contaminated with rats’ urine or faeces or after coming into direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person.

It can be prevented by enhanced hygiene and avoidance of all contact with rats.

More than 100 people were killed in 2016 in an outbreaks affecting 14 of the 36 states, including Lagos and the capital Abuja.

Source: Africa News

28, February 2018

Cameroon, Nigeria and unwanted headaches ⁰

Besieged by an unending campaign of terror by Boko Haram in the northeast, secessionist agitations in the southeast, and vicious attacks by suspected Fulani herdsmen in north central states and elsewhere, Nigeria is a country in need of an urgent reprieve.

Unfortunately, that reprieve seems to be more of a mirage than an actuality.

The theatre commander of the Nigerian troops fighting insurgents in the northeast recently claimed victory against a sect that has proved many times that it can reinvent itself to withstand the heat from the Nigerian troops.

Much like Nigeria, again, Cameroon’s major problem is no longer the insurgents that have killed about 25,000 people in both countries, according to SBM Intelligence estimate, the push for independence by its Anglophone region is now casting a blanket of violence on the country.

The separatists, on October 1, 2017, declared the northwest and southwest regions as the self-proclaimed ‘Republic of Ambazonia’. There is no need to seek an expert view to know that President Paul Biya, a man who has ruled Cameroon for more than 34 years, will haunt the separatists.

Already, hundreds of people have reportedly lost their lives, hundreds more have been imprisoned, and at least 15,000 have escaped across the border to Nigeria, SBM noted in the report published on February 19, 2018.

However, for Nigeria, which has its own internally displaced people to cater to, the influx of Cameroonians escaping from the violence in their country is another headache to a troubled head. Nevertheless, the situation would be a lot better if it remains just that.

With both countries sharing a 1,975km-long border, either side of which are violent crises, the possibility of the proliferation of small weapons is high. Also scary is the presence of fighters, trained, semi-trained or untrained, ready to handle these weapons.

Added to that is the penchant for Cameroonian troops to violate the sanctity of the Nigerian border. In recent months, the Cameroonian military have entered into Nigeria, chasing Anglophone secessionists, without prior permission from the Nigerian authorities. This is in spite of Nigerian authorities handing over 47 leaders of the separatist movement who were arrested in Abuja in January, even though Nigeria does not have a standing extradition agreement with its neighbour.

Besides, the crackdown on the separatists by the country’s military is creating a set of radicalised, maybe untrained, army who have become willing to fill the ranks of the Ambazonian Defence Forces (ADF).

Already, they have been launching attacks from Nigerian territory in recent weeks, aided significantly by a porous border.

“The truth is that many militants are hiding among the refugees, and they just cross the border at will through the forest,” Lawrence Asuquo, head of immigration at Ikom, told AFP.

“They launch attacks on the Cameroonian army and they run back to Nigeria. It’s almost impossible to track them.”

Apart from the security problems that Nigeria faces, there is also an economic dimension to the crisis.

Figures from Cameroon’s Ministry of Commerce show that Nigeria is the country’s largest trade partner, with 22 per cent and 17.8 per cent of imports coming from Nigeria in 2011 and 2012 respectively. Currently, annual trade exchanges are approximated to be worth ₦217 billion, excluding “the robust informal trade linkages on both sides of the almost 2000km border shared by both countries.”

However, if the crisis festers and Cameroon continues to violate the integrity of the Nigerian border, there is the likelihood that the trade volume, formal or informal, between the two countries would reduce drastically.

Both Nigeria and Cameroon are still reeling from the effect of Boko Haram insurgency. An unending separatist agitation is the last thing they need at this time.

Source: The Guardian

20, February 2018

Malawi: Cholera outbreak kills nine ⁰

A cholera outbreak in Malawi described as “very difficult to contain” has claimed nine lives and affected a total of 541 people nationwide, health officials said on Tuesday.

The outbreak began in November near the landlocked southern African nation’s northern border with Tanzania and has since spread to other regions of the country.

UNICEF’s representative to Malawi Johannes Wedenig told local media that “as long as people in Malawi don’t change the behavior of using unsafe water, it’ll be very difficult to contain”.

He urged Malawians to follow strict sanitation rules and stressed the importance of hand-washing before eating or preparing food.

Cholera is a water-borne diarrhoeal disease that can kill within hours if left untreated, but is easily cured with oral rehydration, intravenous fluids and antibiotics.

A woman draws water from an unprotected well at Kawondo in Area 36, in Lilongwen Malawi, on January 25, 2018. (Photo by AFP)

Clean water and hygiene standards are critical to controlling transmission.

The country has also received 216,000 oral cholera treatment packs from the World Health Organization which are being distributed in the badly-affected northern region, health ministry spokesman Joshua Malango told AFP.

Another 450,000 doses are expected to arrive soon for distribution in the rest of the country, added Malango, confirming the current toll.

Health officials have begun a media blitz to educate people about the risk of cholera and what steps they can take to avoid contracting it.

(Source: AFP)

20, February 2018

Ambazonia Crisis: Medical Doctor shot in Bamenda ⁰

A Southern Cameroons physician in Bamenda the chief city in the North of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, Dr Veh Dinga-Nyoh of PMI Nkwen , was shot on the back this morning on her way to work by troops loyal to the Biya regime. Giving an account of the incident to our London editorial office, CIR’s Sama Ernest reported that she has been transferred to the regional hospital for urgent surgical intervention.

Dr Veh Dinga-Nyoh was shot on the lower part of the back on the right side. We understand she was in a taxi heading to work this morning when a gendarme opened fire. Dr Veh was alone in the taxi with the driver who was not hurt.

Urgent surgical intervention is to be carried out to remove the bullet and to verify if any damages have been caused in her internal organs especially as the bullet hole is so close to the kidney.

14, February 2018

Cold Birthday: Cameroon Intelligence Report Analyse Biya-Chantal Birthday Photos ⁰

Many observers have remarked on the recent photo published by Cameroon Concord News Group on President Biya’s 85 birthday celebration forcing us to hire the services of some photo experts to scrutinize the birthday pictures.

The observed animosity and discomfort was evident from the very first photo snapped of the event reportedly hosted at the Unity Palace. The photos showed an elaborate cake with President Biya and his wife grinning with merriment.

Cameroon Intelligence Report has clarified the photo to be a Photoshop modification of a half decent computer artist. Upon scrutinizing the photos they concluded that;

They found a little girl of Asian origin in the background. That supported their theory that the original photo belonged to a family of Asian lineage.

There were three cakes on the cake tray stand where Biya participated in the cutting. So why was Biya holding another cake in the same photo? Where would that fit?

The home background, furniture and deco are all of Asian extraction.
The complexion of his hands is too light and appears youthful for an African male at 85 years of age.
Mrs. Chantal Biya has always loved exotic hairstyles correspondingly; the style on the photo isn’t her taste.

The photos released by the presidency of the republic purporting to show a healthy Paul Biya, may as well just be another ploy by the ruling CPDM crime syndicate to mislead national and international public opinion about his health.

By Chi Prudence Asong in London