Life

23, May 2017

Yaounde: Awareness programmes mark “World No Tobacco Day” ⁰

A free consultation campaign for smokers has been launched at the Cite Verte District Hospital in Yaoundé. The two-day campaign that began on the 22nd May 2017 was initiated by the Cameroonian Coalition for Tobacco Control (C3T) as part of activities ahead of the World No Tobacco Day on the 31^st of May 2017. Commemorative activities are holding under the theme, “Tobacco: A threat to development.”

According to the Communication Officer of C3T, Caleb Ayong the health campaign aims at informing smokers on the damage caused by smoking and the importance of constant medical check-up and follow-up treatment. He also stated that tobacco is a deadly product that kills half of all its consumers, adding that many ignore the devastating effects of tobacco because they are not immediate.

The Cameroonian Coalition for Tobacco Control’s Communication Officer expressed the wish that by the end of the campaign, Tuesday 23rd May, many smokers would have turned up for the free consultation and take necessary measures to get adequate treatment.

According to a communiqué signed by the President of the C3T, Dr Flore Ndembiyembe, sensitization stickers will be distributed to inter-urban transporters on 30th May and a Poster Exhibition dubbed the Shocking Truth will be organized at the Cercle Municipale, Bonanjo in Douala on 31st May 2017.

Source: CRTV

21, May 2017

Yaounde: Husband stops wife from boarding flight to Paris ⁰

A man prevented his wife from boarding a flight to Paris at the Yaoundé Nsimalen airport last Thursday. The lady whose names we are withholding had gone through airport security and was waiting for the time to initiate the formalities for her boarding when her husband arrived and handed over their marriage certificate to the airport police officers who later denied the woman access to the plane.

The 32-year-old wife tried to leave her 39-year-old husband with their her 4 children and taking more than half of their family savings of over 2.5 million CFA francs from their credit union account. The husband, originally from the West region, is a taxi driver and the owner of several others. He was informed of the secret project by his wife’s best friend. Feeling betrayed, the husband hurried to Yaoundé Nsimalen airport on the day of the flight with their marriage certificate and managed to block his wife’s trip to Europe.

Cameroon Concord News gathered that the lady, who hails from Douala in the Littoral reportedly, met a man via Face Book who had promised her a better life and marriage in Europe. After several virtual exchanges, the young lady decided to make the trip. After the drama last Thursday, the husband, decided to seek divorce. But the two families took steps to bring back the serenity and the idea of divorce has been dropped.

By Rita Akana

Cameroon Concord News

18, May 2017

Anglophone teachers in Yaoundé have refused to correct copies of the 2017 Common Entrance Examination ⁰

Unhappy with the reduction the Francophone government’s reduction of the marking fees from 60 francs last year to 33 CFA francs this year, Anglophone teachers in Yaoundé have said that they will not correct a single script of the Common Entrance Examination that held on Tuesday 16 May 2017. The expression on the faces, and the angry tone of the conversations held with some of the teachers by our cream of reporters in Yaoundé, speaks volumes about the prevailing situation.

The 2017 session of the Common Entrance has just been completed by the primary school pupils and they are now waiting for the red ball pen users to get the correction job done. However, Cameroon Concord News has learnt from the Anglophone teaching community in Yaoundé that none of these teachers intend to enter the marking centers.

The Southern Cameroonians have refused to make the corrections and are also denouncing the drastic reduction of their expenses envisaged for this task. They had already done so last year, when the Biya Francophone government reduced the correction costs by half, from 120 CFA francs to 60 francs. The teachers were already in the marking centers yesterday Wednesday, May 17, 2017 preparing the marking scheme to start the corrections, when the CPDM Regional Delegate for the Center Region sent by the Minister of Basic Education announced another drastic reduction- a reduction according to which each teacher will receive only 33 CFA francs per corrected script.

This time around, the pill was impossible to swallow for these dedicated Anglophone teachers especially as reductions have become recurring in the cost of marking the Common Entrance Examination. Based on a Prime Minister Order that sets the fee for correction of the Common Entrance at 120 CFA francs, the angry teachers have made it clear that no copy will be marked under these conditions. It is now evident the Southern Cameroons crisis has spilled over into French Cameroun.

By Rita Akana

Cameroon Concord News

17, May 2017

La Republique: Adèle Mballa Atangana dropped by CRTV following on-air blunder ⁰

The management of the Cameroon Radio and Television, CRTV has replaced the 8:30 pm Francophone newscaster, Adèle Mballa Atangana. Mballa Atangana who also moonlights as Director of Information at Crtv-Television desk was told to get some rest yesterday Tuesday the 16^th of May. CRTV insiders say she is presently depressed following a costly mistake she made during the presentation of the Monday May 15^th 8:30 pm news in the French language.

Adèle Mballa Atangana announced the new members of the French government whose names were unveiled, according to her, shortly after the appointment that Monday, of Edouard Philippe to the post of Prime Minister by French President Emmanuel Macron. Some French citizens in Cameroon did inform CRTV that the new French government has not been made public . The French statement indicated that a new government was expected today Wednesday May 17, 2017. CRTV’s editorial board later on discovered that Adele Mballa Atangana was drowned by the many hoaxes circulating since Monday on the web about the first French government of the Macron era.

Adèle Mballa Atangana was replaced by Evelyne Owona Essomba who presented the 8:30 pm news on Tuesday May the 16^th 2017. CRTV is used to perpetrate crimes against Anglophones far worse than the Lake Nyos Disaster or the numerous deaths recorded on the Tiko-Douala highway. It is an instrument of mass mobilization through falsehood, corruption of the popular conscience and the deification of the 84 year old dictator who has finally destroyed the tribal tolerance miraculously put in place by the late President Ahidjo. CRTV was and is the conduit through which egregious violations and crimes of unimaginable magnitude are perpetrated against Southern Cameroonians.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Cameroon Concord News Group

17, May 2017

French Cameroun: State cracks down on medical doctors ⁰

André Mama Fouda, the Francophone Minister of Public Health, has decided to send a neurologist and a neurosurgeon to a health center, which is devoid of any equipment, and is housed in small locality of barely 500 inhabitants, whereas these specialists are rare in the large cities hosting several millions of people.

In a typical Francophone style of governance, these young doctors, some of whom are teachers and researchers, will no longer be able to pursue their research or offer courses to their students. The only crime committed by these doctors particularly, Dr. Bassong is that he is the leader of the Cameroon Medical Union (Symec), which has called for a strike action to fix the country’s public health system.

Cameroon Concord News gathered that for three months, Cameroonian doctors have observed three days of strike, widely followed, by all medics throughout the national territory. The doctors are calling for the introduction of universal health coverage in order to improve the supply of care and to ensure equal access to care for all Cameroonians from all walks of life.

SYMEC inter alia is also calling for a salary increment for doctors in the public sub-sector, the suspension of assignments for unpaid medics and the implementation of an accelerated processing procedure for their integration files including an increase in the retirement age of doctors from 55 to 65 years.

In the face of the doctors’ grumbling, the government seems to have decided to asphyxiate the strikers, through disciplinary measures, with the sole objective of decapitating the union, which is advocating the end of a policy whereby some few privileged patients are ferried abroad for treatment in a nation where a little more than 8000 Cameroonian doctors have moved outside the national borders.

Minister Mama Fouda has pushed his cynicism further, by banning last Sunday the broadcasting on a private and state television a message from Symec in which the latter had explained the motivations behind the strike action.

By Chi Prudence Asong

16, May 2017

Dumbed down: GCE Board, Gov’t produced exam papers all crashed ⁰

The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium has recorded another victory in the battle for Southern Cameroons as West Cameroon students have massively boycotted the 2017 session of the General Certificate of Education Examination which the Francophone government claimed that it all started well yesterday. Cameroon Concord News can now reveal that the whole process has been a complete and total disaster.

Nature also had a hand in the struggle as bees reportedly invaded the Government High School Buea campus leaving several candidates to escape for their lives. A hand full of students answered present in almost all centers despite measures put in place by the Francophone Minister of Secondary Education, Jean Ernest Massena Ngale Bibehe. Cameroon Info.Net recently quoted a journalist serving with Equinoxe, a popular radio station based in Douala who reported that only 10 out of the 31 students showed up for Computer Sciences in Government Bilingual High School, GBHS Tombel in the South West region. The situation was also true for GBHS Bayele in the North West region where only 200 answered present out of over a 1000 expected.

The GCE Board headed by a pro Biya comedian has said it is too early to advance figures but local media reports have all confirmed a massive boycott. Cameroon Concord News also gathered that shocked by the low turnout, the GCE Board attempted to merge some centers for the state television cameras. Some students from Our Lady of Mount Camel in Muea,Buea were left stranded as they discovered on campus that their center had been moved to GBHS Muea.

In the South West region,7 centers hosted 41 schools in Computer Sciences while 8 centers are hosting 48 schools in Food Sciences. In Limbe only two schools, GBHS and GHS Limbe hosted what is now being described as Francophone GCE. No boarding academic establishment was used for the 2017 GCE examinations.

By Rita Akana

Cameroon Concord News

15, May 2017

African American family kicked off JetBlue flight over birthday cake ⁰

An African American family has been kicked off a JetBlue flight for carrying a birthday cake that flight crew said posed a “safety risk.” The incident took place at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport on May 3, when Cameron Burke, his wife and their two children tried to board a Las Vegas-bound flight en route to a birthday party for the mother.

The flight crew gave the Burkes conflicting advice on where to store their birthday cake and ended up forcing them off the plane although they were fully compliant, said the family. A video clip from the incident shows that the Burkes were forced off the plane even after Port Authority officers showed up at the scene and saw “no wrongdoing” on their part.

JetBlue confirmed Sunday that the family was asked to leave the airplane after they insisted on storing the cake in “improper” places and refused to move it. “The customers became agitated, cursed and yelled at the crew, and made false accusations about a crew member’s fitness to fly,” JetBlue spokesman Doug McGraw said.

Burke children and their mothers look on nervously as flight crew confront them for bringing a cake on board an airplane, May 3, 2017.

Apparently, one of the crew first asked the family to move the cake from their overhead bin to another one and then told them to store it under a seat. However, another flight attendant appeared and asked the family to leave.

“I just want to know why,” Cameron’s wife, Minta, is heard shouting on the video. “Exactly!” Cameron replies. “For a cake?” McGraw said that all passengers were deplaned and rebooked as a result. The plane then took off with the family’s luggage.

The Burkes flew to Las Vegas on a United Airlines flight the next day. However, Cameron said he was going to file a lawsuit against JetBlue.

Source: Presstv

14, May 2017

2017 GCE Crisis: Tension as Black Vipers issue stern warning to Anglophone parents ⁰

The Francophone government has made it public that the practical part of the 2017 June session of the General Certificate of Education, GCE, will begin tomorrow Monday May 15, 2017 in all Centers across the country including students who did not register for the examination.

The decision to allow those who did not registered for the 2017 GCE session was taken by the Francophone Secondary Education Minister, Jean Ernest Massena Ngale Bibehe while on a tour of Southern Cameroons territory. The Minister revealed that new centers have been created and those who did not register will be separated from the eligible candidates.

Tight Security has been previewed for Monday in all the centers following assurance that came from Mr. Jean Ernest Massena. This year, the corrupt management of the GCE Board announced that some 129 000 students registered for the exams— 54 000 less than last year’s figures.

The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium has warned parents to keep their children at home at all times and to also boycott the so-called National Day parades coming up on May the 20^th. The newly created military wing of the Southern Cameroons revolution known as the ‘black vipers’ have promised to ruthlessly crush any student whoever dares to go out to take part in this year’s GCE. The Francophone government has assured parents that nothing will happen to their children.

Several candidates who fled the troubled North West and South West regions will be writing in Douala, Bafoussam and Yaoundé.

By Rita Akana with files from Cameroon Info.Net

13, May 2017

DR Congo hit by fresh Ebola outbreak ⁰

The first Ebola outbreak since the crisis in West Africa that killed 11,300 people has been declared in northeast Democratic Republic of Congo, the World Health Organization said Friday, after the virus caused three deaths in the area. In a television address, Health Minister Oly Ilunga confirmed the cases while urging the population “not to panic.”

The country “has taken all necessary measures to respond quickly and efficiently to this new outbreak,” he said. The DR Congo outbreak is the first there in three years. The three deaths all occurred since April 22. The WHO said it was working closely with DR Congo authorities to help deploy health workers and protective equipment in the remote area, which is difficult for teams to access, in order to “rapidly control the outbreak.”

The organization underlined the importance of tracing people who had contact with confirmed victims to prevent the disease spreading. Sufferers are advised to keep themselves isolated while awaiting treatment for a disease whose incubation period is 21 days.

The WHO said the outbreak, the eighth to date in DR Congo, had affected an equatorial forest region difficult to access in Bas-Uele province, bordering Central African Republic. The last instance of Ebola in Congo in 2014, which was not linked to an outbreak in neighboring states at the time, was quickly contained and killed 49 people according to official figures.

That outbreak saw 66 registered cases hit the district of Boende some 800 kilometers (500 miles) northeast of Kinshasa for an official fatality rate of 74.2 percent. The United Nations at the time saluted the “immense work” DR Congo authorities had put in to contain the disease spread. In 2013, an Ebola crisis began in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Source: Presstv

12, May 2017

Biya regime makes public a new code of conduct for success in End-of-Course Exams in Southern Cameroons ⁰

Secondary Education Minister yesterday instructed special measures to accommodate students who did not register for 2017 examinations. Messages to build hope towards the so-called hitch- free 2017 end-of-course examinations in the North West region was the subject of a frank exchange between the visiting Minister of Secondary Education, Jean Ernest Ngalle Messena Bibehe and CPDM experts in Bamenda on May 10, 2017. The stakes featured security concerns, preparedness of students in some confessional schools, movements of students to and from accommodation Centers and logistics for credible examinations schedule to begin on May 15 with practicals and June 12, 2017 for the written session.

In the region to asses and follow up the state of preparedness, Minister Jean Ernest Ngalle Massena Bibehe reassured all technical collaborators of government’s responsibility to ensure the proper organization and management of the examination in times like this when the social crisis that haunt the North West and South West Regions did not help matters for the 2016/2017 academic year. The visiting Minister, North West Governor, Adolphe Lele Lafrique, the Director of Examinations, GCE and BAC Board authorities took turns to abate worries which include appeals to reinforce security in accommodation schools and concerns about students who, either did not prepare or missed out on registration for the examinations.

It was against this backdrop that in a late hour move, the Minister instructed the Registrar of the GCE Board to give a listening ear with special measures to accommodate such students who show up for examinations. He stressed that all students ready for the examinations will be given a chance and that the government will help matters for movement concerns. Governor Adolphe Lele Lafrique reassured that security will be stepped up and stressed the need for stakeholders to be part of special security measures and readily denounce any threats for action.

Minister Jean Ernest Ngalle Massena Bibehe challenged stakeholders to play their roles and revealed special communications measures to enhance vigilance and probity. The stakes are high and the Minister urged all to showcase a high sense of patriotism for the success of the examination in the supreme interest of children’s right to education. It also emerged from the working session which assembled heads of Accommodation Centers, Principals, Educational Secretaries of Confessional and Lay private education sectors , trade union leaders, that some 40,573 candidates registered for the GCE in the North West, 1,651 for BAC and some 12,277 for technical education.

Source: Cameroon Tribune