The Catholic Church in Nigeria says the continued influx of Cameroon refugees into Nigeria’s Cross River State was worsening the poverty situation in host communities.

According to Caritas Nigeria, a wing of the Catholic Secretariat of Nigeria (CSN), poor communities were suffering from the burden of hosting fleeing Cameroonians.

Head of Caritas Nigeria, Rev. Fr Evaristus Bassey, in a press statement said the Anglophone crisis in south and northwest Cameroon was beyond the political and security parameters, posing a huge humanitarian condition.

“While Caritas Nigeria has carried out assessments in Cross River State where the refugees have the largest concentration, it is seeking for guidance on other areas where the refugees are located to make necessary assessments in the state.

“The assessment revealed that the Cameroonian refugees in Cross Rivers State were mostly based in the communities within Nigeria that are sharing borders with Cameroon.

“Most refugees lived within host communities with relatives or in abandoned government quarters or uncompleted buildings or any available open space.

“They have been dependent on the generosity of their also impoverished host communities for food and clothing as most of them fled for their lives with only the clothes they had on.”

The United Nations refugee body, UNHCR, has reported that persons fleeing the security situation in Cameroon were virtually entering Nigeria with little or nothing. They have been offering immediate relief as they continue efforts at registering them.

Back in Cameroon, the Ambazonia group continues its face – off with security forces. Over 20 security personnel – soldiers, police, gendarmes, have so far been killed. President Biya has declared war against the separatists seeking to breakaway from the French – majority Cameroon.

Calls for effective and sincere dialogue has been made severally. Biya hinted that he supported dialogue but no concrete efforts have materialized in that area. A known separatist leader, Julius Ayuk Tabe and over 40 others were recently deported from Nigeria to Yoaunde.

Source: Africa News

Boko Haram fighters stormed a village in northeast Nigeria and murdered two civilians, while six people were killed in an attack in northern Cameroon, a local resident and security sources told AFP on Monday. The attacks came as Nigeria’s military again maintained the jihadists had been defeated, and that its repeated raids and suicide bombings were “a sign of weakness”.

At least 20,000 people have been killed in nearly nine years of violence and more than 2.6 million made homeless, triggering a humanitarian crisis across the Lake Chad region. Bulama Bukar said Boko Haram fighters stormed his village, Alau-Kofa, about 8:00 pm (1900 GMT) on Sunday, firing guns and rocket-propelled grenades.

“Two people were burnt alive and the whole village was burnt, along with our food,” he told AFP. Bukar, whose father was shot in the leg during the attack, said the jihadists “specifically came to steal our cattle” but were forced to abandon the herds when soldiers arrived.

“Last Wednesday they attacked the village, killed three people and took away 50 cattle. And now they came back,” he added.  A security source 12 kilometres (7.5 miles) away in the Borno state capital Maiduguri, confirmed Bukar’s account.

“It is part of the fightback strategy by the terrorists, who are facing mounting pressure from the military,” he said. Another security source in Cameroon said “six people were killed and the attackers burnt down more than 100 houses” in the village of Hitawa, at about 11:00 pm on Sunday.

Nigeria’s military said last week they had cleared the Sambisa Forest in Borno state of Boko Haram fighters — just over a year after making a similar claim. Major General Rogers Ibe Nicholas, leading operations against the jihadists, was reported as saying on Monday that the Islamic State affiliate was “completely defeated”.

Asked about the claim, he told AFP: “In the Sambisa Forest where we have them, we have completely defeated them.” The military was “taking them on wherever they go outside that area, he added. He attributed Sunday’s attack in Alau-Kofa to “criminals who came to steal goats”.

At a meeting with the military and security agencies in Maiduguri, Nigeria’s Information Minister Lai Mohammed said: “The last phase of the war with Boko Haram is now on.

“The military is punching deep into the enclaves of the insurgents,” he said, adding that the group was only able to mount “cowardly attacks on soft targets”. “That, in itself, is a sign of weakness,” he added. There have been repeated assertions that military operations were in the final stages dating back even further to the previous administration.

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari first claimed the jihadists were “technically defeated” in December 2015. But the security source warned against triumphalism, despite recent successes. “They have indeed been pushed out of Sambisa. They have relocated their camps to Dubur and Yuwe on the rear fringes of Sambisa.” Boko Haram’s capacity has been weakened since it controlled swathes of territory in northeast Nigeria in 2014 but it still poses a threat.

The BBC last month said the militants killed at least 967 people in 150 attacks in 2017, up from 910 deaths in 127 attacks the previous year. Civilians remain at risk, particularly in remote rural areas and even in more well-guarded camps for people displaced by the conflict.

This and a recent federal government request for an extra $1 billion for security funding have led to questions about the veracity of claims about the end of the conflict. Similarly, the military has been asked why it needs 12 Super Tucano A-29 ground aircraft from the United States if the militants are scattered and on the run.

The air force said last month the aircraft were required “to consolidate on successes recorded so far.” The security source said troops on the ground remained cautious about hunting down Boko Haram factional leader Abubakar Shekau, as he was using hostages as human shields.

They include some of the schoolgirls abducted from the Borno town of Chibok in April 2014 and female police officers seized in an ambush last year. “They don’t want to harm them, which is why they are limiting aerial offensives,” he added.

Source: Indian Express

Security forces in Cameroon have killed at least five civilians in the country’s restive Anglophone region from late last week through the weekend, multiple sources have disclosed. On Friday, two people were reportedly shot dead on a road linking Bamenda (capital of the northwest region) to a neighbouring town of Bafut.

A security source said the security officials opened fire on occupants of a vehicle after they delayed in stepping out after they were stopped. We were going back home when the gendarmes arrested us. They opened fire at our vehicle because some of us were slow to get out.

Another person was killed in the Belo region at a time when armed officials invaded private homes ostensibly in reprisals after two officers were killed in the area. Authorities blamed the deadly attacks on armed separatists.

The other death was in Bamenda late Saturday when a young man enjoying time out with relations was shot death. His father confirmed the death after seeing his son’s body at the morgue.

“We were going back home when the gendarmes arrested us. They opened fire at our vehicle because some of us were slow to get out,” the victim’s brother said.

“My brother died after being shot. There were four of us in the car, I managed to escape and the other two were arrested,” he said on condition of anonymity.

Meanwhile, the streets of Bamenda are said to have been deserted following the gunfire and deaths that resulted over the weekend.

Violence has flared in the past week, with armed separatist factions clashing against Cameroon security forces in several towns and villages in the two English-speaking regions after Nigeria deported the leader of the self-declared state and 46 others.

The United Nations refugee agency condemned the handing over of the 47 people, saying most of them had submitted asylum claims and their forced return was in violation of international refugee law.

More than 43,000 Cameroonians have fled as refugees to Nigeria to escape the government crackdown on the separatists, say local aid officials. The majority are in Nigeria’s Cross River state, which borders southwest Cameroon.

Source: Africa News

A leading American investigator into the illegal ivory and rhino horn trade has been found stabbed to death in his home, Kenyan police and officials said Monday.

A family member went to Esmond Bradley Martin’s house on Sunday to check on him after he did not respond to phone calls and found the body on a bed with a stab wound to the neck, said Nicolas Kamwende, head of criminal investigations in the capital, Nairobi.

Conservationist Paula Kahumbu said Martin led investigations into the illegal trade of elephant ivory and rhino horn that threatens the two species with extinction. He was at the forefront of exposing ivory traffickers in the US, Congo, Vietnam, Nigeria, Angola, China and recently Myanmar, Kahumbu said.

“A passionate and committed man who made a big difference to our planet. May he rest in peace,” British High Commissioner to Kenya Nic Hailey said in a Twitter post.

Conservation group Save the Elephants described Martin as “a longtime ally,” a passionate champion of wildlife and meticulous researcher.

Illicit demand for elephant ivory has led to devastating losses from illegal poaching as the natural habitat available for the animals to roam has also dwindled by more than half. As a result, the number of African elephants has shrunk from about 5 million a century ago to about 400,000 remaining. And that number continues to decline each year.

Less than 30,000 rhinos are estimated to remain in the wild due to poaching.

The price of rhino horn skyrocketed as demand has grown in Asian countries, mainly China and Vietnam, where consumers wrongly believe that the horn made of the same substance as fingernails has powerful healing properties. Syndicates from Vietnam, China, South Korea and Thailand have been identified as being involved in the trafficking.

(Source: AP)

At least four civilians have been killed in a suspected militant attack in northern Mali over the weekend, local officials said Sunday.

An unknown number of the attackers were also killed in fighting as the “suspected militants killed at least four civilians around Talataye,” a northeastern town of around 14,000 people, regional officials told AFP.

Mali’s deteriorating security situation is of growing concern as al-Qaeda-linked groups mount increasingly deadly attacks on domestic and foreign forces.

In the Talataye area the militants often target an Azawad group, the traditionally nomadic Tuareg people of the desert, who they consider too close to a pro-governmental armed group, another elected local official said.

Civilians considered too close to the Azawad group are, in turn, considered legitimate targets, he added.

According to a Mali security source, the assailants took hostages during Friday’s attacks, and killed at least one of them on Saturday.

On Sunday tension remained high in and around Talataye, a foreign security source told AFP.

Friday’s attack came after Mali’s army decided to ban the use of scooters and pick-up trucks in some areas to boost their fight against armed militant groups.

Such vehicles are often used by extremist fighters, in the north and the center of the country.

The ban applies to a dozen “circles” in the central regions of Segou and Mopti and northwest Timbuktu region.

“Humanitarian convoys, and all other convoys, must receive authorization from the local military command in order to receive an escort,” the army said, adding that anyone failing to do so would be considered a “military target”.

In late January, 14 soldiers were killed and 18 more wounded in an attack on their camp in Mali’s restive north.

That attack in Soumpi, in the Timbuktu region, came two days after 26 civilians including mothers and babies were killed when their vehicle ran over a landmine in Boni, central Mali, according to a UN death toll.

Extremists linked to al-Qaeda took control of the desert north of Mali in early 2012, but were largely driven out in a French-led military operation launched in January 2013.

In June 2015, Mali’s government signed a peace agreement with coalitions of non-militant armed groups. But extremist insurgents remain active, and large tracts of the country are lawless.

“Humanitarian convoys, and all other convoys, must receive authorization from the local military command in order to receive an escort,” the army said, adding that anyone failing to do so would be considered a “military target”.

(Source: AFP)

Human rights lawyer, Femi Falana SAN has sent an open letter to President Muhammadu Buhari asking him to “bring back naturalized Nigerians, Refugees and Asylum Seekers who were illegally arrested, detained and deported from to Cameroon on Friday, January 26, 2018 by the National Security Adviser, Major-General Babagana Monguno (retd).”

In the open letter today Falana said “We write this protest letter on behalf of our clients whose names and status are set out in the List of Deportees attached to this letter.”

According to Falana, “Our clients are not illegal immigrants in Nigeria. Three of them are naturalized Nigerian citizens while others are recognized refugees and political asylum seekers in Nigeria.”

The letter read in part: “Twelve of our clients who are the leaders of the people of Southern Cameroon and who have been living in Nigeria for several years were assembled for a meeting at Nera Hotel, Abuja on Saturday, January 6, 2018 to discuss the challenges faced by the over 10,000 Cameroonians who have sought political asylum in Nigeria due to persecution and repression under the Paul Biya regime in Cameroon.”

“But before the commencement of the meeting a team of armed security personnel invaded the venue, abducted our clients and took them away to an undisclosed place. The said abduction was reported by the Premium Times edition of Sunday, January 7, 2018.”

“In spite of the detailed report of the credible online news medium the Police and the security agencies denied knowledge of the abduction of our clients. Consequently, all efforts made by the lawyers, doctors and family members of our clients to visit them in custody were frustrated without any legal justification. Even Mrs. Nalowa Bih who is pregnant was denied medical attention by the National Security Adviser.”

“However, a representative of the Office of the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees in Nigeria was allowed to visit our clients at the request of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. During the visit, the United Nations representative found that our clients were held in an underground cell at the headquarters of the Defence Intelligence Agency on the orders of the National Security Adviser.”

“On account of the refusal of the National Security Adviser to allow access to our clients by their lawyers, relatives and doctors we filed an application at the Abuja Judicial Division of the Federal High Court on Thursday, January 25, 2018 for the purpose of securing their fundamental rights to personal liberty and freedom of movement.”

“Notwithstanding the pending suit and the intervention of the Office of the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees, the National Security Adviser expelled our clients from Nigeria and deported them to Cameroon on Friday, January 26, 2018.”

“Although the National Security Adviser was ashamed to disclose the deportation of our clients from Nigeria the Government of Cameroon has celebrated the deportation and threatened to prosecute our clients for unspecified crimes. Thus, with the connivance of the National Security Adviser the Government of Cameroon has since held our clients in an undisclosed military custody in Cameroon.”

“Out of the 52 people who were expelled from Nigeria the Government of Cameroon has maintained that the National Security Adviser handed over to it 47 deportees. Up till now, the National Security Adviser has not accounted for the whereabouts of the remaining 5 detainees!”

“The National Security Adviser knew that two of our clients are naturalized Nigerians, six are refugees while 37 others are political asylum seekers who are entitled to be protected by the Federal Government of Nigeria. For the avoidance of doubt, the Office of the United Nations Commissioner for Refugees in Nigeria drew the attention of the National Security Adviser to the legal obligations of Nigeria to respect the rights of our clients.”

“Under the National Security Agencies Act (Cap N74) Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004 and the Immigration Act 2015 the National Security Adviser is not competent to arrest, detain and deport any alien or immigrant from Nigeria to any other country.”

“Since the Government of Nigeria has never violated the provisions of the United Nations Convention Relating to Refugees and the OAU Convention on Refugees by deporting refugees and asylum seekers to any country where they might be persecuted we are compelled to urge Your Excellency to grant the following requests: Order the National Security Adviser to produce the missing 5 deportees and bring back to Nigeria our clients who have been illegally deported to Cameroon without any further delay.”

“If the National Security Adviser is unable to bring back our clients to Nigeria he should be removed from office for such brazen impunity which has exposed Nigeria to ridicule before the comity of law abiding nations. The Federal Government should prevail on the Government of Cameroon not to persecute our clients to prevent the United Nations from sanctioning Nigeria for violating the provisions of the 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to Refugees.”

“You will therefore agree with us that the arrest, detention and deportation of our clients from Nigeria to Cameroon by the National Security Adviser cannot be justified on the following grounds: Based on the appeal by Nigeria for a peaceful resolution of the political crisis in Cameroon the people of Southern Cameroon filed a suit at the Federal High Court to determine whether the people of Southern Cameroon are not entitled to self-determination within their clearly defined territory separate from La Republique Du Cameroun.”

“By a consent judgment delivered by the Court on March 5, 2002, the Federal Government was directed to file a suit at the International Court of Justice to have a judicial confirmation of the human right of the people of Southern Cameroon to self determination. Attached herewith and marked annexure A is a certified true copy of the judgment.”

“The Federal Government also undertook to take other measures as may be necessary to place the case of the people of Southern Cameroon for self determination before the United Nations General Assembly and other international organizations.”

“Even though the suit has not been filed at the International Court of Justice the Federal Government has continued to recognize the human rights of our clients and other people of Southern Cameroon to self determination.”

Source: PMNEWS

The Cameroon military will soon be answering for its crimes in Manyu Division following its actions in that region. It is now emerging that after the government’s military operation in Manyu Division, many residents of the Division’s leading city are talking of mass graves in and around the city. Cameroon Concord News Group West Africa Bureau Chief, Kingsley Betek, who is currently in Mamfe, has gathered that there is a huge mass grave behind the former Council Office which is located just in front of deep valley.

Residents of the area have been advising our correspondent of the eerie sounds and cries of young men being beaten as the military sought to check the “Odeshi Boys” who were chopping down army soldiers sent from Yaounde to come and quell the rebellion in Mamfe.

“We used to see many young men being dragged to that location by angry soldiers. The boys were being maltreated and despite their plea that they were not responsible for the killing of army soldiers, government troops beat them up like animals. I know that many have been killed and dumped behind the former council office located on the way to Banya. I am prepared to testify whenever the international community comes to investigate the crimes committed by the soldiers,” a resident of Mamfe, who elected anonymity, said.

“The army is supposed to protect civilians, but when the troops came here, they beat up everybody for a crime that was committed by a few people. We do not even know those who have been killing the soldiers, but each time that happens, soldiers go on a rampage. They have completely destroyed Kembong and other surrounding villages and this makes it hard for us to go to our farms and send our children to school. It is like they are instead helping to enforce ghost town operations here,” the angry resident of Mamfe added, stressing that “government has to change its strategy. We would not be in this mess if the government had seen things differently.”

“The government does not even seem to see the folly in its actions. Intimidating and killing civilians makes it hard for the civilians to work with the police or gendarmes. For any real security to return to the environment, the government must consider the local population as its ally instead of its enemy,” he stressed.

There are also reports that there are other mass graves on the way to Eshobi, a little town some 40km from Mamfe town where government troops had set up camps, giving the impression that they wanted to construct the road. Many residents are today accusing the government of employing that strategy to hide its evil deeds in the area.

Residents of villages in Manyu Division are still bitter about the military action against them. They accuse the soldiers of having stolen their cocoa, coffee and petrol as they swept through those villages in their search for the young and determined fighters who actually gave the soldiers a run for their money.

It is alleged that huge bags of cocoa and coffee are being stocked at the Besongabang military camp and some soldiers are using this produce to make some fast money. Besides using the conflict as an excuse to enrich themselves, army soldiers are stopping business people from plying their trade in the region. Many rice exporters are being asked to give more than CFAF 2,000,000 as bribe for them to carry their products to Nigeria and this is done with the knowledge of the top military officials in the region. This is not only robbing the people of their revenue, it is also rendering many young men unemployed and these young men are those who are swelling the ranks of the dangerous fighters.

Meanwhile, the fighting in Southern Cameroons has intensified following the extradition of the Ambazonian President, Julius Ayuk Tabe, to Yaounde. Many young Southern Cameroonians have stepped up attacks on soldiers and gendarmes in a bid to express their frustration and anger.

Two gendarmes were attacked on Thursday in the North Western town of Mbingo by masked men, who shot the uniformed officers point blank, killing the male officer on the spot. The female officer is struggling for her life in the town’s main hospital.

In Bangem, a town in the Southwest region of the country, Amba Tigers have been fighting running battles with Cameroon’s military in the city’s downtown core where it is reported that an ELECAM official has been killed alongside some army soldiers. Unconfirmed reports indicate that more than four people have been killed in Bangem since the Tigers showed up to carry revenge attacks against army soldiers following the extradition of Mr. Ayuk Tabe who has become the incontestable poster child of the Southern Cameroons struggle.

It has also been reported that civilians in the town of Bangem are heading out of the town in large numbers to surrounding villages in a bid to seek refuge from army soldiers who have been attacking and killing unarmed and innocent civilians.

Other towns such Pinyin and Batibo in the Northwest region have also witnessed clashes between Ambazonian fighters and government troops. The increasing attacks had been predicted by many analysts and politicians who had posited that the arrest and extradition of Mr. Ayuk Tabe would only exacerbate things as more people would be radicalized.

Many international observers are calling on the government of Cameroon to use this moment to smoke the pipe of peace as military violence and intimidation have not produced the results the government had expected. They contend that the government must change its strategy as the current one is gradually pulling the country towards a bloody civil war that is unnecessary.

It should be recalled that the government of Cameroon which is stuck in the past is using old tactics that had been employed in the 60s against French Cameroon freedom fighters popularly known as Maquisards in the pious hope that the Southern Cameroons population will submit to its will.

Critics point out that it has unfortunately failed to understand that times have changed. People are more educated today and the existence of the Internet have made it hard for such tactics to produce the desired results. Besides, with a huge and prosperous Southern Cameroons Diaspora, it will be hard for the government of Cameroon to obtain an outright victory.

The Diaspora is propping up efforts of the young and determined fighters who sincerely hold that with a little luck they can successfully bring the government of Cameroon to the negotiating table or get Southern Cameroons out of the mess in which short-sighted politicians like Muna and Foncha had dumped the region.

The Southern Cameroons Diaspora will continue to destabilize Cameroon for a long time if the government does not make permanent dialogue a way of life in a country that was hastily stitched together by the United Nations. The Southern Cameroons Diaspora is rich and it has successfully transformed marginalization into a huge opportunity.

The government therefore stands to gain if it changes its policies to recognize the Diaspora as a strategic partner in the country’s efforts to attain sustainable levels of development.

Mr. Biya and his government must now embrace dialogue as the ideal way to pull the country from the brink. From reactions obtained following the arrest and extradition of Mr. Ayuk Tabe, it is obvious that more blood will continue to flow, as Southern Cameroonians are determined to follow through with their threat of splitting the country.

By Kingsley Betek in Mamfe

More than 80 Cameroonian soldiers, early yesterday, crossed the international border between Nigeria and Cameroun and invaded Danare in Boki Local Government Area of Cross River State, claiming they were fighting Cameroon militants who took refuge in the community. Vanguard learned that more than 3,000 refugees from Cameroun are currently taking refuge in Danare, which borders the Central African country. Army A group of Danare indigenes, led by a former councillor in Boki coucil,  Dauglas Ogar, who  addressed journalists in Calabar, yesterday,  said the gendarmes stormed their village about 2p.m., yesterday  and  started shooting, sending people running for  safety. He said: “Our people did not sleep yesterday because the gendarmes from Cameroun invaded our community claiming to be looking for Ambazonia militants.  The militants, who have since taken refuge in the surrounding forests, were also shooting and the whole community was in chaos.

“It is important to recall the sad invasion of Danare communities by  Cameroonian soldiers on January 25 this year when more than 80 well armed Cameroonian soldiers crossed the international boundary in the Danare-Daddi/Danare-Bodam international border openings and abducted five natives. “By the time they left this morning (yesterday), they said their mission was to warn residents of Danare communities to be aware of their return to carry out a military raid. “According to them, it was intended to cleanse Danare communities of all Ambazonia refugees’ threat to the Cameroon Government.

“The soldiers threatened to come back to Danare to execute the proscription of Southern Cameroonians taking asylum in Danare as a result of the ongoing Anbazonia crises which resulted in the mass influx of refugees from neighbouring Southern Cameroon villages to Danare  communities and many other Nigerian border communities. “This is a calculated offensive from Cameroon military on Nigeria. They have shown outright defiance to Nigeria’s territorial sovereignty and dammed the consequences of crossing the international boundary to carrying out all sort of intimidation and harassment on already alarmed citizens of Danare, with warnings of their further assault.”

He noted that the current situation in their community points “to how weak the Cameroon government sees Nigeria and its security consciousness. “They have weighed the vulnerability of defenceless residents of Danare and concluded that it was capable of inflicting mass death on the citizens of Nigeria and refugees of Southern Cameroon hosted in Danare.” He explained that the breach of the country’s internal security was posing a serious danger to the peace and safety of residents, the refugees and  the entire Boki communities in Nigeria. “The Paul Byia contingents are leveraging on the poor security state of Danare border and all Boki communities to hatch a well-thought out genocide,” he said.

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