Security forces have taken Anglophone leaders hostage in Bamenda as talks between the French speaking and English delegations has ended again with no resolution. Francophone troops have reportedly stormed the governor’s office and seized all mobile telephones from the members of the Anglophone Consortium. Southern Cameroons leaders have requested the Yaounde delegation to take bribe off the table. We are keeping a watchful eye on the goings-on in Bamenda and we will keep our readers posted.

The meeting between Teachers Trade Unionists, members of Government and Stake holders in the education sector resumes today following a nine hour deliberation on Thursday January 12, 2017 at the North West Governors office.

The Director of Cabinet at the Prime Minister’s Office, Paul Goghomu Mingo has said that the teachers should demonstrate a sense of patriotism and responsibility. He observed that the wish is for children to go back to school and cover up for time wasted. Mr Goghomu reiterated that Government is already doing something to solve the problems raised by teachers in the English sub system of education citing the deployment of over 100 teachers to the North West and South West regions in secondary schools and the President’s decree on the creation of 1000 jobs for bilingual teachers.

The deliberation took hours and a huge crowd at the governor’s office waited for the ‘white smoke’ in vein. The ad hoc committee went point after point and later went on break by 5pm. It was only after 8pm that the meeting was adjourned.

Trade Union leaders maintained that the strike will continue even after adoption of resolutions unless the President of the Republic decrees them. The meeting was later adjourned by 8pm after 8 of the 18 points had been scrutinized. A trade Union leader said “The strike will only be lifted by the Consortium after clear deliberations and at a press conference when it becomes necessary.”

Cameroun Info.Net

On Feb. 8th, 2016, hundreds of youths in Wum in Menchum Division NWR, took to the streets protesting the brutal killing of a young Commercial Bike Rider by a soldier. The said soldier {a francophone} had stabbed the young at about 2am following an argument over a woman. That happened in a liquor bar in central town. The soldier promptly fled. Infuriated, youths seized the slain man’s body from the Wum mortuary and paraded it on the streets for hours and finally dumped it at the military barracks. Things degenerated and soldiers opened fire in the ensuing confrontation. Many were wounded.

In the days and weeks that followed, soldiers and police from Bamenda cracked down on the population taking away scores of young people and the 3rd Class Chief of Waindo in Wum. At least four others were dragged from their sick beds at the Wum General Hospital – against the advice of the doctor in charge. They were all whisked off to Bamenda and demanded in prison custody. Also note that the arrests were typical of the abuses unleashed on UB students last month – breaking into homes, seizing of suspects, smeared in dust and mud; they were beaten and parading half-naked at the Wum Grand Stand and in scorching sun.

Then one night, without warning they were plucked from their prison cells and shipped off to Yaoundé (including a lone pregnant girl prisoner) a relative to the dead Ben Skin Rider. Although the pregnant girl was subsequently released after about three months, nothing has been heard of the rest of the Anglophone Detainees from Wum.

Theirs was clearly a daring resistance to what they described as excesses of French speaking soldiers who frequently acted with impunity, tormenting women, man and bike riders. Their pent up anger exploded and they razed a building at the military barracks and vandalized some military trucks – just like last November’s riots in Bamenda where irate youths burnt down a police station. Southern Cameroonians have resisted the regime and obtained the freedom of several youths arrested in Bamenda and taken to Yaounde. The Consortium has done well to achieve this. Is it too much to ask that this same protest action be directed towards the freedom of the Wum Detainees languishing for one long year now in French speaking Yaounde?

The only difference between the Wum Youths and their Bamenda compatriots is the dates of their respective protests or resistance activities. But their motives were definitely the same. The Wum Youths should be honoured for standing up to the brutality of the regime even at a time when the current nationalist momentum was absent. Justice that is good for the Bamenda youths is also good for the Wum and Kumba youths still being held in Kondengui – far away from their home. At best they should simply be freed.

At worst, they should be brought back to their region where (if they must), undergo trial in Bamenda or Wum where the military court can also seat . This way, they will be near their relatives who would easily support their welfare behind bars. So shall we abandon the Wum Youths? Kai!! May our consciences deprive us of good sleep if we do.  Dear Consortium Members, did you hear my plea? Did the Hon. Wirba not tell us this is a DUTY?

Randy Joe Sa’ah

Southern Cameroons detainees released late last night in Yaounde have arrived Bamenda, the capital of the North West region. The freedom fighters were welcomed home by the Francophone governor. The whereabouts of many are still not known.

Southern Cameroon engineers will begin mass production of the largest AK47 rifle ever. The demand for the made in Bamenda weapon has been alarming following the atrocities committed recently in Southern Cameroons by the Francophone army.  A senior Southern Cameroons commander announced the decision on Tuesday, adding that Anglophones are also building a strategy of self defense if talks between the Consortium and the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime fail.

The commander further pointed out that Southern Cameroonians who have served in the US, French and British militaries abroad have been contacted to start the process of building a Southern Cameroons army. One of the foot soldiers of the last riots in Kumba told Cameroon Intelligence Report that the Southern Cameroons military will be a a strategic force with the power and capabilities of playing a very influential role in protecting British Southern Cameroons interests both at home and abroad.

Culled from Cameroon Intelligence Report

The former governor of the South West and North West region, David Abouèm à Tchoyi has sounded a note of caution to President Biya and his Beti Ewondo gang, that the Anglophone crisis may become a more dangerous version of Boko Haram. The respected former civil administrator who served as governor of the two Anglophone regions noted recently that “One can remain deaf to appeals, close one’s eyes to the obvious, clash in denial, or even think like the first Vice Chancellor of the Federal University of Cameroon who, answering this question in 1964, had this memorable phrase: “There is no Anglophone problem; All Anglophones learn French very quickly “. But it is all of us who, very quickly, will be able to be caught up by the realities, warned the experienced administrator.

David Abouèm à Tchoyi pointed out that the Anglophone problem is not about vain threats and rhetoric that Cameroon is one and indivisible. The former governor observed that it is not a problem of living together. He revealed that Southern Cameroons as a nation welcomed thousands of French Cameroonians who escaped indigenous and forced labor from the French colonialists and other French Cameroonians who were involved in the UPC struggle for independence including thousands of men and women from African countries who lived and prospered there in harmony.

So, what’s the problem? How does it arise? Why these recurring eruptions in these two regions? David Abouèm à Tchoyi said there is obviously, an Anglophone problem in Cameroon. “This is not a problem between Anglophones and Francophones: there has never been a conflict between compatriots on both shores of the Mungo, on the basis of linguistic differences. It is not the rejection of what comes from Francophone Cameroon: no community in the North West or South West has ever opposed the practice in its territory of Bassa, Beti, Bamileke, Peuhl, Sawa … or other communities of the former East Cameroon.

David Abouèm à Tchoyi indicated that six facets come to mind:

1- Criticism of the centralized state.

2- The transfer of the decision-making centers to Yaoundé, far from the populations and their problems.

3- Failure to respect commitments to equitably take into account the institutional, legal and administrative cultures and traditions inherited from the former administering powers.

4- Non-compliance with the solemn promises made during the referendum campaign.

5- The change of the name of the State: replacement of “the United Republic of Cameroon” by “the Republic of Cameroon”.

6- Non-respect of bilingualism in the public sector, although the Constitution makes French and English two official languages of equal value.

The former has been making public a better understanding of the Anglophone problem to his French audience.

By Rita Akana with files from CIN