Rights groups in Cameroon have accused the military of torching scores of homes this week of suspected separatist supporters, leaving hundreds of people homeless this holiday season. The military has denied burning any civilian houses.

Cameroon civil society groups say hundreds of people rendered homeless by this week’s attacks are seeking refuge in churches.

Some of the homeless are living with relatives and well-wishers within their community according to the Roman Catholic Church in Cameroon’s restive Northwest region.

Rights groups, civilians and members of the church have been sharing videos of at least 12 houses burned on Thursday in Yer, a village in Jakiri district.

In the videos, shared on social media platforms including Facebook and WhatsApp, a man identifying himself as a community leader accuses Cameroon’s government troops of torching the houses.

“We are at the road linking Jakiri to Kumbo, precisely at Yer where these buildings were razed by the military. The military has burnt down buildings due to the incident that led to the loss of military and they resorted to burning down these buildings to ashes. That is a sign of weakness,” he said.

Cameroon military confirm that the video was taken after government troops attacked a separatist camp in Yer on Thursday to free civilians who were held hostage by separatist fighters.

At least four fighters were killed but no government troops were wounded according to the military. Separatists say at least seven government troops were killed.

The government says frustrated fighters escaped from their camp at Yer and set fire to the houses of people who the separatists accuse of collaborating with government troops.

Tar Emmanuel Tatah is a member of the Cameroon Civil Society Group. He says more than 40 houses have been torched this week in Yer, Kimah and Meluv, all villages in the Northwest region.

Tar says government troops organized reprisal attacks on civilians who the military accused of collaborating with separatists.

“It is really, really terrible that things have gone this way again with the burning of houses when people thought that everything was becoming normal,” Tar said. “It is going to scare people from coming back home. Those who had returned to the Northwest and Southwest regions, will again find themselves internally displaced. Government should use the right approach to solve this problem.”

Tar said the right approach would be for government troops to stop searching homes in towns and villages suspected to host separatist fighters. He said government troops should withdraw and allow only police officers to maintain law and order in western towns and villages where peace and civilians are returning.

Armed groups have been fighting to break off the largely English-speaking Northwest and Southwest Regions from the rest of Cameroon and its French-speaking majority since 2017.

Last week, the government said several thousand of the 750,000 people displaced by the separatist conflict had returned home for the first time since hostilities began in 2017.

The military said no major separatist attack had been reported within the past six weeks.

Source: VOA

The Vice President of the Ambazonia Interim Government Dabney Yerima has condemned the continued detention of Antoinette Kongnso one year after a Southern Cameroons court decision granted her including her 14-month-old baby born in detention bail. She was a former girlfriend of Mbashie Clement the dreaded Ambazonian fighter known as ‘General No Pity’.

Cameroon Concord News understands Antoinette Kongnso was arrested without a warrant on October 2, 2021 in Buea after Francophone army soldiers raided several areas in the South West regional capital. Commenting on the matter, Vice President Dabney Yerima stressed that the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime only understands the language of force.

Yerima stated that the ruling French Cameroun criminal administration led by President Biya is seeking to hide its 40 years of successful failure by means of shedding the blood of ordinary Southern Cameroonians.

The exiled Southern Cameroons leader added that the barbaric crimes of the French Cameroun regime will never undermine the determination of Ambazonian resistance fighters in Ground Zero and Ground One. On the contrary, it shows that the spirit of resistance runs high among all Southern Cameroonians.

Vice President Dabney Yerima also called on all Southern Cameroonians to preserve Ambazonian unity and tighten the noose around French Cameroun occupational forces.

By Asu Isong

London Bureau Chief

Amnesty International calls on the Cameroonian authorities to urgently provide the legal basis for the detention of Abdul Karim Ali, a peace activist, who has been held without charge since 11 August 2022 and kept in inhuman conditions or release him immediately.

“In the absence of information from the justice system what we know is that Abdul Karim Ali was arrested after he denounced torture committed and broadcast online by the leader of a pro-government militia in the south-west region of the country. If this is the only reason for his arrest he should be released immediately and unconditionally since his detention would stem solely from the exercise of his right to freedom of expression,” said Fabien Offner, a researcher at Amnesty International’s West and Central Africa Regional Office.

According to Abdul Karim Ali’s lawyers, he was arrested on 11 August 2022 in Bamenda in the north-west without a warrant by gendarmes and was taken to the regional légion de gendarmerie where he was detained for 84 days, including being held incommunicado for several days, in violation of international and regional human rights norms. Being held incommunicado meant he was deprived of any contact with the outside world and denied the possibility of receiving visits from family and lawyers. He was detained in a cell with no window, deprived of food and water for several days, and had to use a single bucket both as a toilet and for bathing.

Abdul Karim Ali, 41 years old, was then transferred to Service Central des Recherches Judiciaires (SCRJ) of the SED (Secrétariat d’Etat à la Défense) in the capital city Yaoundé, where he is currently detained. He was taken to the military court building in Yaoundé on 7 November 2022, where he was kept in a mosquito-infested cell with others all day. He was returned to the SED late that night without establishing any charges against him or being taken into court.

Two others are currently detained at the SED with Abdul Karim Ali on allegations that they work as his drivers. Rabio Enuah is a cousin who was reportedly arrested in Bamenda on 23 August 2022 and detained in a cell at the légion de gendarmerie for 84 days before being transferred to the SED in Yaoundé. An acquaintance of Abdul Karim Ali, Sulemanu Yenkong, was reportedly arrested on 19 November 2022 in Nkwen, near Bamenda. He was detained in several locations, and held incommunicado, before being transferred to the SED on 28 November 2022. In both cases, their lawyers have reported that the gendarmes who detained them asked for ransoms in exchange for their freedom.

In the absence of information from the justice system, both of them should also be released immediately and unconditionally.

Amnesty International has learned that Abdul Karim Ali’s wife has received threats through anonymous calls, which have led her to flee their home. The calls warned her not to alert people outside Cameroon about his situation and asked her to bring her husband and family’s passports to the military who were detaining Abdul Karim Ali.

“The detention of Abdul Karim Ali is taking place in a period where the Cameroonian authorities continue to arbitrarily arrest and detain those who criticise the government or denounce human rights violations in the context of armed violence in Anglophone regions of the country. The authorities must immediately present a legally recognizable charge against Abdul Karim Ali or release him.”

Abdul Karim Ali was previously arrested on 25 September 2019 and taken to the SED. He was held, initially without access to a lawyer for five days, before finally being released weeks later, on 1 November 2019, without charge.

Distributed by APO Group

Authorities in Cameroon have continued to hold a breastfeeding mother in detention a year after a court ordered her release on bail. An Appeal Court in the Southwest region of the country on December 15, 2021 granted bail to Antoinette Kongnso but she remains incarcerated one year after the court decision, together with her 14-month-old baby born in detention.

Lawyers say her continued detention is an abuse of the justice system in the country and is an example of the injustice felt by Cameroonians.

A former girlfriend of Mbashie Clement – a dreaded armed separatist fighter in the country known as ‘General No Pity’ — Kongnso was arrested “without a warrant” on October 2, 2021 in Buea, the headquarters of the Southwest region, one of two English-speaking regions of the country ravaged by a six-year-long bloody armed conflict.

Military crackdown

About 6,000 people have been killed after a protest by lawyers and teachers in the English-speaking parts of the majority French-speaking country over perceived and real marginalisation which resulted into a conflict following a military crackdown on protesters.

Militia groups have since sprouted and increased demands for the secession of the minority English speakers and the creation of an independent English-speaking country which they want called Ambazonia.

‘General No Pity’ heads one of the militia groups which the government has repeatedly accused of attacking and inflicting casualties on the military in the Northwest, another of the two English-speaking regions.

Though her relationship with ‘General No Pity’ ended long ago, Kongnso was accused of “failure to report acts of terrorism” of her former boyfriend and was arrested while she was eight months pregnant and initially detained incommunicado at local police headquarters before being transferred to the Buea Central Prison. She gave birth in November 2021.

The International Crisis Group and the US State Department have reported on retaliation against women and girls in connection with their relationships – family or romantic – with fighters on both sides of the conflict.

Granted bail

The military tribunal had earlier denied Kongnso bail but the Inquiry Control Chambers of the Appeal Court “which has exclusive jurisdiction to hear appeals on bail-related issues from the military tribunal” granted the bail following an appeal from her lawyers.

According to barrister Legenju Vitalise, one of the lawyers defending Kongnso, she was supposed to be released following the appeal court’s decision – given that no new charges have been brought against her.

“Her continuous detention is a clear testament that there is a breakdown in the rule of law in Cameroon”, barrister Legenju told The EastAfrican, adding that “her continuous detention is illegal and will remain illegal”.

The human rights lawyer explained that Kongnso was charged with failure to report acts of terrorism – a crime for which she will not be sentenced to more than a year in jail.

“Even if she was to be tried and sentenced, she would not spend over a year in jail. No right-thinking judge would sentence someone who fails to report what does not exist for over a year in jail,” barrister Legenju said.

Monitor Kongnso’s trial

The Clooney Foundation for Justice’s TrialWatch initiative announced on Thursday last week that it will monitor Kongnso’s trial as she clocked one year in jail following the bail pronouncement.

TrialWatch monitors criminal trials globally against those who are most vulnerable, including women and girls, and evaluates the proceedings against applicable regional and international standards to advocate for the rights of individuals who are unfairly imprisoned.

Citing Kongnso’s lawyers, the monitor said authorities have refused to free the breastfeeding mother because, among other things, they are insisting on a letter from the Ministry of Justice authorising the release.

Under the international and regional treaties that Cameroon has ratified, “maintaining a person in detention after release has been ordered by a court competent to exercise control over the legality of detention” violates the right to freedom from arbitrary detention.

“TrialWatch will continue to track the case and will release a further report in the coming months,” the monitor said.

Source: The East African

Amadou Vamoulke, the former general manager of the Cameroon Radio and Television Corporation (CRTV), was sentenced Tuesday, December 20, 2022 to 12 years in prison by the Special Criminal Court and he was also fined 47 million FCFA.

Vamoulké spent six years in detention without being convicted on any charge-a situation described by Reporters Without Borders as falling far below even the most basic standards of justice and human dignity.

Adjourned 90 times, his trial is the longest to have been held as part of the anti-corruption drive known as Operation Sparrowhawk that the Biya Francophone government launched in 2006.

Arrested on 29 July 2016, Vamoulké was the subject of two distinct grotesque proceedings on charges of misusing public funds as general manager of the Cameroon Radio and Television (CRTV) – charges for which absolutely no evidence and no witness has ever been produced by the prosecution.

The denouement lasted more than 16 hours, before the reading of a 600-page document that provided a detailed account of the trial since the beginning in 2016.

Amadou Vamoulke was found guilty of embezzlement of the sum of 617.5 million FCFA in coaction with the former Minister of Finance, Polycarpe Abah Abah, who was sentenced to 17 years in prison.

The former general manager of CRTV was arrested and remanded to Kondengui Central Prison in 2016. He stayed there for six years before his fate was finally decided this week. Despite multiple calls for his release by the NGO Reporters Without Borders (RSF), nothing was done.

Depicting the Special Criminal Court established to prosecute alleged corrupt government officials and the several Alibabas responsible for pilfering from the public treasury as President Biya’s court is no misnomer.  Cameroon Concord News Group calls it the President’s court because it is one instrument of power through which President Biya is reining in on perceived opponents from within his CPDM power conduit.

An attribute of a genuine court is the fairness of the trial proceedings in cases which are brought before the court. It is not the number of convictions entered against accused.  A court is legitimate and recognized as such because of its exercise of judicial, executive, legislative and administrative independence.  A court that is independent must be accessible to all citizens after all, is equality before the law, not a constitutionally protected value? The Special Criminal Court is lacking in these attributes of impartiality, judicial independence and accessibility.  It is perceived more as the President’s Court than a Court of Justice.

Establishing this court was President Biya’s way of saving himself the embarrassment of being humiliated during his perennial trips abroad as the President of the most corrupt countries in the world.  This ranking of the country as the most corrupt or one of the most corrupt countries had a potential to hamper President Biya’s personal pecuniary interests far from the borders of Cameroon.  There was therefore a personal interest need to establish the court.  Another personal interest need was to avail himself of a legal tool under his direct control to consolidate absolute power, blackmail potential rebels and competitors within the system and to stifle any form of institutional opposition. He perceived the court as a tool with which to whitewash his more than thirty years of corrupt governance and the rape of the economy.

With the war against Boko Haram, the fight against corruption using the Special Criminal Court has afforded Paul Biya justification contest in the next institutionally flawed elections in order to eternalize power purportedly to direct the war against terror and the war against corruption.  True to the name the President’s Court, Biya has exclusive preserve in referring cases to the Special Court and the power to terminate them. He decides who will be arrested, who will be investigated and who will serve time and who will not.

In one instance, he ordered a detained Minister Bapes Bapes released from remand custody at Kondengui when a warrant was issued for his arrest without the presidential fiat.  Cameroonians want the rule of law to be the guarding principle on which justice is administered in the name of the people.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

The Geneva Police Court on Friday found six members of Cameroonian President Paul Biya’s security service guilty of manhandling a Swiss journalist of public broadcaster RTS in June 2019.

Ruling on appeal, the police court gave them suspended fines, according to a report in Le Temps newspaper confirmed by the journalist’s lawyer. The Geneva Public Prosecutor’s Office had previously sentenced the bodyguards to suspended prison sentences.

The RTS journalist was covering a demonstration of opponents outside the Intercontinental Hotel, where head of state Biya was staying. He was slightly injured. The bodyguards also stripped him of his professional equipment and personal belongings.

The Cameroonian bodyguards argued that they had immunity and the case went all the way to the Federal Court, which ruled that the agents had not acted that day for the security of Biya.

Quoted by Le Temps, the Geneva public prosecutor Olivier Jornot said in court that a “strong signal is needed to remind those who hide behind a so-called diplomatic status they cannot act as they please”.

Source: Swissinfo