News

Kidnapping of Ndopping Roger and breastfeeding wife: Dr. Patrick Ayuk says all evidence points to Cho Ayaba

5, December 2021

Kidnapping of Ndopping Roger and breastfeeding wife: Dr. Patrick Ayuk says all evidence points to Cho Ayaba 0

A senior Southern Cameroons academic, Dr Patrick Ayuk, has called on Ayaba Cho Lucas and his gang to release Mr. Ndopping Roger Ndem, who was kidnapped 29 November 2021 while working for CamWater in Bamenda the chief city in the North West.

Ayaba Cho Lucas, leader of the notorious AGovC/ADF crime syndicate operating in the Southern Cameroons, has blatantly refused to order the release of Mr. Ndopping Roger Ndem despite collecting over USD 5000 as an initial ransom payment.

Addressing a group of Southern Cameroonians in Luxembourg via zoom, Dr Patrick Ayuk said, “To conceive that a criminal gang would kidnap a man and a breastfeeding wife is appalling and unacceptable. This crime has nothing to do with the Southern Cameroons struggle, and the leader of this criminal entity, Cho Ayaba, should order the release of this man immediately. Kidnap for ransom has no place in Ambazonia”

The Ndopping Roger incident has rightfully invited immense pressure on Ayaba Cho Lucas and his Ambazonia crime syndicate.  Our chief correspondent in Bamenda who contributed to this report opined that 97.4% of Southern Cameroonians are against kidnapping for ransom even if the proceeds are for the liberation struggle.

Dr Ayuk furthered, “even if the AGovC/ADF claims that the proceeds of their criminality will be used to buy tools that will eventually liberate Ambazonia, that doesn’t make their actions acceptable. We cannot intentionally punish the people we want to liberate. Cho Ayaba must know that his actions are tantamount to highway robbery and against international law. These actions diminish our struggle in the eyes of our international partners.”

The AGovC/ADF has been one of the many militias operating in Southern Cameroons ever since President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe declared the independence of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia on October 2017. The group says its Defense/Kidnapping Unit is led by a certain Mr Capo Daniel an untrained motor mechanic, who regularly announces kidnappings and ransom demands on social media.

Many Southern Cameroonians have wondered aloud why SDOs and Governors representing the French Cameroun regime in Yaoundé are braving the bad roads and the streets of Ambazonia, while private citizens are easy targets for AGovC/ADF.

Elsewhere, Ambazonian leaders at home and in the Diaspora have condemned Ayaba Cho Lucas over his disgraceful kidnapping-for-ransom activities in Ground Zero. They say his militia is taking advantage of the security vacuum and making life unbearable for ordinary citizens.

By Isong Asu in London with files

Kidnap, Ransom and Extortion in Ambazonia: Yerima moves to block ADF/AGOVC criminal payments

2, December 2021

Kidnap, Ransom and Extortion in Ambazonia: Yerima moves to block ADF/AGOVC criminal payments 0

INTERIM GOVERNMENT STATEMENT ON THE ADF/AGovC CRIMINAL KIDNAP OF MR NDOPING for RANSOM

Fellow Southern Cameroonians,

A video is circulating on social media posted by Capo Daniel and the ADF/AGOVC implicating the  Interim Government of Ambazonia on a sickening crime scheme. The video is of a kidnapped Mr Ndoping, a manager at CamWater. The criminal perpetrators are asking for a ransom for his release. The Interim Government of Ambazonia wants to put on record that it condemns this action strongly.

After consultations with defence teams on the ground, we were informed that they were under the custody of AGOVC/ADF fighters. The kidnapped family includes a breastfeeding mother! The IG calls for them to be released unharmed without delay!!

Earlier, I called Capo Daniel and asked for the immediate release of these Southern Cameroonians, but he requested to talk directly to the family. I know many people who have reached out to Dr Cho Ayaba to ask for their freedom to no avail.

Fellow Ambazonians, our fight is against the invading army of French Cameroun, not on our people fighting for their livelihoods when there is yet no alternative for them. I am a father, and I can imagine what the children of the kidnapped couple are going through right now.

The IG distances itself from any acts of kidnapping and informs Ambazonians that no agreement has ever been reached between the IG and ADF/ AGOVC regarding any Liberation Tax collection in Ambazonia. We know it’s our collective responsibility to liberate our nation and your IG has strong institutions to attain this objective.

Let me make this as clear as possible: any leader’s mandate in this revolution is to liberate our people, not rule over them. Let’s focus on liberation and stop putting the cart before the horse.

I take this opportunity again to call on the AGOVC/ADF and Capo Daniel to refrain from implicating the Interim Government of Ambazonia in criminal activity. I also call on Dr Cho Ayaba to show leadership by releasing Mr Ndoping immediately.

Thank You, and God Bless You

Dabney Yerima

Vice President

Ambazonia Interim Government

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Gunmen abduct Camwater official

1, December 2021

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Gunmen abduct Camwater official 0

Separatist fighters in Cameroon’s restive English-speaking region of Northwest said on Tuesday they have abducted an official of Cameroon Water Utilities Corporation (Camwater), a public-private company that supplies water in the country.

The official who heads the company in the region was seen pleading for his safety and freedom in a video made public on Tuesday by separatist fighters.

The fighters are heard saying in the video that he will only be released when a ransom of 10 million XAF (about 17,299 dollars) is paid and the company ceases to collect money from people for the use of public taps.

Officials of Camwater contacted by Xinhua have confirmed the abduction and said security forces have launched operations for his safe release.

Abductions are common in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions of Northwest and Southwest where an armed separatist conflict is underway. The December end-of-year festivities are also usually characterized by kidnapping and violence in the regions, according to security reports.

Source: Xinhuanet

Archbishop Andrew Nkea is Cameroon Concord Person Of The Year

1, December 2021

Archbishop Andrew Nkea is Cameroon Concord Person Of The Year 0

In December every year Cameroon Concord News and Cameroon Intelligence Report decide on persons who generate the most news in the past 12 months and our readers vote to get the winner.

We of the Cameroon Concord News Group are happy to make public the winner of the Cameroon Concord Person of the Year 2021.   He is the Metropolitan Archbishop of the Bamenda Ecclesiastical Province, His Grace Archbishop ANDREW NKEA

The senior Roman Catholic cleric received the highest number of votes ever since we started the award in 1999 from a list of renowned personalities comprising Barrister Amungwa Tanyi Nicodemus, one of the lawyers representing President Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe, the jailed leader of the Ambazonia Interim Government, and several other people arrested in connection with the Southern Cameroons crisis, Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute, Enow Ngashu, Director General of the National Football Academy and Professor Maurice Kamto of the MRC party.

Cameroon Concord People voted vigorously for His Grace Archbishop Andrew Nkea as the Cameroon Concord Person of the Year 2021 and a cream of them particularly from the diaspora gave explanations for their decision in some soul-searching correspondences sent to Cameroon Concord News and Cameroon Intelligence Report.

Archbishop Andrew Nkea is a key player in efforts at seeking a peaceful resolution to the crisis in Southern Cameroons. As Bishop of the Diocese of Mamfe, Andrew Nkea did all he could to save so many lives. He worked tirelessly to bring supplies to Southern Cameroonians who were internally displaced, going sometimes to areas that even Cameroon government army soldiers could not go.

In Manyu Division, Archbishop Andrew Nkea knew exactly how to negotiate with Ambazonia Revolutionary Guards and in the process; he would appeal to their consciences for them to spare the lives of even their worst enemies.

Even after leaving Mamfe where the Ambazonia war started, the Roman Catholic cleric has remained at the forefront of humanitarian efforts during this crisis that hit the global stage some five years ago and has claimed the lives of some 10,000 Cameroonians, with army soldiers accounting for close to 35% of the deaths.

Archbishop Andrew Nkea’s desire to save lives has taken him to distant lands such as Europe and the United States where he engaged with various Southern Cameroonian communities to raise funds for internally displaced persons and those who are living in Nigeria as refugees.

As recorded for us by the Cameroon Concord News Washington Bureau, Archbishop Andrew Nkea travelled to Baltimore in the USA, in July 2019 for a fundraiser for Southern Cameroons refugees organized by the Manyu Community in the DC, Maryland and Virginia (DMV) area where thousands of dollars were raised to help those who had left their homes to seek refuge somewhere else.

The Bamenda Metropolitan Archbishop called out the government in Yaoundé and sounded a note of caution when the military killed a Kenyan Mill Hill Missionary priest working in Kembong in Eyumojock Sub Division. Like a good shepherd, he flew to Kenya and buried the priest and did all he could to console the family members of the deceased priest.

Ever since the Holy Father Pope Francis appointed him as Archbishop of the Bamenda Archdiocese, Archbishop Andrew Nkea has been playing a key role in efforts at finding a lasting solution to the conflict that is still consuming many innocent lives and he is working day and night to ensure that peace returns to the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon.

The complexity of the Southern Cameroons war required engaged clerics who are full of faith and the Holy Spirit to lead and help prevent the Cameroonian nation from a complete collapse.  Archbishop Andrew Nkea fully understood and embraced this mission marketing the sufferings of the English speaking people to the international community and today, the crisis in Southern Cameroons has earned international recognition with many developed democracies including the United States calling for a frank and genuine dialogue to resolve the situation.

Archbishop Andrew Nkea remains the only Roman Catholic cleric who braved the threats coming from Cameroon government officials and visited the Ambazonian leader President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and his top aides at the Kondengui Maximum Security Prison in Yaoundé. And the Metropolitan Archbishop continues to demonstrate the highest level of neutrality in the 5-year-old conflict that has rocked Southern Cameroons.

For over five years, Archbishop Andrew Nkea who reportedly has no interest in supporting the Yaoundé regime has continued his humanitarian operations so that those who have been caught in the crossfire can have access to humanitarian assistance. He recently seek and gotten support from the Cameroon Catholic Community in Mulheim, Germany to equip the Saint John of God Hospital in Mamfe with an X-ray film printer to help many affected by the fighting.

During a trip to the United States, the Archbishop told an American journalist that his cardinal objective is to ensure that both parties in the Southern Cameroons conflict meet in a neutral place to discuss their differences so that peace can return to a country that was once touted for its peace.

Painted by many around the world as a man of peace, Archbishop FUANYA Andre Nkea (to use his three names) has no interest in taking sides in a conflict that should not have started and understands the risks and the need to bring both parties to the negotiating table.

In a strongly worded pastoral letter addressed to President Biya at the very beginning of the crisis, the Bishops of the Bamenda Province demonstrated that they understood there must always be room for a possible negotiation and only spiritual leaders can bring about that window of opportunity and communication. Archbishop Andrew Nkea carried along with him the Archbishop of Yaoundé, Jean Mbarga to begin a peace process with the jailed Southern Cameroons leaders that was torpedoed by hardliners of the Biya Francophone regime including some top Francophone military officials who are making huge profits from the war in Southern Cameroons.

Upon his appointment as Metropolitan Archbishop of Bamenda and Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Mamfe on 30, December 2019, Fuanya Andrew Nkea opined in his homily that no war has ever been wrapped up in the battlefield even when the belligents are too powerful; they always understand that real and sustainable peace can only be gotten at the negotiating table. He has maintained that position till this day and he remains a total man of God at the service of the Lord.

The Preaching Bishop as the nation always refers to him is not a politician nor a cleric-politician but a servant of God full of faith and the Holy Spirit.

Archbishop Andrew Nkea has met several times with a stone wall in carrying out his Southern Cameroons peace mission but has never relented and as he (himself) rightly puts it:  “My faith in Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit guides all my actions during these difficult times in our nation’s history.”

Archbishop Andrew Nkea’s Southern Cameroons peace mission in the fullness of faith and the Holy Spirit is greatly appreciated.  We of the Concord Group are proud of his work as a man of God, preaching peace and bringing relief to the suffering people of his archdiocese. We therefore congratulate Archbishop Andrew Nkea for the richly deserved recognition accorded him by a tremendous majority of Cameroon Concord News and Cameroon Intelligence Report readers.  2022 will bring more success stories to both French and English speaking Cameroonians.

On behalf of the over daily thirty thousand readers of Cameroon Concord News and the Cameroon Intelligence Report, we call on the Francophone dominated Biya regime in Yaoundé and the Southern Cameroons Interim Government under the stewardship of Vice President Dabney Yerima to listen to Archbishop Nkea’s peace message in order to end this senseless war currently going on in Southern Cameroons.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Chairman/Editor-In-Chief

Cameroon Concord News Group

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Church in Bamenda grieving the killing of students and teachers

30, November 2021

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Church in Bamenda grieving the killing of students and teachers 0

Cameroon’s Bishops of the Ecclesiastical Province of Bamenda have denounced the heinous murder of four students and a teacher of Government Bilingual High School Ekondo Titi, South West Region of Cameroon.

In a statement signed by the Archbishop of Bamenda on behalf of other Bishops, Andrew Nkea, the Bamenda Provincial Episcopal Conference (BAPEC) expressed its deep distress at the cruel killings of students and a teacher on Wednesday, 24 November 2021.

The brutal killings of students and teachers

“Our hearts have been pierced again! In recent times, we have painfully witnessed an agonising drama involving, among other evils, the targeting and killing of pupils, students and teachers … We have hardly recovered from the cruel killing of Enondiale Tchuengia Carolaisse (a class one pupil) killed in Molyko-Buea on Thursday, 14 October 2021, and the brutal killing of another pupil, Brandy Tataw, on Friday, 1 November 2021, in Nkwen-Bamenda, than we are confronted again with the killing of four more innocent Cameroonians within the protected area of a school,” said Bishop Nkea.

Explaining the tragic attack on the school by gunmen, Archbishop Nkea said, “On Wednesday, 24 November 2021, some persons armed with guns and explosives, invaded the premises of Government Bilingual High School Ekondo Titi and shot and killed three students: Emmanuel Orome (12 years), Joyceline Ikem (16 years), and Emmanuel Kum (17 years); and a teacher, Celestine Song. These innocent victims are not the cause of the socio-political crisis, and their deaths cannot be the solution. Their murder is totally senseless and unacceptable,” said the Archbishop of Bamenda and President of the BAPEC.

A fourth student later died at a local hospital bringing the total number of victims to five. Seven students wounded in the attack are receiving treatment in hospitals around the city of Buea.

Dialogue and not violence is the solution

The Bishops of the Bamenda region have appealed for the respect of life and more state protection.

“We, the Bishops of the Ecclesiastical Province of Bamenda, condemn these barbaric acts, which violate all International Laws and Conventions safeguarding the inviolability of schools and the protection of learners (pupils and students), and teachers, offend against the fundamental right to education, and breaks the Fifth Commandment of God … We have been persistent in our call for the respect and defence of human rights, especially the right to life, openness to dialogue, an option for the truth and recourse to peaceful means as the best way to a durable solution. While calling on the Government to ensure the security of schools, we make a special appeal, once more, to all perpetrators of violence to allow the genuinely human feelings of love, pardon and benevolence to flow into their hearts so that the safety and security of all may be guaranteed, alongside the right of all young people to life and to an education and a future,” the prelate of Bamenda said.

Students and teachers abandon schools

According to Cameroonian authorities, the armed attacks on schools scare teachers and students from institutions thus dealing a devastating blow on learning. Local government officials have pleaded with the children’s parents and teachers in the region not to abandon the schools.

Ekondo Titi’s senior government official, Aboloa Timothe, promised heightened security to protect schools, teachers and students from further attacks. Given the many incidents in several parts of the region, it remains to be seen how this will be done, in practical terms. Observers say that there have been more than ten armed attacks on schools in the English-speaking regions in the last few month alone. The exact figure is unclear, but more than 10 children have been killed and several teachers and students wounded.

The Anglophone crisis: A neglected conflict

It is a brutal ‘low level’ armed conflict that has been happening for the last five years in Cameroon’s western Anglophone regions. Cameroon’s military has been engaged in an armed conflict with separatist rebels, the Amba boys, who want the Anglophone areas to break away from the Francophone country. Education has been weaponised as the separatists enforce a boycott of schools. UN rights agencies have accused both the rebels and Cameroon’s military of killing civilians and widespread human rights violations.

By Miriam Metchane Ewang

Equatorial Guinea Deports Cameroonian Citizens Citing Security Concerns

30, November 2021

Equatorial Guinea Deports Cameroonian Citizens Citing Security Concerns 0

Equatorial Guinea has begun deporting thousands of Cameroonians who were residing in the country illegally, citing national security concerns. Authorities in the capital Malabo said the Cameroonians fled conflict in western Cameroon, where government troops have been fighting anglophone separatists. Hundreds of those already deported are trying to return to Equatorial Guinea to gather their belongings.

About 40 people in Kiossi, a Cameroonian southern commercial town, want to enter neighboring Equatorial Guinea this Tuesday morning. Among them is Philippe Oyono, a 33-year-old building material shop owner.

Owono said police in Equatorial Guinea forcefully removed him from his home in the town of Bata. He said he was sent back to Cameroon on November 5 alongside 65 other Cameroonians.

He said he is pleading that President Paul Biya of Cameroon raises their concerns with President Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea so that authorities can allow undocumented migrants who have been deported to Cameroon to return to Equatorial Guinea and gather their belongings. Oyono said it is not common for Equatorial Guinea to deport mothers and fathers without their children and merchants without their goods.

Government officials in Cameroon’s South region say at least 600 Cameroonians have been deported from neighboring Equatorial Guinea in the past month.

This week, Cameroon said it had negotiated with Equatorial Guinea to give undocumented migrants three months to get residency permits or to voluntarily return to Cameroon.

Cameroon’s ambassador to Equatorial Guinea, Desire Jean Claude Owono Menguele, said about a thousand Cameroonians have opted to voluntarily return.

Last week, Nguema Obiang Mangue, vice president and son of President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, said concerns about rising theft and banditry are behind Equatorial Guinea’s decisoin to ask undocumented migrants to leave.

He spoke on Radio Malabo, Equatorial Guinea’s state radio while addressing a crowd that supports deportation.

Mangue said he is surprised that the decision the government of Equatorial Guinea has taken to deport undocumented migrants is generating controversy and criticism. He said rising insecurity in Equatorial Guinea has pushed President Obiang Nguema to ask all undocumented migrants and those who have criminal records, including violence and theft, to leave. Mangue said Equatorial Guinea, like other countries, will not tolerate undocumented migrants.

Mangue added that legitimate refugees, including those fleeing separatist crisis in Cameroon, will not be affected by the deportations. However, he said some people displaced by the crisis in the Central African Republic and Cameroon prefer to hide within the community and work instead of registering as refugees.

In September, Equatorial Guinea announced that it was to deport all undocumented migrants from countries, including Nigerians, Cameroonians, Chadians, Central Africans, Ghanaians and Kenyans.

Source: VOA

China to provide 1 billion Covid vaccine doses to Africa

30, November 2021

China to provide 1 billion Covid vaccine doses to Africa 0

China will deliver another 1 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines to Africa and encourage Chinese companies to invest no less than $10 billion in the continent over the next three years, President Xi Jinping said on Monday.

The country has already supplied nearly 200 million doses to Africa, where vaccination rates have fallen behind amid growing concern over the spread of the new Omicron variant of the coronavirus, which was first identified in southern Africa.

Xi said 600 million doses would be donations and 400 million doses would be provided through other means such as joint production by Chinese companies and relevant African countries. China will also build 10 health projects in Africa and send 1,500 health experts, he said.

In a speech via video link at the opening of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, Xi said a China-Africa cross-border yuan centre would be set up to provide African financial institutions with a credit line of $10 billion, without giving further details.

China will provide $10 billion of trade finance to support African exports, create a zone for trade and economic cooperation and build a China-Africa industrial park, he said.

The announcement comes amid criticism of China’s infrastructure-for-commodities deals that some experts say saddle countries with unsustainable debt. Democratic Republic of Congo is currently reviewing a $6 billion deal with Chinese investors over concerns that it is not sufficiently beneficial to Congo.

The Belt and Road Initiative, in which Chinese institutions finance major infrastructure in mainly developing nations, has slowed: Chinese bank financing for infrastructure projects in Africa fell from $11 billion in 2017 to $3.3 billion in 2020, according to a report by international law firm Baker McKenzie.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during a four-nation tour of the region last week that Washington was pushing for cleaner deals without unsustainable debts.

Xi says imports from Africa to reach $300 billion

China’s imports from Africa, one of its key sources of crude oil and minerals, will reach $300 billion in the next three years, Xi said, adding that the two sides would cooperate in areas such as health, digital innovation, trade promotion and green development.

South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa, also speaking via video link, thanked China for its support and said African economies should be able to manufacture COVID-19 vaccines.

Discussions at the World Trade Organization on a temporary TRIPS waiver to make COVID-19 vaccines and treatments available to all needed to be finalised, he said, while criticising the travel curbs imposed on South Africa.

Source: REUTERS

Southern Cameroons Crisis: SDF says Ekondo Titi school attack is “act of blatant, shameless and senseless terrorism”

30, November 2021

Southern Cameroons Crisis: SDF says Ekondo Titi school attack is “act of blatant, shameless and senseless terrorism” 0

Hon. Joshua Nabangi Osih, 1st Vice National Chairman of the opposition Social Democratic Front (SDF) has condoled with the families of those killed when militiamen attacked a school in Ekondo Titi.

Taking to social media Sunday, November 28, the onetime presidential candidate said he had just attended an ecumenical service in Ekondo Titi organized to mourn those who died in the November 24 school attack.

“On behalf of the SDF, I attended a heart-breaking ecumenical service in Ekondo Titi to mourn the victims of the barbaric onslaught on a school last Wednesday in that locality,” Osih said. “We later on condoled with the bereaved families and visited the severely injured in the Limbe [Regional] Hospital. Against terrorism, we will overcome!”

Hours after the Wednesday school attack, Osih had on behalf of his party said there is nothing worse than terror against education.

His words: “The SDF vehemently condemns the brutal killing of students and a teacher in various schools in Ekono Titi… Our hearts bleed from yet another act of blatant, shameless, and senseless terrorism. There is nothing worse than terror against education. Our prayers go to the injured fighting for their lives as well as the bereaved families. We will overcome.”

Cameroon-Info.Net recalls that On Wednesday, November 24, 2021, suspected armed separatist fighters killed four students and one teacher in an attack on Government Bilingual High School (GBHS) Ekondo Titi, Ndian Division, South-West Region.

Local authorities said the yet-to-be-identified militiamen used hand grenades to carry out the attack between 7:30 am and 8:00 am that fateful day.

According to state media, some of the gunmen were dressed in military fatigue.

The militiamen shot and killed Madam Song Celestine Fien, a French Language teacher who was delivering lessons to Form 2 students at the time of the attack. The mother of four is said to be a native of Ngwainkuma in Fundong Subdivision, Boyo Division.

Three students – one girl and two boys – were killed in the attack while many others sustained injuries.

One of the five students seriously injured died en route to the Limbe Regional Hospital through Idenau. Four others are now out of danger and are responding to treatment at the Limbe Regional Hospital.

Armed separatists are on record to have opposed the reopening of schools, using it as a weapon of war. Many teachers and schoolchildren have been maimed, killed, abducted, and tortured since 2016. schools have also been destroyed and others burnt.

By Enowtaku Ebanghatabi Christelle in Buea

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Yaoundé says kidnapped Divisional Delegates may still be alive

30, November 2021

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Yaoundé says kidnapped Divisional Delegates may still be alive 0

Five months after the abduction of some divisional delegates in Ndian Division, Cameroon’s Ministry of Defence has rolled out a communique that suggests that they may still be alive.

In a communique on last Wednesday’s attack on a school in Ekondo Titi by militiamen, Navy Captain Atonfack Guemo Cyrille Serge, Head of Communication Division at Cameroon’s Ministry of Defence said the civil servants are being held incommunicado by a separatist group led by pseudo-General Ten Kobo.

Reacting to the killing of four students and a teacher of Government Bilingual High School (GBHS) Ekondo Titi by gunmen, Navy Captain Atonfack said inter alia: “…Combing operations are ongoing on the ground to track the  assailants who, according to initial findings, would belong to a terrorist group headed by the so-called general ‘ten kobo’, who is equally responsible for the kidnapping and incommunicado holding of some divisional delegates of Ndian on June 15, and the murder of the divisional delegate in the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Regional Development.”

Cameroon-Info.Net recalls that this is the first time the Ministry of Defence is making allusion to the abducted divisional delegates whose whereabouts remain uncertain.

The only time a senior state official came close to commenting on the issue was on November 3, 2021, during the installation of Gilbert Guibai Baldena as the new Senior Divisional Officer for Ndian Division.

In his address, South-West Governor, Okalia Bilai Bernard asked for the observance of a moment of silence in memory of Mabia Johnson, the Ndian Divisional Delegate for Economy, Planning and Regional Development who was abducted on June 15 and killed on June 18 by separatist fighters.

The Governor continued his speech without mentioning the fate of the remaining kidnapped delegates.

Cameroon-Info.Net remembers that at around 9 am on Tuesday, June 15, 2021, armed separatist fighters abducted six divisional delegates in Misore-Balue village in Ekondo-Titi Subdivision, near Mundemba.

On Friday, June 18, 2021, three days after he was kidnapped by armed separatist fighters along with five other Divisional Delegates, 42-year-old Mabia Johnson Mudika, Divisional Delegate of Economy, Planning, and Regional Development, was killed by his abductors.

Those held incommunicado by militiamen are:

Mambe Elvis Ebaku, Ndian Divisional Delegate of State Property, Surveys, and Land Tenure

Felicia Ndong, Ndian Divisional Delegate of Housing and Urban Development

Elad Emmanuel, Ndian Divisional Delegate of Water and Energy Resources

Mbida Armand Christian, Ndian Divisional Delegate of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises, Social Economy and Handicraft

Agbor Stephen Nyenty, Divisional Chief of Service for Surveys, Ndian Division.

Back in June, Cameroon Tribune reported that the officials had left Mundemba, headquarters of Ndian Division, traveling by land to Ekondo Titi (one of the nine subdivisions of Ndian) on an official assignment to demarcate land for the construction of an electricity plant to enhance power distribution in Ndian Division.

“Between 9 and 10 am at two kilometers to Ekondo Titi, precisely Misore Road Junction, armed men erupted and forced them into the bush. Early hints spoke of some ransom being asked by the assailants but later on, conflicting notes from the social media refused any such ransom. It is not clear yet which amounts were requested,” state-run newspaper, Cameroon Tribune reported on June 23.

Source: Cameroon Info.Net

30 South African white rhino relocated to Rwanda in a Boeing 747

29, November 2021

30 South African white rhino relocated to Rwanda in a Boeing 747 0

Thirty endangered white rhinos arrived in Rwanda on Monday after a long journey from South Africa in a Boeing 747, conservationists said, hailing it as the largest single transfer of the species ever undertaken.

The majestic animals, which can weigh up to two tonnes, travelled some 3,400 kilometres (2,100 miles) from South Africa’s Phinda Private Game Reserve as part of a programme to replenish the species’ population, decimated by poaching since the 1970s.

Once plentiful across sub-Saharan Africa, white rhino suffered first from hunting by European settlers, and later a poaching epidemic which largely wiped them out.

The rhinos began their 40-hour journey to the new home in Akagera National Park in eastern Rwanda following months of preparation, said African Parks, a charity headed by Britain’s Prince Harry which is involved in the exercise.

“We had to tranquillize them to reduce their stress, which is itself risky, and monitor them,” said African Parks’ CEO Peter Fearnhead, calling the project a success.

The animals were transported in a chartered Boeing 747 and were placed in two grassy enclosures — each the size of a football stadium — after arriving in the park.

Later they will be allowed to roam the expansive park, authorities said.

“This will provide an opportunity for them to grow in a safe environment from South Africa where three are killed per day by poachers,” said the park’s regional manager Jes Gruner.

Wildlife transfers are not without risks. In 2018, four out of six relocated black rhinos died a few months after arriving in Chad.

The southern white rhino, one of two subspecies of white rhino, is now considered endangered with about 20,000 individuals remaining, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

It is classified as near-threatened by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Breeding programme

The northern white rhino has all but vanished, with only two females left alive.

Scientists are attempting to save the species from extinction by harvesting eggs from the younger of the two animals, Fatu, and using sperm from two deceased males to create embryos in an unprecedented breeding programme, which is their last chance at survival.

Rwanda, which is positioning itself as a top Big Five safari destination, received five eastern black rhinos in 2019 from the Czech Republic and 17 from South Africa in 2017.

Not a single eastern black rhino has been poached at the Akagera park since their re-introduction in 2017, according to its regional manager Gruner.

Rhinos have few predators in the wild due to their size but have been devastated by poaching for their horns — used in traditional Chinese medicine.

According to the IUCN, there are around 5,000 black rhinos left in the wild, compared to more than a million in the mid-19th century.

Source: AFP

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