Fighting between Francophone Beti Ewondo troops loyal to the Biya regime in Yaoundé and Ambazonia Restoration Forces has continued today in Fako County with heavy artillery fire focusing on the strategically important towns of Muyuka, Muea and Ikata. Muyuka which sits on the only major road that links Buea the historic capital of Southern Cameroons to Meme, Ndian, Lebialem, Kupe Muanenguba and Manyu has seen fierce exchange in recent days as the Francophone Cameroon government forces attempt to gain control of the road.

The developments come as the conflict now in its fourth year is showing no signs of ending. The War in Southern Cameroons has already claimed at least 40 000 lives, almost all of them civilian children, men and women, murdered by Cameroon government troops in a series of targeted killings, organized massacres, and killings by fire in over 400 villages burnt down to ashes. Over half a million people have been forcibly displaced as refugees living in various countries and especially in refugee camps in Nigeria. Over another half a million people have become IDPs hiding in forests, caves and hills due to forced displacement. Additionally, over 1.5 million people are facing a humanitarian disaster.  The Biya French Cameroun regime is yet to release casualty statistics for its armed forces, although military officials have reported that some 3000 Cameroon government army soldiers have died and hundreds more have been injured.

Further clashes in and around Buea are highly likely over the near term. Fighting along the main road linking Mamfe to Ekok and Bamenda to Wum cannot be ruled out in the coming days. A heightened Cameroon government security presence and disruptions to transportation have rocked the entire Southern Cameroons territory.

The latest round of hostilities erupted today when Ambazonia Restoration Forces reportedly carried out strikes on settlements in Muyuka and Muea including Ikata following attacks by Cameroon government troops. Ambazonia Restoration Forces launched what it claimed to be a ‘counter-offensive’ in response. Cameroon Intelligence Report understands that both Amba fighters and Cameroon government forces made extensive use of heavy weapons during the clashes, including artillery and loitering munitions.

The Southern Cameroons was one of the territories set for decolonization in the context of the UN decolonization agenda. Britain’s devious handling of it and the British wheeling and dealing at the UN in 1959 and 1960 caused a great historical injustice to the people of the Southern Cameroons. That injustice continues to cry out for redress. British action resulted in the unconscionable imposition of an unnecessary and precipitated plebiscite with dead-end alternatives. Speaking through Lord Perth, Britain shamefully said the Southern Cameroons and its people were “expendable”.

The plebiscite was imposed in the teeth of opposition by the leadership of the trust territory. It offered a Hobson’s choice of ‘joining’ either Nigeria or French Cameroun. The internationally-prescribed political status option of sovereign independence was deliberately excluded. There was no good reason for doing so. On 11 February 1961, a skewed plebiscite was foisted on the people of the Southern Cameroons. Faced with the Hobson’s ‘choice’ that was forced down their throat, the people opted for independence in political association with Republique du Cameroun. It was agreed in writing between the two countries and to the knowledge of Britain and the UN, that the political association would take the form of an aggregative federation of two states, equal in status.

Western governments generally advise their citizens against all travel to areas of conflict but have maintained a kind of deliberate silence ever since the crisis in Southern Cameroons started four years ago.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai and Isong Asu

International Albinism Awareness Day on June 13 has been observed in Cameroon, with albinos asking for more government and community care and protection. Those living with this hereditary genetic condition that reduces melanin pigment in skin, hair and eyes, say stigma, violence, superstition and killing have greatly lessened, but abuses have not been eliminated.

One hundred and sixty albinos and their family members assembled at the World Association for Advocacy and Solidarity of Albinos office in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde, to mark International Albinism Awareness Day.

Among them is 16-year-old albino Ronald Essi, who said he was abandoned because of his condition.

Essi said he wants to become a police officer to defend his country Cameroon and punish civilians who abuse albinos’ rights. He said his mother abandoned him when he was two years old. He said his grandmother resisted family pressure to kill him. He said he has been living in the streets since 2015, when his grandmother died.

Essi said a Catholic priest rescued him from the street and sent him to a school in Yaoundé.

Essi is one of the about 2,200 albinos the government says live in Cameroon. 

This year Cameroon reported that prejudice and discrimination against albinos in employment and social life had lowered drastically. The government said hunting down albinos for their body parts has been eliminated from many communities.

Witch doctors who claim that albinos bring wealth and good luck to people who have access to their body parts are disappearing. In many communities, albino babies are no longer considered signs of misfortune and buried alive or starved until they die.

Jean-Jacques Ndoudoumou, the founding president of the World Association for Advocacy and Solidarity of Albinos, says albinos are gradually being accepted by communities.

He said the association he leads is happy, as people are increasingly accepting albinos as normal human beings. He said many albinos have graduated from universities and are using the knowledge they acquire to contribute to developing Cameroon. He said complaints of stigma and violence on albinos have greatly declined and there are now marriages between albinos and people without the condition.

Ndoudoumou said his association has instructed all its members to continue teaching people albinos are normal human beings who need special assistance.

Gregoire Amindeh is member of The Association for the Promotion of the Rights of Albinos.

Amindeh said that although Cameroon’s government has done a lot, albinos still urgently need special reading glasses and handheld magnifiers to stop their high school dropout rate from low vision. He said they need subsidies to be treated in hospitals since their skin is extremely sensitive to the sun and can develop cancer. He said skin cancers remain a major cause of death in African albinos.

Pauline Irene Nguene, Cameroon’s minister of social affairs, says albinos are placed in the group of people with special protection needs. She said Cameroon ensures the socio-economic integration and protection of albinos, and immediately intervenes to protect albinos whenever cases of abuse are reported.

She said in 2020, staff of her ministry visited more than a hundred villages where abuses of the rights of albinos were reported. She said civilians in the villages were taught in their local languages to respect the health, education and social rights of albinos. She said the government has continued to lobby for private enterprises, schools and outside organizations not to reject albinos looking for positions in their institutions.

Nguene said 60 government offices created in Cameroon’s administrative units receive complaints and immediately help albinos in need.

International Albinism Awareness Day is observed by the United Nations on June 13 every year. This year’s theme, “Strength Beyond All Odds,” according to the U.N. highlights the achievements of people with albinism all over the world.

Source: VOA

A senior aide to the Southern Cameroons Vice President says Chief Dr Dion Ngute as a prominent Ambazonian is shedding “crocodile tears” over the so-called Cameroon government plans to rebuild Southern Cameroons while he continues to chair cabinet meetings that are fostering murderous crimes on the people of Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia.

Dr Patrick Ayuk made the remarks on Saturday, two day after Cameroon Concord News released names of Cameroon government officials targeted by the US visa restriction program.

“Ngute is talking about reconstruction but his French Cameroun army is still carrying out unlawful & murderous crimes in Southern Cameroons.  No need for Ngute’s crocodile tears when his French Cameroun military is busy killing innocent women and children in Southern Cameroons” Dr Patrick Ayuk told Camcordnews.

The Dabney Yerima senior adviser also called on the President Biden administration to place additional sanctions on the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime in Yaounde.

Ambazonia is the indigenous name of the former United Nations trust territory of the Southern Cameroons under United Kingdom Administration for close to half a century, excluding the period of British connection with the territory from 1843 to 1887. When Republique du Cameroun took control of the territory, it split it into two parts and designated them as “northwest and southwest provinces/regions of Republique du Cameroun.” This was rejected and continues to be rejected by the people of the former British Southern Cameroons. The people of the territory insist on the indigenous name of their Homeland which is Ambazonia. This is consistent with a 1978 recommendation of UNESCO that African countries should call their countries by the name they wish to be known.

By Isong Asu in London

The latest Atanga Nji Boys onslaught on the main road linking Bamenda to Wum, the chief town in Menchum is creating a tragic humanitarian aspect as the fighting in Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia continue to unfold further day by day.

Most people in Wum predominantly from the Aghem extraction are in need of medicine. Pattern medicine shops in Wum are all empty and several people are dying. The heavy deployment of Francophone troops around the main market and in Naikom Overside is making matters worse.

Several innocent Southern Cameroonians including women and children have been killed in Cameroon government military attacks in Wum, Esu and Weh ever since the conflict began four years ago. Cameroon government army soldiers have also brought widespread devastation to the already impoverished Menchum County.

Ambazonia Restoration Forces defending the Menchum constituency say the French Cameroun aggression has not undermined their will to stand against the occupation crime syndicate in Yaoundé. They say, despite their suffering, they will remain steadfast and fight for until Southern Cameroons is free.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai with files

Southern Cameroons Vice President Dabney Yerima has denounced as an act of state terrorism the fatal shooting of more than ten children, including three elderly women by Cameroon government forces in the North West region.

The Southern Cameroons Broadcasting Cooperation (SCBC) cited Yerima as saying in a press statement that the killing in the North West region now being denied by the French Cameroun regime in Yaoundé was an act of organized state terror and would have serious consequences for the occupying French Cameroun troops.

The Ambazonia Interim Government (IG) announced late on Friday that pro French Cameroun armed militias known as Atanga Nji Boys have blocked the main road linking Bamenda to Wum preventing the flow of food and medicine. The IG also said the Atanga Nji Boys were harassing the sick and the elderly and putting the blame on Ambazonia Restoration Forces.

Several Southern Cameroons activists have also reported that the Bafut passage that links Bamenda to Menchum Division is now under the control of the Atanga Nji Boys with support from Yaoundé.

Vice President Yerima described the latest deadly violence in the Northern Zone of Southern Cameroons as an attempt by the 88-year-old corrupt French Cameroun leader Paul Biya to elicit reactions that would enable him to transfer power to his ill equip and poorly educated son Franck Biya in his final days of his grip on power in French Cameroun.

The exiled Southern Cameroons leader called for an urgent intervention of the United States and the European Union to stop the killings going on in Southern Cameroons and to condemn the French Cameroun genocidal campaign.

Dabney Yerima also offered his condolences to all suffering Southern Cameroons families and wished a speedy recovery for the wounded Amba fighters.

By Chi Prudence Asong with files from Fon Lawrence

Cameroon government military spokesman Cyrille Serge Atonfack says soldiers did not carry out any attack on Southern Cameroons civilians in Ako in Donga-Mantung and Bafanji in Balikumbat.  Captain Atonfack noted in a poorly worded statement in the French language that troops loyal to the Francophone regime in Yaoundé have suspended its attacks in Southern Cameroons.   

The Cameroon government army spokesman contradicted himself in the same press release when he   claimed that a military operation was carried out in the vicinity of Ekuru in the Nkambe district by the Francophone dominated army.

The 88-year-old President Biya and his French Cameroun political elites with support from France — launched a brutal war against the English speaking people of Southern Cameroons. The ongoing war was declared to crush the British Southern Cameroons uprising and it’s Interim Government.

The offensive has failed to achieve its goals, but pushed Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia to the brink, killed thousands of innocent people, and destroyed the territory’s impoverished administrative infrastructure.

Captain Cyrille Serge Atonfack’s remarks come amid a four year offensive by the Cameroon government army to restore French Cameroun dominance in the rural areas of Southern Cameroons.

The leader of the Ambazonian nation and its people President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe say the French Cameroun aggressors have to end all their attacks against Southern Cameroons, take out all their forces, end their simultaneous and crippling occupation of the territory, compensate Southern Cameroons victims before entering any peace process that will determine the future of the two Cameroons.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

The disgraced president Paul Biya (88) was hospitalized for the first time in his country of birth late on Wednesday after he reportedly suffered a minor vascular incident, Cameroon Intelligence Report sources in Yaoundé said.

We gathered that Biya did not spend a night in the hospital facility as his private doctor who is now a powerful personality in his entourage revealed that his general condition was satisfactory.

Our Yaoundé city reporter who contributed to this report said members of the Biya family had feared that the corrupt Francophone leader had probably suffered a stroke.

Biya has high blood pressure and has been suffering from arteriosclerosis.

Nobody in the current Ngute government including the so-called ruling CPDM barons have access to the president’s bill of health. The regime and its media war lords are now teleguiding the focus on Niat Marcel, leader of the House of Senate and the constitutional next-of-kin to Biya.

A medic at the National Social Insurance Hospital in Yaoundé, where the 88-year-old recently had an examination was heard saying that Etoudi warned the management of the hospital not to release any information on the nature of the illness of the head of state.

French speaking Africans have little faith in medical bulletins about their leader’s health. In Guinea, Gabon, Togo, Ivory Coast, heads of state have died after hiding their various cancers from the public. The late Omar Bongo of Gabon was diagnosed with HIV but with French support issued fake medical reports for decades.

By Rita Akana in Yaounde