2, March 2019
Understanding Acting President Sako’s financial message 0
We are a people who respect authority when authority earns respect. We also confront authority when authority crosses the acceptable boundaries in projecting excesses and disregard of honest engagements. I watched Acting President Sako today as he delivered his message to the nation and felt like I was watching one of those devilish conmen of the genocidal vampire terrorist Paul Biya government. It was hard to take. Tears came to my eyes that at this moment of the history of our long struggle when our people are being slaughtered every second and suffering indignities we would have a leader who will find the needs to be taking us for fools.
Let me explain: a member of Sako’s cabinet came out to tell the world that another member of the same cabinet has not been accountable with the funds of the government. Immediately after that Sako came out siding with the member who made the allegations by ordering an audit. While that audit was ongoing, the member who made the allegations came out again attacking the other. Sako remained quiet. Then a partial audit sent to his office was deliberately leaked to public to set the stage for him to come out with a pretentious gesture of taking full responsibility and issuing an executive order, which in a way is empowering one member of his cabinet and sanctioning another. No Dr Sako you are very wrong. You cannot take such measures if you are genuine and honest about the audit. Unless your audit is just for window dressing and is not independent. Your executive order already taints the validity and accuracy of the so-called audit. That executive order can only come as part of the recommendations from the audit, not you doing it in mid-audit.
Maybe you miss what the audit should be about. The treasurer whom your executive order is empowering to open new accounts must also submit to the audit. The office of the presidency that has been receiving funds as we have seen in the partial leaked audit, must also account for all the funds it received. All the departments of your cabinet that received funds must also account for those funds. You seem to be thinking that this audit is for Brado Tabenyang alone. You are wrong. It is for your whole cabinet and your cannot issue executive orders to open new accounts when there is an ongoing audit.
You mentioned the restoration council as if it is a department of your cabinet. From all indications you have functioned in total disregard and disrespect of that body. Since you seem to be influencing this audit process and putting its independence in doubt, without taking any instructions from you, the restoration council should and must order its own independent audit of all the funds that have come in since you came to office and how it was spent to the last penny. Stop directing and interfering with the audit process. You are not dealing here with fools.
And please stop sending out people to attack fellow Ambazonians who disagree with you. You do not own the IG we do and we will not allow these games on the blood and sufferings of our people.
Christmas Ebini
2, March 2019
Investigation into Biya regime killings wins Royal Television Society award 0
An investigation led by Emmanuel Freudenthal (MPhil in Development Studies, 2007) and colleagues into mobile phone footage of the brutal killings of two women and their children in Cameroon has won the 2019 Royal Television Society’s (RTS) News Technology award.
The footage, which went viral in July 2018, showed a group of soldiers leading away the women and children, who they accused of being part of Boko Haram, before blindfolding them and shooting them dead.
The footage appeared to have been filmed in northern Cameroon, but the country’s government dismissed the video as fake news and denied that the soldiers taking part were Cameroonian.
However the team, working as part of the BBC’s Africa Eye and with a group of amateur investigators on Twitter, used clues from the footage together with open source data and software to determine where and when the killings took place as well as the identity of the killers.
The team used satellite imagery and tip-offs to help pinpoint the location, clues such as the angle of the soldiers’ shadows and the presence of seasonal paths to determine the time of year, and details of weaponry and army uniforms to confirm that the killers were indeed Cameroonian soldiers. They also used Facebook profiles along with nicknames heard in the video and information from a military source to identify the soldiers involved.
The investigation itself, named Anatomy of a Killing, went viral on Twitter and was picked up by multiple news outlets. While the investigation was taking place, the Cameroonian government announced that seven soldiers had been arrested, of whom three appear to be those identified by the team.
According to RTS, the judges described the report as ‘a superb piece of public interest journalism which held power to account and had a huge impact in social media’. The awards were announced on 27 February.
Emmanuel Freudenthal is a freelance investigative journalist based in Nairobi. He completed the MPhil in Development Studies at ODID between 2007 and 2009.
Source: Oxford Department of International Development