News

Biya regime invites bids to build a new house for the president of the Constitutional Court

25, October 2018

Biya regime invites bids to build a new house for the president of the Constitutional Court 0

Cameroon has invited bids to build a new house for the president of the Constitutional Council, two days after the council announced the re-election of long-time president, Paul Biya.

The $475,000 (£370,000) mansion is in an upmarket neighbourhood of Yaoundé.

Last week, the body dismissed 18 opposition petitions against the running of the elections.

During the hearing, an opposition lawyer accused Judge Clement Atangana of supporting the president.

His wife is an MP for the ruling party but Justice Atangana denied any bias and said all his judgements were based on the law.

While the tender indicates that the building will be a public structure, given the timing, many Cameroonians view this as being specifically for Justice Atangana, reports the BBC’s Ngala Killian Chimtom in Yaoundé.

The BBC has approached both Justice Atangana and the government for comment, but neither have responded.

What happened in the election?

Mr Biya won a seventh term with 71.3% of the vote in the 7 October election.

He has been in power since 1982.

Opposition candidate Maurice Kamto, who came second with just 14% of the votes, continues to dispute the official results, alleging widespread fraud.

The election was also marred by violence especially in the two English-speaking provinces which have been hit by more than a year of violent protests and attacks by separatist rebels which have left hundreds dead.

Voter turnout in the country’s two Anglophone regions – North West and South West – was as low as 5%, according to the International Crisis Group.

Official figures recorded an almost 16% turnout in the South-West region.

The formation of the Constitutional Council was enshrined in the 1996 constitution, but its 11 members were only appointed, for a six-year renewable term, by Mr Biya in February.

The team’s first public function was adjudicating the results of the October presidential election.

 

Culled from the BBC


Saudi Arabia would not dare murder Khashoggi without US protection, says Iran’s Rouhani

24, October 2018

Saudi Arabia would not dare murder Khashoggi without US protection, says Iran’s Rouhani 0

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Wednesday that Saudi Arabia would not have murdered prominent journalist Jamal Khashoggi without American protection, according to the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA).

US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday Saudi authorities staged the “worst cover-up ever” in the killing of Khashoggi in Turkey this month, as Washington vowed to revoke the visas of some of those believed to be responsible.

“No one would imagine that in today’s world and a new century that we would witness such an organised murder and a system would plan out such a heinous murder,” Rouhani said, according to IRNA.

“I don’t think that a country would dare commit such a crime without the protection of America.”

Khashoggi’s death in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2 has triggered global outrage.

Saudi Arabia initially denied knowledge of Khashoggi’s fate before saying on Saturday he was killed in a fight in the consulate, an account met with skepticism from several Western governments.

Iran and Saudi Arabia are regional rivals and have supported opposing sides in the conflicts in Syria and Yemen and different political factions in Iraq and Lebanon.

U.S. protection has allowed Saudi Arabia to carry out bombings against civilians in Yemen’s war, Rouhani said, according to IRNA.

“If there was no American protection, would the people of Yemen still have faced the same brutal bombing?” Rouhani said.

Rouhani also called on Turkey’s government to conduct an impartial investigation into Khashoggi’s “unprecedented” murder.

Separately, Rouhani said that Iran would “defeat” new American sanctions targeting its oil sector, according to the IRIB news agency.

Washington plans to impose the sanctions from November 4 with the aim of stopping Iran’s involvement in conflicts in Syria and Iraq, and bringing Tehran to the negotiating table over its ballistic missile programme.

(REUTERS)


Cameroon’s Presidential Poll: Prof. Elvis Ngolle Ngolle is bitter

24, October 2018

Cameroon’s Presidential Poll: Prof. Elvis Ngolle Ngolle is bitter 0

CPDM Prof. Elvis Ngolle Ngolle, has become very bitter after he learned that his party comrades had a party at their party headquarters in Yaounde last Friday when the Constitutional Council President, Clement Atangana, handed the people’s victory to the CPDM candidate, Paul Biya, who neither campaigned nor addressed the nation during the campaign.

Prof. Elvis Ngolle Ngolle who had spent most of his time at the Constitutional Council hearing throughout the week only learned from unofficial sources that there was a huge party in which his comrades were having a good time after successfully stealing the people’s victory at the party headquarters.

The bitter professor was so disappointed and even pointed out that whenever it came to working, he would be asked to be there for the party and whenever there was food and drinks, he would be sidelined or simply made to look foolish. He said he was tired of being humiliated by his peers of Beti extraction and that if not given a position in government, he would just stay in his own corner of the world.

“I think they think that I am their dunce. When it comes to work they will make sure I am there all day, but when the fruits of our labor are there, they will quietly leave me in my little corner as if I don’t matter. I wish they could know what risks I have taken just to make sure Mr. Biya is given the votes he has today. If they think I am not useful, let them head to the southwest region to face those violent Amba boys. These are people can chop off my head if they lay their hands on me. I have been exiled by my own people and now the people in Yaounde are behaving as if I don’t count,” the frustrated professor is alleged to have said.

Our source added that the cash-strapped professor was helpless, adding that he had not got alternatives. He stressed that like every Cameroonian, he has his bills to pay and given his involvement in some shady deals while he was in government, it is very unlikely that Prof. Ngolle Ngolle will walk away from the ruling CPDM.

“He is stuck with that party. He is cash-strapped and cannot survive without the CPDM. The professor is in debt right up to his eyeballs and if he walks away from the CPDM, he will be walked straight to Kondengui, the country’s maximum security jail located on the outskirts of the city,” our source said.

A native of the Southwest, Prof. Ngolle Ngolle has been working very hard to get a place in government before, during and after the rigged presidential poll. Prof. Ngolle Ngolle has been very desperate ever since he was kicked out of government a few years ago. His desperation was noticed during the presidential election campaign during which he said his party members should employ spiritual and supernatural means just to gain the support they needed to return his party candidate, Paul Biya, to power.

It should be recalled Prof. Ngolle Ngolle has been exiled from the Southwest region and he is among those who have been earmarked for killing if they returned to the region. Others from the region who are also facing the death penalty include, Senator Tabe-tando, Minister Victor Mengot Arrey, former prime minister Peter Mafany Musonge, Member of Parliament Okpu, former minister Ogork Ntui, Mayor Patrick Ekema, Prof. Etchu George, Minister Dion Ngute and all seating CPDM parliamentarians and senators. They were found guilty of treason by the Southern Cameroons Supreme Court.

It should be stressed that Senator Tabe-tando, Minister Victor Mengot Arrey and Prof. Echu George missed death by the skin of their teeth on October 7, 2018 as they defied Ambazonian orders to vote for their party in Mamfe.  

It should also be pointed out that most chiefs in the region have been chased away from their areas of jurisdiction. According to a source close to the Ambazonian fighters, all the chiefs who have been found guilty of working against the people’s interest have been handed a lesser charge and if arrested will have to spend a long time in an Ambazonian environment-friendly jail.

 By George Esame and Ernest Sama in Yaounde


European Union executive rejects Italian 2019 draft budget

24, October 2018

European Union executive rejects Italian 2019 draft budget 0

The European Commission rejected on Tuesday, October 23, Italy’s draft 2019 budget because the plan breaks EU rules in an “unprecedented” way and asked Rome to submit a new one within three weeks or it would face disciplinary action.

The decision by the European Union executive arm is the first time it exercises the power, obtained during the sovereign debt crisis in 2013, to send back a budget of a euro zone country that violates the rules.

Commission Vice President for the Euro Valdis Dombrovskis told a news conference that for the first time, the Commission is obliged to request a euro area country to revise its draft budget plan.

He said the European Commission sees no alternative than to request the Italian government to do so. It has adopted an opinion giving Italy a maximum of three weeks to provide a revised draft budgetary plan for 2019.

The Commission said that the revised budget it expected to receive from Italy should be in line with the recommendation of EU finance ministers from July 13.

Italy sent a letter to the Commission on Monday, October 22, acknowledging that its draft budget was in violation of EU rules, but insisting it would still go ahead with it.

Dombrovskis added that unless Rome changes its draft budget in the next three weeks, the Commission was ready to open a disciplinary process against the country, called the ‘excessive deficit procedure’, based on the lack of progress in cutting debt — an obligation under EU law.


French Cameroun army attacks have killed 4000 Ambazonians: Interim Government

24, October 2018

French Cameroun army attacks have killed 4000 Ambazonians: Interim Government 0

The Interim Government of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia says more than 4000 Southern Cameroons civilians have lost their lives ever since President Biya launched a war purportedly fighting what the Francophone regime in Yaounde painted as “separatist terrorists”.

The Ambazonian Interim Government made the revelation during a meeting with the renowned Prof PLO Lumumba in the USA. Acting President Ikome Sako observed that there were 2450 Southern Cameroonians under the age of 18 among the fatalities in addition to female victims.

French Cameroun helicopter raids in the Lebialem County including Belo, Weh, Batibo and Oku also resulted in the injury of hundreds of civilians, some of whom suffered permanent disabilities. Cameroon government sources, requesting not to be named, told Cameroon Concord News Group reporters on Thursday that the death toll from separate Cameroon military assaults conducted by Beti-Ewondo troops to force Southern Cameroonians to participate in the presidential polls had reached 105.

Our sources said attacks that targeted villages in Manyu, Menchum, Boyo,  Kupe Muanenguba and Mezam on Election Day left at least 40 civilians, including women and children, dead and many more wounded.

12 civilians including a Roman Catholic Seminarian were also killed and tens of others injured when the Francophone dominated army pounded on Roman Catholic medical establishments in the Northern Zone of Ambazonia. Separately, at least 9 civilians were killed and many more wounded in Besongabang, Nchang and Eyumojock Sub constituency in Manyu.

Cameroon government forces have been conducting raids against Southern Cameroons civilians in Tombel and Bangem and also in Bafut. The United Nations and the International Crisis Group have repeatedly accused the Biya Francophone regime of targeting and killing civilians. Yaounde has also been largely incapable of achieving its declared goal of destroying the Southern Cameroons resistance and quest for independence.

By Chi Prudence Asong with files from Asu Vera Eyere and Sama Ernest


Trial of Ambazonia Interim President: Biya, Judge hold secret meeting inside Unity Palace

24, October 2018

Trial of Ambazonia Interim President: Biya, Judge hold secret meeting inside Unity Palace 0

A French Cameroun judge whose name we are withholding on Friday last week had a secret meeting with President Paul Biya at the Unity Palace in Yaounde. The meeting took place after that of the members of the so-called Constitutional Council who left the State House with huge envelopes.

The outcome of the meeting is still unknown as there was no communication between the judge and our Unity Palace source. The judge was in the Presidential Villa to take instructions on how to manage the trial of the Interim President of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe.

Biya had requested a delay to enable the staging of the presidential polls by ELECAM. This was not the first time the same judge would hold such a private meeting with President Biya in Etoudi. The duo met during the trial of Inoni Ephraim, Prof. Titus Edzoa and the release of Lord Justice Ayah Paul.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai


Canadian Prime Minister says Ottawa ready to halt $13bn arms deal with Saudi Arabia

23, October 2018

Canadian Prime Minister says Ottawa ready to halt $13bn arms deal with Saudi Arabia 0

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Ottawa is ready to halt a $13 billion arms deal with Riyadh if it concludes the weapons have been misused.

“We strongly demand and expect that Canadian exports are used in a way that fully respects human rights,” Trudeau said in the Parliament on Monday.

“We have frozen export permits before when we had concerns about their potential misuse and we will not hesitate to do so again,” he added.

Canada has been exporting arms to Saudi Arabia based on a 2014 contract, which is worth up to $13 billion. The contact, won by the Canadian unit of US weapons maker General Dynamics Corp, allows Canada to supply Saudis with light-armored vehicles.

Trudeau’s comments on halting the huge arms deal came amid increasing pressure to punish Riyadh for the killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

The Canadian PM condemned the journalist’s death and said Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland had been talking to allies to discuss the next steps.

Back on Saturday, Freeland had noted that the Saudi explanations on the death of Khashoggi at its consulate in Istanbul lacked credibility and consistency.

“There are very important questions about the entire relationship with Saudi Arabia that need to be asked,” she told reporters on Monday.

The Khashoggi case has fanned the flames of a dispute between Saudi Arabia and Canada, which escalated to new levels after Riyadh abruptly cut ties with Ottawa over its criticism of the Saudi crackdown on dissent.

The dispute broke out in August after the Canadian Embassy in Riyadh tweeted that it was “gravely concerned” over a spike in the arrests of human rights campaigners in the kingdom, including gender rights activist Samar Badawi, and called on “Saudi authorities to immediately release them and all other peaceful #humanrights activists.”

Following the move, Saudi Arabia expelled the Canadian ambassador and recalled its envoy after severing business ties with Ottawa over claims of interference in its internal affairs.

Culled from Presstv


Cameroon gets a new Head of State

22, October 2018

Cameroon gets a new Head of State 0

The Republic of Cameroon has a brand new Head of State. He is the 85 year old President Paul Biya who has ruled the country for 36 years.

There are scenes of celebration across French Cameroun and many Francophones are happy to have the ailing Chief Executive as their new Head of State.

It should be recalled that the President-Elect did not campaign but has won a landslide. On behalf of the Cameroon Concord News and the Cameroon Intelligence Report, we of the Cameroon Concord News Group wish him well and may he continue to guide his country towards the disaster that the people admire.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai


UK: British Prime Minister says Brexit talks “95 percent” complete amid fears of political mutiny

22, October 2018

UK: British Prime Minister says Brexit talks “95 percent” complete amid fears of political mutiny 0

Prime Minister Theresa May will tell Britain’s parliament on Monday that Brexit talk are “95 percent” complete but that she cannot accept the EU’s Northern Ireland border proposals – as she faces an increasingly mutinous faction within her party.

May has been on the receiving end of a furious backlash from Brexit hardliners in her own party after indicating at an EU summit last week that she could accept a longer post-divorce implementation phase than previously envisaged.

Her shift aimed to break an impasse in negotiations between London and Brussels over how to keep the Irish border open after Brexit, by giving the two sides more time to agree their future relationship.

But it infuriated Brexiteer colleagues who fear remaining tied to the EU for years after Britain’s formal departure next March.

Several Sunday newspapers said rebellious MPs were preparing a fresh bid to topple her leadership this week, many carrying colourful off-record quotes from the plotters.

In a bid to calm passions, May will address MPs in the House of Commons on Monday where she will say the divorce deal with Brussels is nearly done.

“Ninety-five per cent of the Withdrawal Agreement and its protocols are now settled,” she will tell parliamentarians, according to a partial transcript released by her office late Sunday.

Highlighting progress in the year-long talks, she will say agreements have now been reached across a broad range of issues including with Spain on the status of the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar, and with Cyprus on the UK’s military bases there. “We have broad agreement on the structure and scope of the future relationship, with important progress made on issues like security, transport and services,” she will say.

Busted backstop

But on Ireland she will seek to reassure MPs in her own party that she will not bow to the EU’s current proposals.

“As I set out last week, the original backstop proposal from the EU was one we could not accept, as it would mean creating a customs border down the Irish Sea and breaking up the integrity of the UK,” she will say.

“I do not believe that any UK Prime Minister could ever accept this. And I certainly will not.” The so-called backstop is a proposal to keep either Northern Ireland or all of Britain in a customs union should future trade talks end in deadlock.

Talks have stalled over how to stop its land frontier with the Republic of Ireland, an EU member, becoming a hard border again. London believes customs and other checks can be avoided through a new trade agreement with Brussels, but accepts the need for a fallback plan until that deal is agreed.

However, the two sides have so far been unable to settle the terms of this so-called backstop. France’s Europe minister Nathalie Loiseau told the BBC Sunday that the bloc needs “definitive answers, or at least no temporary measures which disappear and we don’t know what to do afterwards”.

Despite voting in favour of a split from Europe, the British public remains deeply polarised on Brexit. On Saturday more than half a million anti-Brexit protesters hit the streets of London, the largest demonstration since 750,000 people showed up against the Iraq war in 2003.

(AFP)


Southern Cameroons Crisis: Gunmen abduct six children from a school in Bamenda

22, October 2018

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Gunmen abduct six children from a school in Bamenda 0

Gunmen have abducted six children from a school in Bamenda, the capital of the northwestern, English-speaking Northwest region of Cameroon, a teacher there told AFP. “People attacked the high school yesterday (Friday) at 11:00 am (1000 GMT),” a teacher in Bamenda told AFP. “Six pupils have been abducted.”

The information was confirmed by a source close to the security services in Bamenda. Local media reports said one of the six had managed to escape, but that information has not yet been independently confirmed. Cameroon’s two anglophone regions in the west of Cameroon are the site of an armed separatist uprising, where the separatists have called for a boycott of the schools. They argue the French-language education system penalises English-speaking students.

Already, since the start of the new term in September, insurgents have killed one school director, mutilated a teacher and attacked several high schools. The results of the country’s presidential election, which took place on October 7, are still to be announced, but the incumbent, Paul Biya, ran for a seventh term in office.

Biya, 85, has refused to enter into dialogue with the separatists and at the beginning of the year launched a military crackdown in the regions.

AFP


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