Fighter aircrafts bearing names of Ambazonian towns and cities that were flying the Yaoundé sky to celebrate Cameroon’s National Day may not have been the only kind gesture that the Biya regime extended to Southern Cameroonians to avoid embarrassment. They had also been used in attacks in Southern Cameroons to kill women and children.

By early evening on Sunday in the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, it became clear that there will be a marked low attendance of the so-called National Day at the Bongo Square in Buea because of the Southern Cameroons boycott. Cameroon Intelligence Report sources say that it was at this juncture that the Biya  Francophone Beti Ewondo regime decided to bring in van loads of its military personnel from La Republique in an attempt to prove that Cameroon was indeed one and indivisible.

The US ambassador and several other western diplomats were present at the Yaoundé 20^th may Boulevard today. However, many more French Cameroun soldiers arrived in vans in both the Northern and Southern Zones of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia to increase the number of people at the 20^th   May National Day celebration.

Some French Cameroun officials have however denied knowledge of any such development and pointed out that the number of guests from French Cameroun for the 20^th May National Day celebration in Ambazonia were high even in the previous years before Biya declared war against the people of Southern Cameroons. However, given the strong bond that the ruling CPDM government and some corrupt Southern Cameroons political elites enjoy, the possibility of Yaoundé trying to bail out it’s newly appointed Prime Minister, Chief Dr Dion Ngute and a cream of Southern Cameroons political elites to get out from yet another spot cannot be ruled out.

But irrespective of the French Cameroun Biya effort, participation at the 20^th May function in Southern Cameroons remained significantly low.

Today’s 20^th May celebration in Southern Cameroons was marred by intrusive behavior and harassment of the French Cameroun CPDM guests in every nook and crannies of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia.  It was very clear that the boycott was sparked off by a call from the Ambazonia Vice President, Dabney Yerima’s decision to officially boycott the celebrations due to French Cameroun’s murderous attack throughout Southern Cameroons territory.

The unprecedented and over-zealous move by the Francophone governors of the South West and North West regions did not only target pro Yaoundé Southern Cameroonians during today’s 20^th May celebrations, subjecting them to intense  French Cameroun security scrutiny but also prevented most of the Ambazonian moderate invitees from entering the Buea or Bamenda 20^th May Boulevard.

The Cameroon National Day is officially celebrated on May 20th.While no senior elite from British Southern Cameroons were noticeable anywhere in the Northern and Southern Zone, the usually packed French Cameroun celebration that every year overflows with Francophone SDOs and DOs was an extremely low-key affair this Monday.

By Seseskou Asu Isong in London

The Yaounde government is coming under enormous pressure. The regime that once said the form of the state was non-negotiable, is today contemplating building a federal system for the country.

The country’s Prime Minister recently indicated that the president wanted to dialogue, but would not dialogue with separatists. This position is gradually changing as the international community mounts more pressure.

The government is gradually cracking and Americans are not relenting. The government dissolving resolve can be clearing noticed as government ministers keep on contradicting each other.

Speaking on Friday, May 17 on France 24, the country’s territorial administration minister, Atanga Nji, an ex-convict, said that the president was ready and willing to dialogue with separatists. A significant shift in the government’s rhetoric.

A shift that is being welcome across the world, though many observers are still skeptical about the regime. They hold that the government must put forth a clear agenda, adding that there must be a mediator and the genuine inclusive dialogue must be held out of the country for the Diaspora and civil society to fully participate.

But before this happens, the Biya regime must change its ways. The Yaounde government must submit itself to international scrutiny.

Stopping human rights groups from coming into the country does not give the nation a good name. The International Crisis Group has been banned in Cameroon as the rights group has been very critical of the dictatorial regime.

A Human Rights Watch representative was recently refused entry into the country. Amnesty International is not given free and unfettered access to the two English-speaking regions of the country for it to document atrocities.

The government must understand that these organizations have the resources and means to conduct open source investigation to obtain the facts they need. What is the government hiding that it does not want the international community to know?

The government’s dishonesty and refusal to hold a truly genuine dialogue on the Southern Cameroons crisis has put the country in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons.

The Southern Cameroons Diaspora has done a good job at courting the international community and the fruits are there. Americans have embraced the cause and they are doing all they can to rally other countries to the cause.

The Americans and Canadians are pouring enormous pressure on the government. America does not want to break up the country, but it is clear when it comes to what it wants.

The US wants a federal system for Cameroon and Tibor Nagy, the American undersecretary for African Affairs, is promoting this idea and the American society has bought the idea hook, line and sinker.

This has also been the Canadian idea since the conflict started some three years ago and the Canadian government is not wavering on this.

It has the experience of dealing with minorities and can help Cameroon build a solid federal system that will make the Central African nation one of the best countries in the world.

Southern Cameroonians might have lost loved ones and homes, but they must work with the Americans to address those issues that have triggered this unfortunate situation.

Extremism in this case will be foolish. America and Canada are great allies. Do not alienate them. The Diaspora that has so far done a great job can now start sensitizing the fighters on the ground regarding the American, Canadian and UN positions.

The real work has just started and all Southern Cameroonians must make their contribution.

Dr Arrey Joachim

In Cameroon, civil war is brewing along linguistic lines. Its origins lie in the botched decolonization of the country’s anglophone territory, but President Paul Biya’s repressive regime has poured fuel on the fire. Lorraine Mallinder reports.

Lucy speaks of her last day in her village of Mbonge with arresting clarity. The 64-year-old was cooking plantains to sell by the roadside when soldiers came sweeping in to root out separatist rebels known as Amba Boys. She remembers the rat-a-tat-tat of machine guns and the screams of villagers scattering ‘helter-skelter’ – many fleeing to the bush, shot in the back as they ran. ‘Whosoever the bullets met, the people died,’ she says.

Mbonge is in Cameroon’s anglophone southwest. The soldiers were with the Rapid Intervention Battalion (BIR), an elite Israeli- and US-trained corps deployed by the francophone regime to crush an anglophone uprising in the northwest and southwest regions. In Douala, a port city just over the border from anglophone Cameroon, countless people who have fled the conflict tell similar stories: of security forces shooting indiscriminately, torching homes and sometimes entire villages in their determination to snuff out the separatist threat.

Some call it the ‘anglophone problem’, others ‘the war’. Semantics can be blurring, but the numbers don’t lie. At least 1,600 people have lost their lives, according to the International Crisis Group (ICG). Caught between government forces and the Amba Boys, nearly half a million have fled their homes, many trapped in the bush, terrified of returning to their villages but unable to seek refuge in the towns, often because they don’t have ID cards. Wary of being seen to take sides in a conflict that is becoming deadlier by the day, NGOs struggle to get food and medical assistance to those in need.

Colonel Didier Badjeck, chief of army communications, terms the regime’s actions as ‘legitimate defence’. The military, he claims, is targeting the Amba Boys – the nickname a reference to the separatists’ self-declared independent state of Ambazonia – in their rural camps, minimizing the risk of civilian deaths. He accuses groups like Human Rights Watch (HRW), which has reported on military abuses, of supporting the separatists. These groups, he says, are ‘compromising the country’s honour’.

One NGO source says otherwise. The BIR, he says, has a ‘licence to kill’. And it wields it liberally, with utter impunity.

At first sight, the musket-bearing Ambas would appear to be no match for the mighty BIR and its high-tech Israeli rifles. But the BIR and its lowlier army counterparts are unaccustomed to cat-and-mouse games of guerrilla warfare. And the mice are proving especially nimble, a rag-tag of around seven separatist militias and an unknown number of smaller cells, according to ICG, who know the dense forests like the backs of their hands. More importantly, the separatists have the support of the people, for even if they themselves have been guilty of killings and torture, anger at military excesses is reaching boiling point.

In recent speeches, President Paul Biya has paid lip service to bilingualism and decentralization, but he fails to convince. Lion Man, as his supporters call him, has not survived 36 years in power by making compromises. So confident is he of his cast-iron grip on the country, maintained through paralysing bureaucracy, entrenched patronage networks and legal witch-hunts against political opponents, that he can afford to chillax at length in Geneva every year. Meanwhile, in the sealed-off anglophone regions, the conflict rages on, far from the world’s view.

‘The way things are going now, the situation will be endless,’ says the NGO source.

The devil comes in

In Buea, capital of the southwest, we meet human rights lawyer Agbor Nkongho. In 2016, Nkongho led lawyers and teachers in protests against the government’s efforts to enforce the use of French in anglophone courts and classrooms. The regime responded with shooting from the air and on the ground, locking up protesters it labelled as ‘terrorists’. Today, an estimated 800 to 1,000 people are in prison, many of them moderates. What had started out as a civil rights protest soon spiralled into a full-blown conflict. The government’s brutal response mainstreamed separatist sentiment that had been simmering for decades.

The conflict has its roots in the botched decolonization of Cameroon in the 1960s. Formerly a German colony, it was carved up between the British and the French after the First World War. While French Cameroon gained independence in 1960, the smaller British Cameroons were denied a shot at self-determination. Instead, they had to choose between joining Nigeria or French Cameroon. The northern zone went with the former, the south opting to be folded into French Cameroon. The fledgling federal state started with two stars on its flag, symbolizing the union. But in the early 1970s, two stars became one. Francophones, who make up around 80 per cent of the population, now called the shots. The anglophone regions, rich in oil and other natural resources, were sidelined into near-insignificance.

A federalist at heart, Nkongho is caught in the middle. Jailed by the regime for eight months, he has also received death threats from separatists. Nkongho is critical of the Amba Boys, who chop off the fingers of workers ignoring strikes, torture teachers defying their boycott on schools and kill anyone suspected of collaborating with the state. As the territory descends into chaos, rival diaspora leaders in the West who are funding the two main militias – the Ambazonia Defence Forces and the Ambazonia Self-Defence Council – continue to maintain a hard line. In their battle for supremacy, their fighters occasionally clash in the bush. ‘If they’d pulled together, they could have obtained territory and controlled it,’ says Nkongho. ‘If they were really organized, they would open schools and teach the kids their history.’

There have also been kidnappings, notably November’s Boko Haram-style seizure of 78 schoolchildren and three staff members from a school in Bamenda, capital of the northwest. It took place during a strictly enforced dusk-to-dawn curfew, causing many to question how the group cleared checkpoints on their 19-kilometre journey to the town of Bafut, where the hostages were later released. Separatists and the government blamed each other, the former claiming the abduction was staged to damage their reputation. On the ground, the jury is still out. Courage, a teacher from Bamenda, says the children themselves are still giving conflicting stories.

In the anglophone regions, people now speak of ‘real Ambas’ and ‘fake Ambas’ – the latter covering anything from alleged state-sponsored mercenaries to the gangs of bandits now roaming the land. ‘When you have a house that is always quarrelling, the devil outside realizes and comes in,’ says Brenda, a civil rights activist from Mamfe, in the southwest.

In February, the conflict spiked during a 10-day lockdown. In the northwestern town of Kumbo, 176 people – mostly schoolchildren – were kidnapped and released the next day amid rumours of ransoms. Kumbo was especially volatile, security forces burning houses and shops, and threatening hospital staff, according to HRW. In the southwest, a hospital in the town of Kumba was burned, killing four people. Nobody knows who did it, but military attacks on hospitals are not uncommon. Wounded locals often resist being admitted for treatment for fear of being hauled out by soldiers.

Nkongho estimates that around 30 people lost their lives during February’s violence.

Gerontocracy

The first casualty of war is truth, they say. Especially in a country where journalists risk being hauled before a military court for doing their job, increasingly on charges of ‘fake news’. Currently there are four journalists from anglophone Cameroon in jail, three of whom are known to be in Yaoundé’s notorious Kondengui Prison. One, Thomas Awah Junior, of Afrik 2 Radio, is critically ill.

Journalist Mimi Mefo attracted worldwide support when she was arrested in November 2018. Released on the orders of President Biya, she was warned that the military would eventually get her. Living in permanent fear, she continued to work, threatened by online trolls whom she suspected of being government agents. Now in London, she believes she will be arrested again if she returns.

‘Many journalists are now doing self-censorship,’ she says. ‘The government doesn’t want the story of Cameroon to be told.’

The story of Cameroon right now is one of a gerontocracy holding ever-tighter on to power, crushing the country in its death grip. Anglophones are not alone in their opposition to a government that has over-stayed its welcome – possibly by 26 years. Many Cameroonians believe Biya stole victory in the 1992 elections from John Fru Ndi – an anglophone, as it happens.

History repeats itself endlessly here. Biya, now 86, was re-elected for a seventh mandate last year, amid allegations of fraud. Though, as one diplomat in Yaoundé notes wryly, the outcome was already baked into the system. The opposition organized protests, which ended in mass arrests, including the jailing of opposition leader Maurice Kamto in January. Potential rivals for power are regularly locked up. Cameroonians like to joke that an entire parallel government resides in prison, given the numbers of former high-ranking officials incarcerated.

Observers wonder whether the anglophone conflict will prove to be the regime’s unravelling. Aside from being a drain on state finances, it is now hitting export crops like bananas, rubber, cocoa and coffee hard. And it’s not as if the regime doesn’t have other problems to contend with. Up in the far north, the war on Boko Haram jihadists drags on into its fifth year. And in the east, troops are battling armed gangs from the war-torn Central African Republic.

Diplomatically, the country is under strain. Traditionally a stable foothold in Central Africa, it has long escaped international criticism. But last year, it was stripped of hosting the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations, partly owing to security concerns. And, this year, the US scaled back military aid, citing concerns over human rights violations. It’s unclear whether the move was in response to abuses in the anglophone regions or in the far north, where soldiers have also wielded their ‘licence to kill’ with reckless abandon. Either way, it came as a blow to the regime.

The President is fighting back, employing the services of Glover Park Group, a Washington DC-based lobbying and communications firm. In the anglophone regions, people despair that the narrative is going Biya’s way, the state asserting its right to crush ‘terrorists’ and ‘criminals’, who often turn out to be innocents. NGOs at the mercy of capricious bureaucrats who can withhold passes dare not speak of the abuses they witness lest they lose access to the conflict zone.

One international aid worker, who is assisting people in the bush, agrees that Biya may be winning the PR war. ‘But that’s the only war he’s winning,’ he says. ‘The military know that brute force is not going to win the conflict. You can’t catch so many people hidden in the population.’

‘On the ground people are blaming the government,’ says one journalist in Buea. ‘The people are fed up. The government has failed.’

Culled from New Internationalist

After intense pressure from the international community and stakeholders, Paul Biya, the president of the Republic of Cameroun has grudgingly called for negotiations with undisclosed representatives of Ambazonia, or Cameroonian Anglophones as he prefers to call them.

OEAS has learned from reliable sources in Yaoundé and Europe that in addition to the above actions, the Biya regime has formulated a plan under which so called representatives of the Anglophones will negotiate a “peace plan” calling for the armed resistance in Ambazonia to stop in exchange for assurances of equal rights for the Anglophone community.

This  sort of “peace plan” which simply guarantees the Ambazonians their own existing rights is a position that will never be accepted by the armed resistance and its commanders who seek nothing short of total independence for Ambazonia.  Further, the international community which is responsible for bringing Biya to the bargaining table must be a third party to the negotiations. The deaths of up to 15,000 Ambazonians and many times more refugees and internally displaced persons has forever internationalized the peace process.

OEAS stands firm in its resolution to stand by the Ambazonian people.  As Southern Cameroons, Ambazonia was among the founding members of OEAS.

OEAS calls for the following comprehensive peace initiative:

The parties must negotiate in good faith with no preset conditions or limits.  The armed Ambazonian resistance must be a necessary party to the talks.   The international community must also be present at the negotiating table.

It is obvious Ambazonia freedom fighters and their supporters will not accept the status quo any more than Biya will accept total independence as a starting goal.  Biya must understand that the situation in Ambazonia has forever changed and there is no going back to the pre-2017 status quo.

Independence however can take many forms.  Both parties can learn from what has worked in South Sudan, Somaliland, Kurdistan and the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic.  An interim solution that allows for healing, nation building, and peace benefits everyone.  But to reach any solution, negotiations with no preconditions must first take place with an international peace broker.  OEAS points out that an incremental process eventually won out in South Sudan ending decades of violence and slaughter.

A sham peace process will only serve to strengthen the will of the freedom fighters and escalate the armed struggle.  If the Biya regime truly wants peace, it must look beyond the pre-2017 status quo and seek a new framework that benefits all parties.  Only then can the initiative become a comprehensive solution.

The Organization of Emerging African States OEAS is a United States 501(c)(3) public charity registered with the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs NGO Branch and The European Commission Authentication System (ECAS) with member states throughout Africa.

The former Acting President of Ambazonia, Samuel Ikome Sako has reportedly displayed a well-developed criminal intent all in a bid to hang on to leadership. Earlier this week, on the 6^th of May 2019, Cameroon Concord News Group sounded a note of caution to Southern Cameroonians that Sako was planning to offer Elvis Kometa money in exchange for the Restoration Council’s approval of his dubious 75 member IG Cabinet. Two days after our publication, the Restoration Council issued a statement that it had completed the vetting process and Sako could proceed to announce his cabinet.

It has now been revealed in the USA that the document which accorded Sako Ikome the right to form a new government bearing Chairman Kometa’s signature was a Sako fabrication. Our correspondent in the US hinted that Chairman Kometa made calls yesterday disassociating himself from the Restoration Council’s decision and documents. We have not been able to establish the source of the document but fingers are all pointing at Otto Tiale, Sako, Irene Ngwa and Chris Anu.

“Kometa has to come out and publicly state on camera that he didn’t sign those documents. It’s not good enough for him to make calls to activists and media outlets stating his innocence” noted a senior Southern Cameroons citizen in Germany who spoke to us and sued for anonymity. “Until he does that the people of Ambazonia will continue to hold him jointly accountable in undermining the Interim President’s decision to dissolve the cabinet last week” he added.

While the situation in the exiled Southern Cameroons Interim Government remains confused, events on Ground Zero, the US and Europe demonstrate once again that the likeliest resolution to Ambazonia’s seemingly endless USA political crisis lies in the hands of President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and the Southern Cameroons Restoration Forces.

The Sako Ikome failed dictatorship and the President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe’s decision dissolving the controversial Interim Government’s cabinet has been locked in a tense stand-off ever since a financial scandal rocked the Interim Government in the USA.

The United Nations now estimates that a quarter of Southern Cameroon’s population is in need of humanitarian assistance, with almost half a million suffering from undernourishment in the forest. It also calculates another 50,000 have already fled to Nigeria in desperation. But the continuing support of ill informed Ambazonians in the USA has so far given Sako Ikome the feeling that he has survived the fallout from his leadership failure.

By Sessekou Asu Isong in London

Cameroon’s Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute on Thursday began a one week visit to the conflict-hit English speaking Northwest and Southwest regions hoping to find a political solution to the escalating violence and the ensuing humanitarian crisis.

During the visit from May 9 -16 the first by the premier since his appointment last January, Dion Ngute will discuss with community leaders and other groups key to finding a lasting solution to the incessant violence.

The prime minister was received in Bamenda by a traditional ruler as he arrived holding a peace plant.

The visit is in line with the governments efforts to resolve the conflict in the face of international pressure from among others the United Nations and the European Union. In contrast the Africa Union has stood by the non-interference clause contained in its charter despite calls from civil society groups for it to act.

The visit comes less than a week after the UN Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet Jeria warned that the crisis was getting out of hand and the window for reconciliation closing.

Killings, torching of villages and kidnapping for ransoms and other human rights abuses perpetrated by both government troops and armed groups fighting for the secession of the two English speaking regions to establish a new state called Ambazonia continue to be reported almost on a daily basis.

Last week the International Crisis Group (ICG) reported that 1850 people have been killed and 530,000 displaced in clashes in the past 20 months as the government and the separatists refuse to cede ground for talks.

The May 2 report said lack of concessions could generate more violence and prolong the conflict.

“Both sides must explore compromise solutions aimed at a level of regional autonomy somewhere between the secession desired by the separatists and the fake decentralisation proposed by Yaoundé,” ICG advised.

It called on Cameroonian and international actors to encourage the two sides to make concessions including by rewarding the less intransigent and sanctioning those who stand in the way of dialogue.

Violence erupted in the Cameroon’s two English speaking regions when an industrial strike by aggrieved lawyers and teachers in 2016 over perceived marginalization turned into a clamour by armed separatists for outright independence of the region.

Ambazonia, as the separatists identify the region, was administered as part of Nigeria as a UN trust territory under British control prior to reunification.

“The separatists continue to dream that independence is just around the corner. In Yaoundé, the government still wrongly believes it can win a quick military victory,” the ICG report said.

In a separate report four days later, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Cameroon authorities have regularly tortured and held incommunicado detainees arrested in the government’s crackdown on the English-speaking armed separatist movement.

HRW said it had documented 26 cases of incommunicado detention and enforced disappearance between January 2018 and January 2019 at the State Defence Secretariat (SED) detention centre in the capital Yaounde.

Besides the armed separatist movement in the Anglophone regions, Cameroon faces multiple other challenges including persistent threat by Boko Haram jihadist group in the Far North, political tensions and a growing number of refugees fleeing violence in neighbouring Nigeria and the Central African Republic.

The divisions in the country have seen two major opposition political parties announce a boycott of the 47th National Day celebrations on May 20.

The Social Democratic Front (SDF) of Ni John Fru Ndi and the Cameroon Renaissance Movement (MRC) of Prof Maurice Kamto have separately announced they will not be part of the celebration whose rallying call is “Unity in diversity.”

The SDF said the boycott was in “strong protest of the decaying state of the nation” and in sympathy to the suffering of Cameroonians caught up in the civil war and other crisis across the country.

“As long as the civil war and this severe insecurity prevails, the SDF cannot participate in the National Day Celebrations on May 20. One side of the face cannot be smiling while the other side is crying,” the party’s 2018 presidential candidate Joshua Osih said. It said the government had turned a deaf ear to dialogue. The boycott was also in protest to the continued incarceration of its leader Maurice Kamto and other supporters.

Prof Kamto was arrested in January for organizing post-election protests and is standing trial before a military court in Yaounde on charges of rebellion, insurrection and “hostility to the homeland.”

The opposition leader was arrested alongside 116 of his supporters while taking part in the demonstrations dubbed “white marches” which were suppressed by security forces.

Prof Kamto maintains that he was the winner of the October 2018 presidential poll, but official results showed he emerged a distant second with 14.23 percent behind Paul Biya with 71.28 per cent.

Boycotts of state functions, however, are of little significance in Cameroon.

Two years ago SDF boycotted the ceremony to push for labour rights and an inclusive electoral code.” The party went on to participate in the 2018 presidential election under the same electoral code and political dispensation.

The opposition Cameroon People’s Party (CPP) has not taken part in any National Day parade since 2016 citing violation of freedoms.

Its leader and 2011 presidential candidate Kah Walla said the day has lost meaning as the government continues to ignore divisions and opportunities to unify the country.

Source: The East African

After twenty months of clashes, the government and the separatists are both refusing to give ground. Both sides must explore compromise solutions aimed at a level of regional autonomy somewhere between the secession the separatists yearn for and the fake decentralisation proposed by Yaoundé.

What’s new? The conflict in the Anglophone regions of Cameroon is deadlocked. There is no dialogue between Yaoundé and the separatists, who are both refusing to give ground: the government is counting on a military victory and refuses to discuss the form of the state; the separatists demand independence.

Why does it matter? In the last 20 months, the conflict has left 1,850 dead, 530,000 internally displaced and tens of thousands of refugees. The intransigence of the belligerents threatens to generate further violence and prolong the conflict, which neither can win in the short term.

What should be done? Cameroonian and international actors should encourage the two sides to make concessions by threatening to sanction those who stand in the way of dialogue and rewarding the less intransigent. Ending the conflict will eventually require changes in the legal framework for decentralisation to grant greater autonomy to communes and regions.

Executive Summary

Cameroon’s Anglophone crisis is deadlocked. Twenty months of clashes have killed 1,850, displaced 530,000 and led tens of thousands to seek refuge abroad, but the government and the separatists are sticking to their irreconcilable positions. The separatists continue to dream that independence is just around the corner. In Yaoundé, the government still wrongly believes it can win a quick military victory. Meanwhile, moderates and federalists, who enjoy majority support, are unable to organise. To break the deadlock, Cameroonian and international actors should put pressure on the government and the separatists. Both sides must explore compromise solutions aimed at a level of regional autonomy somewhere between the secession desired by the separatists and the fake decentralisation proposed by Yaoundé.

The socio-political crisis that began in October 2016 in the Anglophone Northwest and Southwest regions mutated into armed conflict at the end of 2017. Seven armed militias are currently in positions of strength in most rural areas. The security forces reacted slowly, but since mid-2018 have inflicted casualties on the separatists. They have not been able, however, to regain full control over rural areas nor prevent repeated separatist attacks in the towns.

There is currently no dialogue between Yaoundé and the separatists. The latter are calling for talks to hammer out the practical details of independence in the presence of an international mediator. The government refuses to discuss the form of the state or reform of institutions. It proposes instead a decentralisation model that grants neither adequate funding nor sufficient powers to local authorities (communes and regions) and intends to organise the country’s first regional elections later this year. Far from resolving the conflict, this half-baked proposal risks provoking further violence.

Local initiatives to promote dialogue are emerging. In July 2018, Anglophone religious leaders (Catholic, Protestant and Muslim) announced a plan to hold an Anglophone General Conference as a first step toward an inclusive national dialogue. A majority of Anglophones are in favour of this initiative. Initially reluctant, some separatists now seem to be more open to the idea on condition that it prepares the way for a referendum on self-determination that would give the choice between federalism and independence. Faced with opposition from the government, the conference organisers have already had to postpone it twice: from August to November 2018 and then to March 2019. It still has not taken place.

Although some separatists will refuse to give ground, others might accept a dialogue with the Cameroonian authorities, in the presence of an international mediator, to discuss federalism or genuine decentralisation that would grant autonomy and adequate funding to the regions and that would guarantee respect for the specific features of the Anglophone judicial and education systems. Similarly, although the Cameroonian government seems to rule out federalism, it might consent to regionalism or genuine decentralisation, which would involve changes to the legislative framework.

To clear the path to talks, the belligerents must each make concessions in order to establish a minimum degree of trust and reverse the spiral of violence. The government should support an Anglophone General Conference in order for Anglophones to appoint representatives to a national dialogue while at the same time providing non-separatist Anglophones with the opportunity to express their point of view. Cameroon’s president should adopt a conciliatory stance and recognise the existence of the Anglophone problem and the legitimacy of the Anglophones’ demands; order investigations into abuses by the security forces; make provision for reparations to victims and the reconstruction of affected areas; and release the hundreds of Anglophone activists currently in detention, including important members of the separatist movement. The separatists should renounce their strategy of Monday “ghost towns” (general strikes) and their school boycott and expel combatants guilty of abuses against civilians.

A combination of internal and international pressures could lead both the government and the separatists to make such concessions. International actors could reward the parties who agree to moderate their positions and sanction those who remain intransigent. The Europeans and Americans, in particular, should consider targeted sanctions against government leaders and senior army officers who continue to obstruct dialogue (travel bans, asset freeze) and separatists who encourage or organise violence (judicial proceedings). The International Criminal Court prosecutor should open preliminary examinations into abuses committed by both sides, to underline that the pursuit of violence will have judicial consequences. International actors are divided, however, on what position to adopt and what measures to take and should first reach a common position, at least among Western countries.

Internally, Cameroonian Francophones and Anglophones who advocate compromise should mobilise to put pressure on the separatists and the government. In particular, federalists should work together to strengthen their position in the talks. They should continue to dialogue with the separatists and encourage them to moderate their positions, and increase the pressure on the authorities to open up to the less intransigent separatists. Finally, they should conduct an international campaign to promote peaceful solutions.

Once trust has been established, preliminary talks between government, federalist and separatist representatives will be necessary. These should take place outside the country. During this process, international actors, especially the U.S., Switzerland, the Vatican, the UN, the EU (especially France, Germany and the UK) and the African Union (AU) should continue to encourage the government to dialogue and offer funding and support for the talks.

In the event of a dialogue taking place, they could also help to fund compensation payments to victims of abuses, the reconstruction of Anglophone regions, the return of refugees and internally displaced persons and the disarmament and demobilisation of former combatants. Given the level of acrimony between the parties, the presence of an international mediator will be necessary during the preparatory discussions and then during the national dialogue. Several countries and international institutions and organisations have offered to mediate since the start of the conflict. The UN, the AU, the Catholic Church and Switzerland seem best placed to play this role, because the parties to the conflict perceive them as relatively neutral.

Substantive talks between the three parties should take place in Cameroon, which would require the government to guarantee safe passage for separatist representatives. During these talks, the government should indicate its readiness to amend the Constitution in order to grant greater autonomy to the regions and develop the legal framework for decentralisation. This could include direct elections for the regional councils and these councils’ presidents; the establishment of regional structures with substantial financial and administrative power; and an increase in the powers and resources allocated to communes. The government could also reform institutions and governance in order to take account of the specific features of the educational and judicial systems in the Anglophone regions.

More broadly, the conflict highlights the shortcomings of Cameroon’s centralised governance model and raises two crucial issues that the government must address: the need to improve the way the state handles minority rights, colonial heritages and cultural specificities; and the need for a fairer and more equitable redistribution of the country’s wealth. A lasting solution to the conflict requires dialogue and consensus, which are indispensable to undertake the institutional and governance reforms that Cameroon needs.

Source: International Crisis Group

Ambazonia Acting President Samuel Ikome Sako ’s forthcoming Cabinet shakeup has been described as a “CPDM Coup” meant to stifle the Southern Cameroons revolution and prepare him for a takeover from Sisiku Ayuk Tabe by axing those opposed to his failed leadership.

The Southern Cameroons European bloc says that instead of a Cabinet reshuffle, the disgraced Ambazonia leader should just step aside and save the Southern Cameroons resistance and quest for independence.  Southern Cameroons leaders in France, Belgium, Holland, the UK and Germany have unanimously opined that the Sako reshuffle is a joke that isn’t funny.

While prominent Southern Cameroons voices have called for calm observing that for our struggle to succeed, we must be committed to the principle, which is the Southern Cameroons and not individuals. And that much time was needed for the governing IG structures to correct discernible errors based on forensic evidence, Cameroon Concord News Group can now reveal that Dr Samuel Ikome Sako is no longer the man to lead us to Buea.

The general opinion is that Sako is simply the biggest stumbling block to the Ambazonia revolution. To be sure, the Ambazonian Interim Government under Sako is pack with lazy, corrupt and incompetent people. It is abundantly clear that Sako’s reshuffle is meant to crush those opposed to him and Irene Ngwa and has nothing to do with the performance but more to do with factional wars in the Interim Government.

This shudder and cockiness is reverberating around the whole nation. Cameroon Concord News Group is trying to make sense of this absurdity. The fact that Sako hasn’t got the decency or respect to consult the pillars of the struggle some of whom are in Kondengui speaks volumes of his intent. This looks like a coup. Come to think of it, it is a coup. He has arrived. He has made himself President by Executive Order.

We now understand that the jailed leaders in Kondengui were reportedly informed of the so-called reshuffle by a third party.  This utter disregard for the institution and structure of government must be condemned in the strongest terms. The question now is if the Restoration Council can have a pair of brass balls to block this madness. If Chairman Kometa and his team don’t block this psychosis, they will be confined to the dustbin of Ambazonia history and every indictment that comes their way will be deserved.

This so-called new cabinet is a Chris Anu-Irene Ngwa affair!! And it is intended to hide the truth that Sako and his gang misappropriated the proceeds of MTTB. He then hired a friend of his to prepare an audit report. No cabinet reshuffle will mend this. The buck stops with the leader. No amount of cover-up will make this go away. Southern Cameroonians have elected to vote with their wallets. The IG as we speak has no finances.  The LGAs are in charge and no competent and rightful thinking County head will authorize payment to this clowns.

In his new cabinet, Acting Interim President is expected to appoint Presidential Security and a Webmaster. IG sources have hinted that Professor Martin Ayim has moved from a nurse to a PhD in Physical Education and has just been made Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Prof Ayim is Sako’s political hit man. After a trip to South Africa last year, Ayim returned and made up a story that Milan Atam had met Issa Tchiroma, he was rewarded with the position of Chief of Staff. After a personal attack on Chris Anu last week, his boss was so impressed with his skills and rewarded him with Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.

For failing to raise $100,000 in Berlin for Sako , Dr Elad has been sacked and given an insignificant role in the cabinet. Sako and Chris Anu are strange bed fellows but Chris will carry on as Secretary of Communication. The esteemed Barrister Ndeh has been demoted for failing to find legal grounds to make Sako the Ambazonian Head of State.

Acting Interim President Sako has also appointed members into the Ethics Commission including a General Manager of the Ambazonia National TV station, ABC.  Sako’s new cabinet has more than six Pastors with congregations in several basements in the USA.

Chairman Kometa and the Restoration Council have an easy decision to make. They can be accomplices in this madness or attack the problem. They can stand up for the constitution and institutions of Ambazonia or participate in ripping them apart. One thing is for sure, the people of Ambazonia will hold them collectively accountable. They have to know that the Nuclear Option of an alternative Government is now inevitable and imminent if they fail in their constitutional responsibilities.

By Haggai Fung Achuo

Cameroon Concord News Group

Authorities in Cameroon are jailing opposition politicians and barring their supporters from holding rallies. Security forces and separatist groups continue to carry out atrocities in the country’s restive Anglophone regions. More and more civilians are being forced from their homes, adding to a tally of displaced people that already exceeds half a million.

These problems and more were cited in a speech delivered last week to the European Parliament by Federica Mogherini, the European Union’s top foreign policy official. Her words painted a picture of an increasingly volatile country, just six months after 86-year-old President Paul Biya coasted to reelection following a campaign in which he pitched himself as the only conceivable guarantor of stability.

Brussels isn’t alone in sounding the alarm. African and Western diplomats and human rights groups, to say nothing of observers within Cameroon, have become more vocal in denouncing conditions under Biya, who appears to have interpreted his reelection as an invitation to become even more aggressive in targeting his opponents.

The external scrutiny is the latest indication of Cameroon’s deteriorating international image, which is perhaps inevitable for a country that’s had the same autocratic leader for more than three decades and is battling multiple insurgencies. Yet it’s unclear, at this stage, whether diplomats are interested merely in signaling concern or if they’ll push for real change.

Moreover, there’s no guarantee that, with a leader as entrenched as Biya, the latter is even possible. Hans De Marie Heungoup, a senior analyst with the International Crisis Group, notes in an interview that while Biya once put more effort into guarding Cameroon’s reputation, these days he is playing a kind of political “survival game,” making it more difficult for outsiders to influence his behavior. If critical statements aren’t accompanied by steps that could undermine his security apparatus and patronage networks, Biya might be willing to simply ignore them.

“Nowadays he has prepared himself psychologically to withstand this kind of pressure,” Heungoup says. “If that pressure moves from simple, powerful statements to meaningful concrete action, then I suspect that Biya could step back and try to show a more democratic face.”

Cameroon’s security woes, which fuel many of the human rights violations taking place there, are complex. It’s been more than five years since fighters from Boko Haram, the Nigeria-based extremist group, first infiltrated northern Cameroon, drawing the country into a regional counterterrorism campaign. These days, however, instability stems primarily from the “Anglophone crisis,” which has been on the world’s radar for more than two years now. What began in late 2016 with anti-government protests in regions of western Cameroon dominated by the country’s English-speaking minority has turned into an all-out insurgency, with rebel fighters working toward the establishment of an independent nation called Ambazonia.

The separatist violence has triggered a brutal state crackdown. Human Rights Watch reported in late March that security forces, including the elite Rapid Intervention Battalion, have engaged in a spate of violent activity in the months since Biya’s reelection, shooting and killing civilians, sexually assaulting women and burning and looting homes. Human Rights Watch said security forces had “killed scores of civilians,” while warning that “the number of civilian deaths is most likely higher.”

It’s unclear, at this stage, whether diplomats are interested merely in signaling concern or if they’ll push for real change.

Separatists, for their part, have continued their campaign of kidnappings and assault. One witness told Human Rights Watch that two people were beaten to death by separatists on suspicion of having voted in the presidential election, which the separatists considered an illegitimate exercise.

Given the difficulty of reporting in the Anglophone regions, it’s unclear whether the overall level of violence there has increased since the vote. But Heungoup, with the International Crisis Group, says the conflict is expanding into areas that had previously been relatively untouched. And Human Rights Watch noted that violence on the part of the government risked making the situation even worse. “Cameroon’s authorities have an obligation to respond lawfully and to protect people’s rights during periods of violence,” Lewis Mudge, the organization’s Central Africa director, said last month. “The government’s heavy-handed response targeting civilians is counterproductive and risks igniting more violence.”

The political space is similarly troubling. Those looking to mount any kind of challenge to Biya are operating under mounting restrictions. Official results from the October election showed Biya winning reelection with 71 percent of the vote; his closest challenger, Maurice Kamto, officially earned 14 percent. Yet elections in Cameroon are neither free nor fair, and Kamto has insisted that he was the real winner.

In late January, supporters of Kamto’s political party, the Cameroon Renaissance Movement, participated in protests in multiple regions of the country, including its two main cities, Yaounde and Douala. In response, security forces used live ammunition to disperse crowds and arrested hundreds of protesters, according to Amnesty International. The following week, Kamto himself was arrested, and he has remained in custody ever since. His request for provisional release was rejected, a decision that was upheld on appeal earlier this month.

Kamto’s fate seems to be of particular interest to Western officials. In addition to Mogherini, Tibor Nagy, the top U.S. diplomat for African affairs, has raised it publicly, including on a visit last month to Cameroon. This prompted a quick rebuke from a government spokesman. “The Cameroonian government deeply regrets these words which denote a lack of knowledge of the issues, realities and facts,” the spokesman wrote in a press release that accused Nagy of interfering in the government’s internal affairs.

As Emmanuel Freudenthal pointed out in an in-depth report for WPR last year, Washington has recently been more inclined to criticize Cameroon than has France, a former colonial power with deep ties to Biya. Yet Heungoup says that, across the board, there are signs diplomats are recalibrating their approach to Biya’s government.

“They have started to realize the true nature of the regime,” he says. “When I discuss with some diplomats, they are less defensive of Biya. We now see statements at the highest level—statements that we used to not see.”

But will these same diplomats do anything to back up their words? Perhaps Biya’s greatest vulnerability is the security forces. In February, the U.S. announced that it was reducing military aid to the country, citing human rights concerns related to the fight against Boko Haram and Anglophone separatists. “The bottom line is right now in Cameroon, they have been a good partner with us counterterrorism-wise, but you can’t neglect the fact that they have—there are alleged atrocities in what’s gone on there,” Gen. Thomas D. Waldhauser, the head of U.S. Africa Command, said at the time.

Similar measures from the U.S., France and Israel, all of which have been involved in military training and security assistance, could ramp up pressure on Biya. Targeted sanctions could also get the Biya government’s attention, though Washington might want to avoid the kind of standoff they would produce.

In the absence of such steps, it will likely fall to Cameroonians to spur change, perhaps via large-scale protests like those that have threatened the government in the past, most recently in 2008. This would be the messiest kind of upheaval, further giving the lie to the notion that Biya, and only Biya, can keep the country stable.

Reported by World Politics Review

Two years ago, nobody would have thought that the Yaounde crime syndicate that passes off as a government would ever yield to any pressure. The support it was enjoying from France gave it the impression that all would be well at the international level and that Southern Cameroonians would never turn the table on a government that has been built on lies and arrogance.

With French support, the country’s ailing and aging president, Paul Biya, has been conducting himself as a monarch, holding that he was the master of diplomacy and that France will always intercede with the European Union on its behalf.

Of course, for two years, the European Union looked the other way, while Mr. Biya’s militia mowed down the people of the North West and South West regions of the country.

The fighting has gone on for close to three years and more than 5,000 Cameroonians have lost their lives in a war that the U.S.A Undersecretary of State for African Affairs, Tibor Nagy, has declared as unnecessary.

Most of those killed are innocent civilians, especially women and children who cannot run into the bushes for them to be protected by Southern Cameroonian fighters.

Many soldiers have also been sent to an early grave, though their families are not aware of what has happened in the South West jungles where hundreds of soldiers have been buried alive.

The picture is even grimmer when you take a closer look at other aspects of life. Thousands of soldiers are dealing with shattered legs and arms. Post-traumatic stress disorder has become a normal health issue among the country’s soldiers, although the government is doing a good job at hiding the truth.

But the Yaounde government has lost its charm. Its lies have been discovered. First by Americans and later by the European Union that is taking the French government to task for its role in the serious human rights violations that have played out in Cameroon’s two English-speaking regions.

Americans can no longer trust Mr. Biya and his band of incompetent and ineffective gangsters whose cardinal objective is to subject the people of Cameroon to grinding poverty and dehumanizing corruption.

While they consider Cameroon as a major ally in the fight against Boko Haram, the Trump Administration has easily figured out that weapons sent to fight this religious sect were instead used to maim and kill innocent Southern Cameroonians who just want the errors of the past to be addressed through peaceful means.

Washington has promptly reduced its military aid to Mr. Biya’s crime syndicate and has urged its undersecretary of State for African Affairs to speak up against a corrupt and unreliable Yaounde government that has little or nothing to offer its suffering masses.

The Trump Administration wants a political and personality change in Yaounde and Mr. Tibor Nagy has been throwing deadly punches at the old Yaounde government that is visibly on its last leg. The Southern Cameroons charm diplomatic offensive is effective. It is working like a charm.

The European Union is under its spell and there is not much France can do. France’s traditional allies have jumped ship and they are siding with Washington that is clear about its intention.

Thanks to Ambazonian diplomacy, the Trump Administration has woven a network that is hemming in the Yaounde government that once thought it had the leeway to murder its own people with impunity.

The American arms embargo is being supported by most European countries and before the end of this week, Yaounde will know what the EU decision and sanctions will be.

The usual recreation is over and Yaoundé’s reaction to the EU’s criticism of its actions in the two English-speaking regions of the country and its imprisonment of Professor Maurice Kamto, the winner of last year’s presidential election, speaks to the frustration that has become the government’s hallmark.

Last night the country’s minister of communication and government spokesperson held a press conference on the unsettling EU criticism. As usual, he reminded the EU that Cameroon was dealing with common criminals and separatists, adding that Cameroon was a sovereign state.

Cameroon is always a sovereign state when it is being taken to task for misconduct, human rights abuses and corruption. But its sovereignty melts when its president heads to the West, cap in hand, to seek financial assistance to the same countries it has been sending reminders about its sovereignty.

By preaching sovereignty to those who have sustained them in power for decades, Mr. Biya and his government are simply shooting themselves in the foot. Cameroon is hurting and the government has clearly lost its way.

From the noise coming out of Yaounde, it is clear that the government is in a tight spot. Ambazonia’s charm offensive abroad is keeping the government awake all night. Besides taking a punch to the liver due to the humiliation abroad, the government is facing a huge financial deficit. It is out of cash. Its Automatic Teller Machines (ATM) are dry or simply broken down.

CDC, PAMOL, Delmonte and other state-owned corporations have crumbled like packs of cards. Southern Cameroonian fighters have succeeded to disrupt government activities in the English-speaking regions and the cash-cows (state-owned corporations) that have fed Yaounde politicians fat over the last five decades are no longer delivering the “milk and honey” that have kept the system going.

The Southern Cameroons crisis that started like a simple protest has finally brought the arrogant Yaounde government to its knees. Its traditional financial allies are gradually walking away from it and the cash flows that fed its ego are gradually and slowly drying up.

Southern Cameroons’ Diaspora has given the Yaounde government a very bad name and even within international financial institutions, the country is being viewed as a dry hole that has nothing to offer.

Most projects in the two English-speaking regions financed by the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the African Development Bank have been put on hold till further notice.

Funding for the ring road is available at the World Bank and the African Development Bank, but the chaos playing out in the two English-speaking regions has made it hard for any disbursements to be made.

Despite assurances from the beleaguered government, development finance institutions are very reluctant to deal with a government that is adept at speaking from both sides of its mouth.

The nightmare is getting worse by the day. Cameroon’s debtors have begun knocking at the door. They want their money back, but Yaounde is in no position to reimburse the hefty loans it had contracted. The dying government is no longer solvent. The international finance world is skeptical about Cameroon’s ability to meet its international financial obligations.

That is why a high-level delegation from China’s EXIM bank which granted a massive loan to Cameroon in the second half of 2018 has shown up in Yaounde to remind the government of its obligations.

China’s EXIM bank wants its money, but Yaounde is speaking a language that is not music to EXIM bank’s ears. The crafty Chinese are asking for a re-negotiation of the repayment terms. Yaounde has already defaulted in February and this is worrying to the Chinese who are not so sure about Mr. Biya’s future.

It should be recalled that China EXIM bank was the only bank that had accepted to extend a loan to the bankrupt government when all other major international financial institutions lost appetite for Cameroon’s debt.

It never rains, but it pours! It is now hard for Mr. Biya to even venture out to ask for more loans. The U.S.A has slammed members of his government with travel bans and Europe is no longer welcoming. Even Switzerland that took care of Mr. Biya’s health is now thinking differently. Cameroon’s Diaspora has become a major threat to Switzerland and Mr. Biya is no longer wanted on the shores of a country he so loves.

The days ahead bear no hope for Cameroon. Mr. Biya has gambled and lost. His decision to fight instead of negotiating with Southern Cameroonians is finally coming back to haunt him. He has lost his allies and now the money that used to make him arrogant is also disappearing.

However, he still has a chance to make it right. Talking to all the stakeholders and renouncing war as a conflict resolution instrument. The world is watching him. If he does not heed calls by the international community to organize an inclusive dialogue, he might be the next dictator to exit the political scene. This will be a painful exit. He just needs to check with Abdelazziz Bouteflika of Algeria and Omar Al-Bechir of Sudan. It is never too late to mend.

By Kingsley Betek in Yaounde and Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai in the United Kingdom