Campaigns for the upcoming presidential elections are well underway and the CPDM presidential candidate who has not been campaigning travelled to Maroua to urge the northern population to grant him their votes.

While other presidential candidates have been all over the place highlighting what they will do if they are given power, Paul Biya, the man who has led the country for 36 years is counting more on a rigging machinery he has deployed.

The constitutional council, the body the publishes election results is replete with people loyal to him. ELECAM, the body that organizes elections, has already done its job and it has made sure that fewer opposition supporters have actually received their voter’s cards. While Mr. Biya was absent in the field, his surrogates have been doing their best to convince an electorate that is already aware of the ruling party’s dismal economic and political performance.

As the campaign progresses, it is clear that the English-speaking regions will not be part of the process. The heat is particularly on the CPDM, but hard core CPDM criminals are not backing off despite the threats from Southern Cameroonian fighters. They have huge skeletons in their cupboards and those skeletons may be exposed if they stop working for their party even in war-torn areas.

Like most people have said, the CPDM is a crime syndicate and its militants are using it for personal purposes.  Chief Moses Obenofunde and Mr Abey Napoleon Ntui seen here wearing military protective gear to campaign in Mamfe have once served as PAMOL’s general manager and Principal of Sar Ndekwai respectively. During their time at the various institutions, huge chunks of money cannot be accounted for.  Internal audits have been conducted and there is evidence that Chief. Obenofunde and Mr. Abey Napoleon Ntui are honest men when money is not involved.

To avoid jail time, they are using party loyalty as a shield against the law, but some party insiders who are not happy seeing these two men around the party are working underground for their arrest. It is obvious that after the election, they might be among those who would be appointed to a high position at the Kondengui Maximum Security Prison.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

John Nlom has five children and wants to keep them alive. When machete-wielding men attacked a nearby school this month in a suspected strike against the teaching of French, wounded students were rushed to hospitals while frightened parents decided to flee.

Nlom and his family piled onto one of the dozens of buses now leaving daily from the capital of Cameroon’s Southwest Region, joining thousands of civilians escaping bloody fighting between the government and Anglophone separatists who vow to disrupt next month’s presidential elections.

The government of the largely French-speaking country insists the Oct. 7 vote will be peaceful, even in the troubled English-speaking southwest and northwest where nearly 400 people have died. Nlom, a teacher, could not take that chance.

“The governor himself who is saying that people should stay back, that they are protected, he is moving around with soldiers protecting him,” Nlom said. “Will the soldiers protect all the people? That is the reason why I cannot stay.” He and his family, like many, have taken refuge in the French-speaking city of Douala.

President Paul Biya, one of Africa’s longest-serving leaders since taking power since 1982, vows to hold the country together.

The separatists, with support from some in the diaspora in the United States and elsewhere, are fighting to create an independent state they call “Ambazonia” in Cameroon’s English-speaking northwest and southwest regions.

Their movement grew out of dissatisfaction with what some English speakers, who make up about 20 percent of the country’s population, have called marginalization in the officially bilingual country. The blocking of the internet in English-speaking regions for months last year fed the frustrations.

The government describes the fighters as terrorists.

Weary civilians caught in the fighting have pleaded for peace. Women, saying they can no longer remain silent, have gathered for protests, saying the violence keeps children from their studies. At least 70 schools have been burned.

Last week, Muslim and Christian clerics announced they are afraid a wave of carnage could occur if peace is not found before the election. “We call on the diaspora to stop the hate speech communication that promotes violence, suspicion and fear among the people of Cameroon,” their declaration said.

The clerics asked both the military and armed groups to drop their guns and stop the killing, looting and burning that have sent nearly 200,000 civilians fleeing. The government, however, replied that only the separatists should drop their guns.

Attacks were reported in at least 20 towns and villages over the weekend, according to the country’s minister of territorial administration, Paul Atanga Nji. Casualty figures were not yet available, he said.

“We are happy that some of the terrorists have willfully handed their guns to the military and we have forgiven them,” he said. “I call on all those who are still in the bushes to drop their arms and make use of the ballot if they want a change.”

Human rights groups have accused both sides of abuses. Separatists have burned and crushed buses and used construction equipment to dig up roads in efforts to stop people from fleeing. Some people leaving English-speaking regions have said the military conducts searches on those trying to leave.

With the elections approaching, the tensions have grown. Separatists on Friday blew up a key bridge to stop campaign teams from reaching communities, authorities said.

“The only bridge linking the northwest regional capital, Bamenda, with other localities like Bui and Donga was destroyed by the terrorists,” said Lele L’Afrique Deben Tchoffo, governor of the Northwest Region. Thousands of passengers were stranded, he said.

In response, the military killed at least a dozen separatists near the northwestern town of Mbiame as they planted explosives to blow up another bridge, the governor said.

People who have fled the English-speaking regions will not be able to vote if they don’t return to the polling centers where they are registered, he warned.

In Cameroon’s French-speaking areas, campaign rallies kicked off over the weekend in defiance of the separatist threat.

“We should not fear them. We should brave the situation and go about campaigning. The government has deployed troops to protect everyone,” Prime Minister Philemon Yang told supporters in Bamenda while campaigning for the longtime president.

Biya is favored to win another seven-year term, as opposition parties did not succeed in negotiations to back a single candidate. Cameroon’s government has vowed that voting will take place nationwide.

“We have … created polling centers where voters can assemble and vote under the protection of the military,” said the chairman of the country’s electoral board, Enow Abrams Egbe.

AP

Dear Professor Elvis Ngolle Ngolle,

I have been observing you over the last two years since the Southern Cameroons problem made its way to the global arena and I have always felt I should talk to you, but seeing you on TV sharing your party-based theories and perspectives on this conflict, I have advised myself that it will be a waste of time, as you will never quit your greed-and power-driven monolithic thinking.

I understand you have to toe party lines, but I am sometimes taken aback by some of your statements. The Southern Cameroons crisis is a conflict that concerns every Cameroonian, especially those of us who are from that region. If you and I were living in a normal country, our job would be to bring pressure to bear on the government so that an alternative to the military violence could be sought.

As intellectuals, we are supposed to seek ways of getting both parties to the negotiating table so that some of the vexing issues could be addressed amicably. The issues raised by Southern Cameroonians do not have any party or political connotations. These are issues that have been around for decades and have been begging for a solution.

But from your behaviour and statements, it appears human life has no value and the supreme interest of the state must take a back seat to your selfish and egoistic interest.

What shocked me recently was your statement that supporters of your party in the Southwest region should use secret and supernatural powers to have your party’s message across in a region that is witnessing a lot of fighting and despicable violence.

From this statement, I know you have finally completed the process of masturbating intellectualism out of your system. I was even more surprised to hear you call on courageous young men and women to go from village to village to spread the false gospel that has made of you a disrespected professor.

If you so love this country and your party’s political philosophy, why are you not bringing back your own kids from the U.S.A for them to come and help with your efforts at spreading your party’s heresy in such a dangerous region?

Some of you have decided that our country must be ruined before you leave this world. Your greed and hunger for power have transformed you into a buffoon. For years, your likes have been living in a bubble and that bubble has been burst by Southern Cameroonians.

The people of the southwest no longer have faith in you. You are not representing them and be advised that any decisions you and others take on our behalf will be rejected by the people of our region.

Peter Mafany Musonge, Chief Tabetando and you constitute an axis of evil that is spreading pain, suffering and death in the Southwest region. Your acts will come with karmic consequences and I hope you are aware of this. It is not too late to make amends.

As South-westerners, we are a liberal and a forgiving people. We will be welcoming you to the fold the day you shed your greed and understand that life is more interesting when everybody has a smile on their face.

We are not a vindictive people. Change and we will lift the sanctions we have imposed on you. You have been dinning, wining and dancing with the devil for too long. Make that change and live a decent and simple life.

I look forward to seeing a different you.

Yours Sincerely,

Dr. Joachim Arrey

About the Author: The author of this letter has served as a translator, technical writer, journalist and editor for several international organizations and corporations across the globe. He studied communication at the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom and technical writing in George Brown College, Toronto, Canada. He also studied translation at the Advanced School of translators and Interpreters (ASTI) in Buea, as well as Languages and Linguistics at the University of Calabar, Calabar, Nigeria. He holds a Ph.D.

Cameroon will head to the polls on October 7, to decide who will captain the country for another 7 years. According to an official list published by Elections Cameroon, 28 candidacy files were received by the commission that was charged with receiving files at the ELECAM headquarters and in Regional Delegations.

The elections governing body, ELECAM, on August 7, 2018 published a list of 9 candidates including the incumbent president, Paul Biya who is seeking another 7 years term to continue his 35 years rule over the country.

This year’s presidential poll seems to be very different from previous elections the country has witnessed considering the reduced number of candidates to take part in the elections and the insecurity which has plagued the country for over two years.

Get to know the Presidential Candidates

Biya will be facing political amateurs in the upcoming elections and an opposition which has failed despite several attempts to present a united front to challenge his candidacy.

Joshua Osih was picked on February 24 as the flag-bearer of the main opposition party, the Social Democratic Front, to replace Ni John Fru Ndi who has over the years been the strongest candidate to face Biya.

Akere Muna, and a host of others; Libii Li Ngue Cabril, Matomba Serge Espoir, Kamto Maurine and Njifor Afamwi will also be testing the waters for the very first time.

Paul Barthélemy Biya’a bi Mvondo

Paul Biya, Cameroonian native who hail from the South was born on 13 February 1933, in the village of Mvomeka’a.

He studied at the Lycée General Leclerc, Yaounde and the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, Paris and went on to the Institut des hautes études d’Outre-Mer where he graduated in 1961 with a Higher Education Diploma in Public Law.

He became a bureaucrat in his late 20’s under President Ahmadou Ahidjo.

He was Chargé de Mission at the Presidency of the Republic upon his return from Paris in October 1962 and Director of Cabinet of the Minister of National Education, Youth Affairs and Culture in January 1964.

He was named Director of Cabinet of the Minister of National Education, Youth Affairs and Culture in July 1965 and later Director of the Civil Cabinet of the President in December 1967

While still serving as Director of the Civil Cabinet, Biya was appointed Secretary-General of the Presidency of the Republic in January 1968.

He gained the rank of Minister in August 1968 and the rank of Minister of State in June 1970, while remaining Secretary-General at the Presidency.

Following the creation of a unitary state in 1972, he became Prime Minister of Cameroon on 30 June 1975.

Ahidjo unexpectedly announced his resignation on 4 November 1982, and Biya accordingly succeeded him as President of Cameroon on 6 November.

Joshua Osih

Joshua Osih joined the Social Democratic Front (SDF) in March 1991 in Douala.

In 2002 he was elected regional chairman of the Social Democratic Front for the South West region.

In 2006, he was elected 2nd Vice Chairman of the party.

In 2012 and 2018 he was voted in both instances as 1st Vice Chairman of the party. At the 2018 Extra-ordinary convention of the party that concludes the party’s primaries, he was chosen as the SDF’s presidential candidate for the 2018 presidential election of Cameroon to be held in October 2018.

Osih holds an MBA in Leadership and Sustainability, and has more than 25 years of experience in the aviation industry, notably in operations and management.

His is an established entrepreneur in Cameroon and is the founder and managing director of the notable companies including Camport PLC and Africa Travel Management.

Osih is a Member of the Cameroon Parliament for the Wouri Centre constituency in Douala.

He serves both as Vice President of the Finance and Budget Committee of the National Assembly, and Special Rapporteur for the National Assembly.

He is Deputy General Rapporteur in charge of state income, Vice Coordinator of the Hope for the Youth caucus, and a member of multiple parliamentary friendship groups.

Born on 9 December 1968, the 49-year-old lawmaker and native of the South West Region is married to Tina Osih with 3 sons.

Akere Muna

Akere Tabeng Muna is a Cameroonian lawyer who was born on August 1952 in the North-West region of Cameroon.

He obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in International Relations in 1975 from the American University in Washington, D.C. and later moved to England, where he joined the Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn.

After he was called to the Bar in England in 1978, he returned to Cameroon, and joined the legal practice of his brother, Bernard Muna. In 1984, the legal practice was converted into a law firm called Muna, Muna & Associates.

In 1997, he assumed the presidency of the Cameroon Bar Association after a landslide victory.

In 2000, Akere Muna founded the Cameroon chapter of the anti-corruption watchdog, Transparency International.

In 2004, Akere was elected to the Board of Directors of Transparency International and was later designated as the Coordinator of the Coalition of African Chapters of TI.

In 2005, he was elected Vice-Chair of the Board of Directors of TI and he stepped down in 2014, after serving the maximum number of terms.

He was thereafter appointed by the Board of Directors of TI as Chair of the International Anti-Corruption Conference (IACC) Council.

Akere Muna was a founding member of the Pan African Lawyers Union (PALU), and in July 2005, he was unanimously elected president of the organisation by the heads of the various African bar associations.

In September 2008, Akere Muna was president of ECOSOCC and in 2012, he became a member of the High Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows from Africa, a body established by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa

On February 11, 2013, the Board of Directors of the African Development Bank (AfDB) approved the appointment of Akere Muna as Sanctions Commissioner of the African Development Bank.

Akere Muna is married to Beverly Bird, and a father of two daughters, Lydia Muna and Kandi Muna.

Adamou Ndam Njoya

Adamou Ndam Njoya is a Cameroonian politician, lawyer, author, and professor.

He is the President of the Cameroon Democratic Union (UDC), an opposition party

He served as the Minister of National Education from 1977 to 1980, and has been the Mayor of Foumban since 1996.

From 1997 to 2007 he was a Deputy in the National Assembly.

He became Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1969 to 1970 and joined the faculty of law at the University of Yaoundé in 1970.

Njoya worked for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Cameroon as director of the diplomatic training program from 1970 to 1972.

He was instrumental in the creation of the International Relations Institute of Cameroon (IRIC) where he served as its first director from 1972 to 1975.

He became a member of the Economic and Social Council of Cameroon in 1974, and he was then appointed as Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs on 30 June 1975.

In December 1977, Ndam Njoya was appointed Minister of National Education. In July 1980, he was appointed Minister Delegate at the Presidency for General Inspection of State and Administrative Reforms.

Dismissed from government in 1982, Ndam Njoya focused on his writing and teaching as well as donating his time to philanthropic endeavors.

He later served as a member of the Executive Bureau of UNESCO from 1985 to 1989, and was the President of the Jury of the Grand Prix of Literary Associations 2014.

Ndam Njoya was born at Njika, Foumban, West Province, Cameroon, on 8 May 1942.

He is a holder of an MA and a PhD degree in public international law and political science at the University of Paris (Panthéon).

He studied diplomacy at the Institut International d’Administration Publique (IIAP), followed by three internships, with the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with the French Embassy in London, and with International Organizations at the United Nations European office in Geneva.

Culled from Africa News

The unending gory pictures from Southern Cameroons for the past two years for me is stretching my understanding to its limit. Yes, Southern Cameroonians had the “temerity”, as always, to rise up against long years of marginalisation and second-class citizenship. Yes, they went down on the streets to protest, an inalienable right of all citizens in any country that lays claim to civilised governance. Yes, they took up arms to defend themselves when the government response to their protests was excessive use of military force. But no, I do not understand the extent to which a government can come down so hard on its citizens.

Someone help me understand how for two years running, a government worth its name can be mercilessly mowing down its citizens in silence. Defenceless boys and girls are being quietly decimated on our streets and in our homes (the latest case of Njikwa is telling). How has it become normal to sit idly by and watch our kith and kin being killed in total indifference? How normal has it become for a whole part of the country to be bleeding while we look the other way? The economy of the region has ground to a screeching halt. Our children can no longer school, for want of security. I read with horror the various communiqués from schools in the Southern Zone requesting parents to come collect their children from school. How long shall this sacrifice continue while a so-called President is more absorbed by elections than by peace and security in a territory we “hired” him to protect? What government sits quiet for two years while the country is being torn apart? What government watches idly as the country slides irreversibly into chaos?

Our farms have been abandoned. Businesses have crumbled. Unemployment is now rising at an alarming rate. The people have lost their sources of livelihood. Starvation is staring this region straight in the face and before long, the region will be needing real humanitarian assistance, South Soudan-style, not the contrived humanitarian assistance which the same government has used to con people out of their meagre resources. Granted, the authorities in the country have never been known for their sense of forward thinking, either out of sheer incompetence or poor planning. But, it does not take a degree in economics to anticipate the impending doom. It will come and when it does, it will be ugly.

Please, help me to understand how the notion of dialogue became a foreign and strange notion in Cameroon. Help me to understand how it became difficult for the government to talk to its citizens. Someone please explain to me how empathy and sympathy exited from our national space.

Please, help to understand, as I am lost, perplexed and frankly frightened. I am frightened because the people we thought were human beings capable of reasoning and empathy have, sadly, turned out to be cold-blooded killers. I can bet my bottom franc that had it not been for social media, the scale of the genocide would have been more horrendous.

I am scared because within the country, we have sympathizers and enablers of this ongoing genocide, while the international community is deafeningly quiet in its complicity… We have heard the usual ineffectual noises from international organisations and other “brotherly” countries. Beyond these cliché statements, radio silence. While the killing machine turns and gathers more momentum. And, it is getting worse. We will get up one day and realise that our villages and towns have become veritable ghost towns…

I am still seeking answers…

Shey Kukih Mansah

As Cameroon prepares to go to the polls on October 7, 2018, insecurity in the country poses a major constraint which may hamper the smooth conduct of the polls.

The country now faces violence in three regions: the Far North, where Boko Haram continues to mount attacks, as well as the Northwest and Southwest, where an Anglophone insurgency emerged in 2017.

The crisis in the Anglophone regions is rapidly developing into full armed insurgency, following the Cameroonian security forces’ violent repression on 22 September and 1 October, 2017.

Several small “self-defence” groups (the Tigers, Ambaland forces and Vipers,) now operate alongside two armed militias: the Ambazonia Defence Forces (ADF) and the Southern Cameroons Defence Forces.

Pro-independence fighters, who had earlier declared the elections banned in these regions recently called for a total shutdown from September 20 to October 10 in a bid to completely frustrate efforts by the government to carry out elections in the troubled regions.

According to messages allegedly from the fighters, people have been urged to stock their houses with basic items which can sustain them throughout the no circulation period. The message constraints movement only within the English speaking areas while inter-urban movements to and from other French parts of the country were prohibited.

Gripped with fear and amidst the growing uncertainty, denizens in the regions are now fleeing to neighboring towns for safety. The massive exodus has forced the government to take stringent measures to restrict movement out of the regions. A communique signed by the regional delegate of the North West region on September 18 indicated that people without valid reasons will not be allowed to leave the town.

Yaounde took a hard line, rejecting demands made by the fighters in the early phase of the conflict and ordered a complete crackdown after the separatists issued a symbolic declaration of independence last October 1.

The elections governing body has however assured that elections will take place in these regions while noting that the issue of security for all stakeholders in the process was the responsibility of the government.

Culled from Africa News

Two years ago, when the then-called Anglophone problem began, few predicted that it would snowball into a full-blown war with its attendant bloodletting. No one thought, a mere strike initiated by lawyers and teachers would, two years down the line, culminate in this horror that has become the ecosystem of the citizens of Southern Cameroons. From Nkambe right down to Mundemba, the pain of the people, who only set out to demand freedom and dignity for their lives and those of their children, rings stridently across the land. Every day, we are served with gory pictures of young lives prematurely cut short, young boys and girls maimed to the point of non-recognition. Few imagine the sorry plight of the families (some with nurslings) hiding out in forests, exposed to the hazard of the elements and the dangers of wild creeping things and carnivorous animals. I cry for the souls of these innocent lives and the ordeal of my people now forced to share the forests with animals!

It is difficult to attempt an explanation for this inexorable slide into mayhem; because there were opportunities to ward off this crisis or nib it in the bud, so to speak. Compliance with the various calls for civil disobedience and “ghost town” operations, open defiance of authority as well as the unprecedented public display of anger across Southern Cameroons back on 22nd September 2017 were alarm bells ringing deafeningly, alerting the authorities to the volcanic anger that was boiling underneath, ready to the blow up the country at its seams. Calls for the return to the federal system which, up until 1972, had held the country together in an otherwise beautiful experiment in bi- and multi-culturalism, were greeted with absolute disdain and arrogance. The moderate leadership of the movement was thrown into jail with trumped-up and, frankly, ridiculous charges of terrorism, hostility against the state and any other ludicrous charge that their Jacobin minds could conjure up. I cried then, as I knew this was the onset of trouble.

Now, trouble is here. It took the shape of the hundreds of lost lives of protesters who, tired of being treated with absolute contempt, decided on 1st October 2017 to “symbolically” declare their independence from La République du Cameroun, hoping to draw national and international attention to their plight. Instead, in return, terror was unleashed on them with hundreds shot dead, and thousands arrested and thrown into jail. Since then, life for them has become a daily unending nightmare, the stuff of horror. Gunshots and screams of fright are now the soundtrack their daily reality. Villages have been completely razed, houses and hospitals torched, and old and vulnerable elderly persons roasted in their homes and sickbeds. I shudder at the thought of the strain, agony and excruciating pain these old ones experienced as, helpless, they slowly burnt to death. I cry! Yes, I weep for them.

I weep because, instead of negotiating with the people, the government of La République engaged a full-scale war of attrition nay, a scorched-earth blitzkrieg on an innocent people. The army was given a “shoot-to-kill-on-mere-suspicion” order, otherwise known in French as ‘l’ordred’ouverture de feu”. What this means is that they were given the green light to shoot at anything and anybody if it/he/she poses a “threat”. They are not required to furnish any explanation or justification for their actions. The manifestation of this blanket order is visible throughout Southern Cameroons. This same tactic was used during the days of the “Maquis” for good effect. In other words, it worked then; why should it not work now? The only drawback for this soldiery and this barbaric tactic is the social media to which their cruelties are systematically uploaded and, lo and behold, live streamed, even by the perpetrators themselves.

Multiple calls for dialogue have been royally ignored. When attempts are made, it is in the form of make-belief missions fielded to the region by surrogates of a regime that have been rejected outright by the population. Enormous sums have been squandered hoodwinking the international community that there is some modicum of dialogue initiated. Huge amounts of taxpayer francs are squandered by government on the “war effort”. Needless to say these sums are lining the pockets of the select few for whom this crisis is a gold mine, irrespective of the lives lost and the untold suffering inflicted on the people. Countless horror stories come to light every day of the havoc wreaked by these soldiers on a hapless population. The recent pictures of droves of people attempting to flee this mayhem are heartrending. The response of the authorities has been to dissuade, nay, block these helpless people from flight, requiring them to justify their movement. In a country they claim is “one and indivisible”! All of this in an attempt to obfuscate the scale of the disaster and hide it from the eyes of the world. Yes, I cry…

For those who still think secession or, better still, separation is a physical thing, have another think coming. It starts from the mind. And the actions of the authorities and their forces of (dis)order are driving the two Cameroons further apart. Whatever the outcome of this crisis, the road to reconciliation will be long, tortuous, if not impossible.

Shey Kukih Mansah

The South West governor, Okala Bilai, who once called the people of his region “dogs”, has been pleading with them not to leave the region. Over the last week, residents of the two English-speaking regions have been leaving the place following threats by Southern Cameroonian fighters to implement a strict movement of goods and persons within the region from September 16, 2018 to October 7, 2018.

Campaigns for presidential elections scheduled for October 7, are currently underway and Southern Cameroonians fighters have vowed to disrupt an election they consider as foreign.  While other candidates are on the ground canvassing for votes, the incumbent, Paul Biya, is in a Swiss hospital seeking better healthcare.  It is generally held that Mr. Biya, considered by the ruling crime syndicate as its natural candidate, will not campaign but will emerge as the winner in an election that has already been rigged.

Mr. Biya’s heart and prostate have been an issue to the 86-year-old who still wants to rule the country for the next seven years. Known as the “monarch”, Mr. Biya was in China recently for the China-Africa Summit where he thought he could cajole Chinese to lend him some money.

But things are not working out well for the ailing monarch. The Chinese are skeptical about lending money to a dying man and the hold that after presiding of his country’s destiny for 36 years, Mr. Biya has nothing to show for his long ruler ship.

There are no world-class hospitals in his country, no good roads, and the country’s railway system has simply collapsed. For more than three decades, the narcissistic monarch has been using his country’s treasury as his personal ATM.

When traveling abroad, Mr. Biya always has more than 50 persons in his entourage and all of these people are lodged in five-star hotels.  Besides, members of his entourage, the monarch also uses expensive escort services when he is abroad. His love for young girls is costing the country an arm and a leg.

He has a Ghanaian doctor in Geneva who screens all the young ladies he uses to satisfy his carnal desires.  It is alleged that he dislikes preservatives, which is why the ladies are thoroughly screened for HIV and other communicable diseases.

Worst of all, the monarch, noted for his incompetence and manipulation, has plunged his country into a deep economic crisis and a long civil war that has already resulted in the killing of some 4,000 Cameroonians, including young army soldiers.

The Southern Cameroons crisis that started as a demonstration by teachers and lawyers has taken a turn for the worse. The adverse impact of the conflict is now spilling over into East Cameroon and this is a nightmare to government officials who are scared of a general revolt in East Cameroon.

Food and housing prices have gone up and many cities that are receiving these displaced persons do not have the proper infrastructure to deal with such a situation. According to a Douala City Hall official, the migration of Southern Cameroonians to the city of Douala is not only costly; it is also a major risk.

He pointed out that among the displaced could the fierce fighters who may use the situation to wreak havoc on innocent citizens in the city. He regretted that the government was letting this situation to spiral out of control, adding that if immediate action was not taken, the entire country could become a war zone.

By Kingsley Betek in Buea

While Cameroon has been caught in a downward political and economic spiral, its president, Paul Biya, is clearly missing in action. The president, also known as the monarch, has not yet returned to his country after the China-Africa Summit which was expected to attract Chinese investors and money to Cameroon.

But with the Chinese noted for their craft and discipline, it is likely that Mr. Biya will be returning home with an empty begging bowl.  Like the last time he was in China, he might only end up signing a series of cooperation agreements that might never yield the cash he so badly needs to corrupt voters in his native Cameroon.

It is alleged that even the plane Mr. Biya examined in China will not be delivered to Cameroon as the country is unable to make a good down payment. The Chinese are very suspicious of Mr. Biya and his government. They suspect that the end may be near for a man who is popularly unpopular in his country. Giving Mr. Biya and his government huge amounts of money is, in their view, a huge economic and financial miscalculation.

As to Mr. Biya’s disappearance from the political scene, it is alleged that the monarch has gone to Switzerland for a quick health fix. His failing heart is still a tough challenge and given that he has a huge political challenge ahead of him, he has to see with his doctors if he will be equal to the task.

Mr. Biya’s health has been a huge concern to the country over the last ten years and this has been a huge dent to the country’s treasury. He has been using the country’s treasury as his personal ATM and this has been a huge concern to many development experts who hold that the money he spends abroad could have been better spent at home. After 36 years in power, Mr. Biya has not been able to build a good health facility that can enable all Cameroonians to have quality health care.

Currently, campaigns for the presidential elections are underway and there are nine candidates, including Mr. Biya who is the incumbent. But for now, only eight candidates are in the field trying to convince Cameroonians that they are better than Mr. Biya who has plunged the country into a long civil war and a deep economic crisis.

During Mr. Biya’s time at the helm of the country’s affairs, Cameroon has spent most of its time trying to put out the economic and financial fires that he and his collaborators have been setting.

Mr. Biya inherited a sound economy from his predecessor, but three years after his accession to the country’s highest position, the country’s economic indicators started trending very low. Corruption and embezzlement of state funds have become the government’s hallmark.

It should be recalled that more than 50 of Mr. Biya’s former collaborators are currently in jail for embezzlement and corruption. Many of those in jail have intimated that Mr. Biya is also to blame for all the corruption and mismanagement that have blighted so many lives in the country.

The country is in a deep political and military crisis that is costing the country an arm and a leg. Cameroon needs lots of money to overcome this challenge. After having been mired in a tough military, economic and social battle for two years, the Yaoundé government is facing serious economic and financial crisis and this is keeping the country’s officials awake all night.

The crisis pitting Southern Cameroonian separatists against the Yaoundé government has seriously eroded the government’s financial base.  The fighting is expensive and it has taken a huge bite out of the government’s fragile finances.

This is weighing on the government and the operation of heavy military equipment in the jungles of Southern Cameroons is costing the government an arm and a leg. This has been compounded by the economic sabotage that Southern Cameroonian fighters have engaged in.

Over the last six months, some of the country’s major state corporations which are great money spinners have had to deal with the angst of Southern Cameroonian fighters who are determined to bring the country’s economy to its knees.

Corporations such as PAMOL and CDC all require a shot in the arm, but the cash-strapped government of Yaoundé is incapable of providing the much-needed infusion. Priming the pump of these corporations will require huge amounts of money. PAMOL has completely shot down due to increased disruption by Southern Cameroonian fighters.

Some 3,000 PAMOL workers have been rendered jobless and the corporation’s equipment is gradually rotting. Some of the palm oil production corporation’s facilities have been burned down and threats from Southern Cameroonian fighters actually made some of the workers to throw in the towel even before the corporation announced its bankruptcy.

For the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC), its operation capacity has been diminished over the last seven months. Ghost town operations and violence against its workers have made it hard for the country’s second largest employer to operate at full capacity.

The separatists’ economic sabotage is actually producing the desired effect as the government has seen some of its revenue streams diminishing.  With many workers laid off from these two large corporations, the government has also witnessed a huge tax base erosion. The loss of more than 3,000 workers from these two corporations implies that income taxes paid to the government have diminished.

But the collapsing of these two corporations is not the worst news the Yaoundé government will be hearing. Southern Cameroonian separatists have their eyes set on the country’s lone refinery, SONARA, which is located in the southwest port city of Limbe.

They strongly believe that if they can successfully bring down SONARA, then they will be able to force the government to the negotiating table where some of the divorce issues can be discussed and addressed.

The Southern Cameroons crisis which started as a demonstration by teachers and lawyers in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions has resulted in many other problems for the government and it is finally migrating to East Cameroon, as thousands flee Southern Cameroons major cities following threats from Southern Cameroonian fighters to stage sporadic attacks on soldiers and punish civilians who have been cooperating with the Yaoundé government.

All major cities in Southern Cameroons have become beehives as helpless civilians struggle to find a safe place before the expiry of the deadline given by the fighters. Buea, Mamfe, Limbe, Bamenda and Kumba have all witnessed huge crowds struggling to leave, following warnings from Southern Cameroonian fighters that from September 16, 2018, all roads will be blocked and there will be no movement in the region.

More than half a million people have, throughout the week, been seeking ways to leave the region as presidential elections scheduled for next month approach. Southern Cameroonian fighters have warned civilians in the two English-speaking regions not to participate in the elections as they are considered foreign and illegal.

It should be pointed out that Cameroon will be holding presidential elections next month and the incumbent is widely expected to win.  Many analysts hold that much will not change in the country and the conflict tearing the country apart may only get worse if Mr. Biya wins the elections.

So far, the government has not issued any statements to reassure the fear-stricken population and local officials have been tight-lipped over the displacement of over half a million people in the region. Meanwhile, the fighting between restoration forces and army soldiers has intensified.

Over the last week alone, more than 200 civilians have been killed in the region, while some 50 army soldiers have been sent to an early grave by restoration forces. The government has been struggling to localize the Southern Cameroons crisis, but as the fighting intensifies, many people are seeking refuge in the French-speaking region of the country.

The mass movement of Southern Cameroonians into other parts of the country has resulted in escalating food and housing prices. The high living cost is keeping government officials in cities such as Yaoundé and Douala awake all night, as they fear that the increasing pressure might cause the cash-strapped Francophone population to rebel against the government.

Mr. Biya is a man under pressure. He wants to prove that he can still do the job. His health is clearly telling him that his time is over. He will be better off throwing in the towel than staying on, as he will only take more pressure that will further ruin his fragile health.

Besides, the world is tired of seeing him. The new global political arena is inimical to old incompetent leaders.  Mr. Biya is anything but competent. He has not only failed Cameroonians; he has also failed his foreign allies who are scared that his country might break up or become a terrorist haven in the sub-region.

Mr. Biya’s political and economic failings have transformed him into a clown and a beggar. While heading to China to look for money, he should understand that he who goes aborrowing will one day go asorrowing. He should also understand that he is mortgaging the lives of future generations by borrowing all over the world.

 By Kingsley Betek

Materials meant for Cameroon’s upcoming presidential elections were printed in Germany. The process has been finalized and handed over to the country’s diplomatic mission in Berlin, a local news portal 237online reported earlier this week.

The election materials are due to be transferred to the country ahead of the October 7, 2018 vote in which incumbent Paul Biya is seeking an extension of his mandate.

The body in charge of the process, Elections Cameroon, ELECAM, cleared Biya and eight other aspirants to contest for the presidency. The vote will be the last installment of a busy election year. Voting for the legislative chambers have all been executed earlier this year.

The 2018 presidential race will take place in a delicate and volatile context, with the so-called Anglophone crisis and its attendant violence threatening daily life in the Southwest and Northwest regions.

However, there are doubts that the election will be free and fair, or whether at all they will take place especially in the Anglophone regions which have been in turmoil for the past two years, when residents started pressing their claims for more autonomy and now independence under the banner of Ambazonia Republic.

Source: Africa News