Politics

22, August 2020

Traditional rulers meeting with Minister Atanga Nji: Treacherous stab in the back of Ambazonian people ⁰

The Vice President of the Southern Cameroons Interim Government Dabney Yerima has censured the recent meeting between French Cameroun Minister of Territorial of Administration Paul Atanga Nji and some Southern Cameroons traditional rulers describing the meeting as a treacherous stab in the back of the Ambazonian nation.

Cat calls greeted the said meeting with thousands of Southern Cameroonians around the world stating that all the Fons and Chiefs who took part in the forum be dethroned.

“They have betrayed their people and are all considered traitors to the people of Southern Cameroons and the revolution. It is a treacherous stab in the back of the Ambazonian people” Vice President Yerima said in conversation with Cameroon Concord News Group Germany Bureau Chief late on Friday.

Vice President Dabney Yerima pointed out that some illusions pushed the Southern Cameroons traditional leaders to seek the meeting with the Biya French Cameroun regime.

The first illusion the Ambazonian exiled leader said is that the Fons and the Chiefs think the Federal Republic of Ambazonia is in a state of defeat, and they are viewing Biya and French Cameroun as victorious. “The reality however is that the Ambazonian nation has not been defeated and the Southern Cameroons people will not stopped their struggle until French Cameroun occupying forces leave their homeland” Yerima noted.

Vice President Dabney Yerima revealed that the second illusion is that because of the poverty culture, some Southern Cameroons traditional rulers believe their political legitimacy is achieved through support from the Biya Francophone regime, the French Cameroun army, the French Cameroun National Gendarmerie rather than their own people’s backing.

Comrade Yerima concluded that the third illusion that prompted some Southern Cameroons native authorities to attend the Paul Atanga Nji meeting is that they believe that Biya and French Cameroun are seeking peace and coexistence with the people of Southern Cameroons, but the French Cameroun regime is in fact an occupying regime founded on brutality and violence and its only conflict resolution tool is the gun.

By Isong Asu in London

21, August 2020

Emergency ECOWAS summit calls for reinstatement of Mali’s president Keita ⁰

An emergency summit of the West African bloc ECOWAS called Thursday for the reinstatement of Ibrahim Boubacar Keita as Mali’s president after he was deposed in a military coup on Tuesday. West African leaders said they would soon head to the country amid growing concerns about regional stability.

West African presidents plan to fly to Mali as regional powers escalate efforts to block a coup-driven regime change, two sources said, after an opposition coalition there joined the junta in rejecting foreign interference.

Leaders of the 15-nation Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) convened over the crisis on Thursday, after it suspended Mali, shut off borders and halted financial flows in response to Tuesday’s overthrow of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita.

The bloc plans to send a delegation of presidents including the leaders of Niger, Senegal and Ghana to Mali’s capital, Bamako, to seek a resolution to the crisis, a regional diplomat and a senior official told Reuters.

It was not immediately possible to confirm the information.

The coup, which has rocked a country already in the grip of a jihadist insurgency and civil unrest, has been met with almost universal condemnation abroad.

Within Mali, the M5-RFP coalition of opposition groups said it was working with the mutineers. It labelled ECOWAS’s initial response to the coup over-reaction stemming from some regional leaders’ fears that it could set off unrest in their countries.

“(The leaders) are on an all-out drive to set ECOWAS against Mali,” said M5-RFP spokesman Nouhoum Togo.

The capital Bamako was calm for the second straight day on Thursday, a Reuters reporter said, as people appeared to heed earlier calls from junta spokesman Colonel Ismael Wague to return to work and go about their daily lives.

Marc-Andre Boisvert, an independent researcher on the Malian security forces, said the senior mutineers were all respected army colonels.

“It was a coup led by combat-experienced, not personality-driven  officers,” he said “I expect they were selected to be the image of the coup as they are respected and close to the (ordinary) soldiers.”

ECOWAS is expected to release a statement outlining its next steps later on Thursday.

In July, an ECOWAS delegation failed to broker an agreement between Keita and the opposition, who were leading large-scale protests against the government.

Leaders attending the bloc’s virtual summit said the political upheaval in Mali could destabilise the entire region.

“The events in Mali (have).. grave consequences for the peace and security of West Africa,” Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari tweeted.

The coup has fuelled concerns it could disrupt a military campaign against jihadists linked to al Qaeda and Islamic State operating in northern and central Mali and West Africa’s wider Sahel region.

France will continue its Mali-based military operations against Islamist fighters, its armed forces minister said on Thursday.

Landlocked Mali has struggled to regain stability since a Tuareg uprising in 2012 which was hijacked by al Qaeda-linked militants, and a subsequent coup in the capital plunged the country into chaos.

(REUTERS)

20, August 2020

African Union suspends Mali’s membership as international community condemns coup ⁰

Military coup leaders in Mali faced a barrage of condemnation on Wednesday from international powers, with the African Union suspending the country’s membership a day after mutinying soldiers detained President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita following months of protests against his rule.

The chorus of disapproval included statements from the African Union (AU), the European Union and the United States demanding that the military leaders release Keita, Prime Minister Boubou Cisse and other officials detained on Tuesday.

Keita – under pressure from months of protests over economic stagnation, corruption and a continuing Islamist insurgency – said in a televised address hours after he was detained that coup leaders had given him no choice but to resign.

Jubilant crowds cheered the rebels as they arrived in central Bamako on Tuesday. Tens of thousands of protesters have taken to the streets of Bamako since June calling for Keita to resign over what they say are his failures to address security and economic woes.

Mali coup ‘diplomatic nightmare for France’

The mutinous soldiers who staged the coup, who have called themselves the National Committee for the Salvation of the People, have promised a transition to civil political rule with elections to be held in a “reasonable amount of time”. In the meantime they have closed the country’s borders and announced a curfew.

A spokesman for the junta, Ismael Wague, said France’s anti-jihadist Barkhane force and the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali as well as forces from neighbouring countries were “partners for stability and restoring security”.

However, France and other international powers as well as the AU have denounced the mutiny, fearful that the fall of Keita could further destabilise the former French colony and West Africa’s entire Sahel region.

The AU has suspended Mali’s membership in response to the military’s seizure of power and the detention of the president, the bloc announced in a tweet on Wednesday. The suspension will last until constitutional order is restored, it said, demanding the release of the deposed president and other senior officials.

The current chairman of the AU, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, called for the “immediate return to civilian rule”.

An emergency meeting of the UN Security Council convened on Wednesday condemned the mutiny and urged the soldiers to release all detained government officials without delay. The 15 members “underlined the urgent need to restore rule of law and to move towards the return to constitutional order”, according to a statement.

‘Unconstitutional’

The influential West African regional bloc ECOWAS said it was sending a high-level delegation to “ensure the immediate return to constitutional order”. The 15-nation bloc – which includes Mali – also said that it would suspend the country from its internal decision-making bodies.

French President Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday that “the fight against terrorist groups and the defence of democracy and the rule of law are inseparable”, referring to the situation in Mali.

“To leave is to provoke instability and to weaken our fight. It is not acceptable,” the French president wrote on Twitter, calling for power to be “returned to civilians,” for “milestones (to be) laid for a return to constitutional order” and for the Malian president and his prime minister to be freed.

French troops have been fighting in the country since 2013, after Mali asked it to help regain territory seized by Islamist extremists who had hijacked a Touareg rebellion in the country’s northern desert regions the previous year.

The French military succeeded in this initial task – but the jihadist insurgency has since spread throughout Mali and across the border to Niger and Burkina Faso.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo denounced Keita’s overthrow in a statement on Wednesday. “The United States strongly condemns the August 18 mutiny in Mali as we would condemn any forcible seizure of power,” he said. “The freedom and safety of detained government officials and their families must be ensured.”

The EU condemned the events in Mali as “unconstitutional”.

“The European Union condemns the attempted coup d’état under way in Mali and rejects all unconstitutional change,” the bloc’s diplomatic chief, Josep Borrell, said in a statement Tuesday.

Neighbouring Algeria has also rejected the coup. “Algeria reiterates its firm rejection of any anti-constitutional change of government,” the foreign ministry said in a statement on Wednesday. It said Algeria was following with “concern” developments in Mali, with which it shares an almost 1,400-kilometre (850-mile) border.

Morocco also reacted to the coup on Wednesday, stressing the need for “stability” in Mali, calling for “responsible dialogue, respect for constitutional order and the preservation of democratic gains.”

In a statement shortly after the coup Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged Malians to protect their democratic institutions and called for the “immediate and unconditional release” of Mali’s president.

The UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on the events later on Wednesday.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and REUTERS)

20, August 2020

US Politics: Kamala Harris accepts VP nomination ⁰

US Senator Kamala Harris accepted the Democratic nomination for vice president on Wednesday, imploring the country to elect Joe Biden president and accusing Donald Trump of failed leadership that had cost lives and livelihoods.

The first Black woman and Asian-American on a major US presidential ticket, Harris summarized her life story as emblematic of the American dream on the third day of the Democratic National Convention.

“Donald Trump’s failure of leadership has cost lives and livelihoods,” Harris said.

Former US President Barack Obama told the convention Trump’s failures as his successor had led to 170,000 people dead from the coronavirus, millions of lost jobs and America’s reputation badly diminished in the world.

The evening featured a crush of women headliners, moderators and speakers, with Harris pressing the case against Trump, speaking directly to millions of women, young Americans and voters of color, constituencies Democrats need if Biden is to defeat the Republican Trump.

“The constant chaos leaves us adrift, the incompetence makes us feel afraid, the callousness makes us feel alone. It’s a lot. And here’s the thing: we can do better and deserve so much more,” she said.

“Right now, we have a president who turns our tragedies into political weapons. Joe will be a president who turns our challenges into purpose,” she said, speaking from an austere hotel ballroom in Biden’s hometown of Wilmington, Delaware.

Biden ahead in polls

Biden leads Trump in opinion polls ahead of the Nov. 3 election, bolstered by a big lead among women voters. Throughout the convention, Democrats have appealed directly to those women voters, highlighting Biden’s co-sponsorship of the landmark Violence Against Woman Act of 1994 and his proposals to bolster childcare and protect family healthcare provisions.

Obama, whose vice president was Biden from 2009-2017, said he had hoped that Trump would take the job seriously, come to feel the weight of the office, and discover a reverence for American democracy.

“Donald Trump hasn’t grown into the job because he can’t. And the consequences of that failure are severe,” Obama said in unusually blunt criticism from an ex-president.

“Millions of jobs gone. Our worst impulses unleashed, our proud reputation around the world badly diminished, and our democratic institutions threatened like never before,” Obama said.

The choice of a running mate has added significance for Biden, 77, who would be the oldest person to become president if he is elected. His age has led to speculation he will serve only one term, making Harris a potential top contender for the nomination in 2024.

Biden named Harris, 55, as his running mate last week to face incumbents Trump, 74, and Vice President Mike Pence, 61.

Former first lady and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee who lost to Trump, told the convention she constantly hears from voters who regret backing Trump or not voting at all.

“This can’t be another woulda coulda shoulda election.” Clinton said. “No matter what, vote. Vote like our lives and livelihoods are on the line, because they are.”

Clinton, who won the popular vote against Trump but lost in the Electoral College, said Biden needs to win overwhelmingly, warning he could win the popular vote but still lose the White House.

“Joe and Kamala can win by 3 million votes and still lose,” Clinton said. “Take it from me. So we need numbers overwhelming so Trump can’t sneak or steal his way to victory.”

Democrats have been alarmed by Trump’s frequent criticism of mail-in voting, and by cost-cutting changes at the US Postal Service instituted by Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Trump supporter, that could delay mail during the election crunch. DeJoy said recently he would delay those changes until after the election.

Democrats also broadcast videos highlighting Trump’s crackdown on immigration, opposition to gun restrictions and his decision to pull out of the Paris climate accord.

‘Disrespect’ for facts, for women

Nancy Pelosi, the first woman Speaker of the US House of Representatives, told the convention she had seen firsthand Trump’s “disrespect for facts, for working families, and for women in particular – disrespect written into his policies toward our health and our rights, not just his conduct. But we know what he doesn’t: that when women succeed, America succeeds.”

US Senator Elizabeth Warren, a leading progressive who ran against Biden in the 2020 primary, spoke to the convention from a childcare center in Massachusetts and cited Biden’s proposal to make childcare more affordable as a vital part of his agenda to help working Americans.

“It’s time to recognize that childcare is part of the basic infrastructure of this nation — it’s infrastructure for families,” she said. “Joe and Kamala will make high-quality childcare affordable for every family, make preschool universal, and raise the wages for every childcare worker.”

In her speech later, Harris will have an opportunity to outline her background as a child of immigrants from India and Jamaica who as a district attorney, state attorney general, US senator from California and now vice-presidential candidate shattered gender and racial barriers.

She gained prominence in the Senate for her exacting interrogations of Trump nominees, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Attorney General Bill Barr.

The Republican National Convention, also largely virtual, takes place next week.

Source: REUTERS

19, August 2020

It will be in Biya’s best interest and legacy to talk to Sisiku Ayuk Tabe ⁰

A senior Southern Cameroons elite based in South Africa, Dr Patrick Ayuk has criticized the French Cameroun regime of President Paul Biya for sponsoring the arrest and forced extradition of the Ambazonian leader President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and his top aides from the Nigerian capital Abuja to Yaoundé saying it is in Paul Biya’s best interest to talk to the Southern Cameroons chief executive.

During a Cameroon Concord News Group event on Tuesday, Dr Patrick Ayuk opined on how the UN should intervene in the Ambazonia crisis and assist the two Cameroons move forward with several domestic and international issues, among them the terms of separation.

Dr Patrick Ayuk said the French Cameroun regime in Yaoundé could have tried to fix what it viewed as the Anglophone problem with the Federal Republic of Nigeria as a mediator instead of wasting millions of US dollars in staging an action now described by international actors as state terrorism.

One consequence of the Biya-Buhari Abuja blunder was the internationalization of the Southern Cameroons crisis, Dr Patrick Ayuk noted.

The Southern Cameroons academic who holds a PhD in Management and leadership from the North West University highlighted the devastating effect of the 4 year old war that is showing no signs of ending blaming it on failed and irresponsible leadership in French Cameroun and pointed out that only a UN Security Council resolution will be able to bring to a very important conclusion the crisis in Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia.

The researcher at North West University and Founder and CEO of Global Leadership and Development Nexus also said the United Nations should thus return to the Milner-Simon Agreement as a means of restricting the casualties and preventing further conflict between the two Cameroons.

“I think it would be in Mr. Paul Biya’s best interest and his legacy to start talking to President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and to stop the senseless war that has radicalized thousands of Southern Cameroonians” Dr Patrick Ayuk added.

He, however, cast doubt on whether the Southern Cameroons Interim Government and its leadership would be receptive to that saying, “I think after Yaounde ignored the recommendations of the so-called Grand National Dialogue, President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and the Ambazonia Interim Government may have moved on and adopted a tough position.”

Vice President Dabney Yerima of the Southern Cameroons Interim Government has increasingly signaled that he wants the United Nations to send a fact finding mission to the Federal Republic of Ambazonia.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

17, August 2020

Race For The White House: Biden leads Trump by 9 points in national poll ⁰

A new opinion poll shows that presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has a nine percentage-point lead over President Donald Trump nationally with less than three months before the 2020 election.

The NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll, released on Sunday, found that 50 percent of registered voters favored Biden while just 41 percent said they would support the Republican incumbent.

Forty-nine percent of participants said the former US vice president was better suited to handle the current health crisis sparked by the coronavirus pandemic, while just 33 percent said the same of Trump.

The survey also showed that Biden leads Trump by 24 percentage points on handling race relations.

The new poll was carried out days after Biden selected Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) to be his running mate.

Harris, the daughter of immigrants from Jamaica and India, was the wire-to-wire frontrunner for Biden’s No. 2 job.

Thirty-nine percent of voters expressed a positive view about the California senator, while 35 percent said the opposite. Feelings about Harris also created sharp division along party lines, with 71 percent of Biden-backing voters saying they held a positive view of her and just four percent of Trump’s supporters saying the same.

The NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll was conducted from August 9 to 12 among a population of 900 registered voters. The survey has a margin of error of 3.3 percentage points.

The opinion poll, published just a day ahead of the start of the Democratic National Convention, comes as national and states polls have continued to show Biden with substantial advantages over Trump in his bid for the White House.

A CNBC poll released last week found the former US vice president leading the incumbent in five of six battleground states, including Florida, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

The decline in national support for Trump can be explained by the president’s chaotic handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has taken a heavy toll on American lives and economy.

The United States remains the worst-hit country by the pandemic, with over 5.5 million infections and more than 170,000 deaths.

Trump and his administration have been under fire for an untimely relaxing of lockdown measures as well as a blatant disregard for personal protection equipment since the flu-like pathogen erupted in the US early in January.

Moreover, police violence and racial injustice protests that followed the brutal murder of unarmed African American George Floyd in police custody have dealt a heavy blow to the president’s approval rating.

The 46-year-old died after a white officer knelt on his neck and pinned him to the ground for nine minutes in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25.

His death unleashed protests against police brutality and for racial justice in the US and many world countries, with protesters saying they were hopeful that Floyd’s death would mark a turning point in race relations and police reform the US.

Source: Presstv

16, August 2020

Trump reportedly eyeing Putin meeting before 2020 presidential election ⁰

US President Donald Trump is reportedly eying a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, ahead of the US presidential election.

Citing of four unnamed people, NBC News reported Sunday that Trump told aides he would want to have a meeting with the Russian leader before the November race.

The Republican president could potentially meet Putin next month in New York.

The report came after Trump said he will “probably” not take part in the summit that the Russian president has called after the UN Security Council rejected Washington’s resolution to extend an arms embargo on Iran.

“The goal of a summit would be for the two leaders to announce progress towards a new nuclear arms control agreement between the U.S. and Russia,” NBC News said in its report.

“He wants it to show his deal-maker abilities,” said one of the people interviewed. “It’s just a big stage.”

US coronavirus hotspots had disproportionately high numbers of cases among communities of color, says the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Trump is facing Democratic presumptive nominee Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.

Apart from a weak performance to address the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump is under pressure over a series of other domestic issues, including the economy.

On the world stage, the US faced an embarrassment at the Security Council Friday after even its allies — Germany, France, and Britain — refused to throw their support behind Trump.

Source: Presstv

13, August 2020

Cameroon sends new ambassador to Ethiopia ⁰

Ewumbue Monono Churchill has been appointed ambassador to Ethiopia by the 87-year-old French Cameroon dictator. The decree was published on Wednesday, August 12, 2020 by state radio and television.

The new boss of Cameroon’s diplomatic mission in Addis Ababa replaces Jacques Alfred Ndoume Eboule who died in August 2019 due to an undisclosed illness.

The 59-year-old long standing Cameroonian diplomat was before this appointment a Technical Adviser to the butcher of Yaoundé.

Churchill Ewumbue Monono previously served at the Cameroon Embassy in Russia and Ethiopia. He was the brain behind the Orthodox South West Elites Association that successfully put an end to the SDF dominance in South West politics.

Nicknamed by the late Chief E.T.Egbe as SWELA’s obasinjom warrior, the renowned Bakweri elite reportedly suffered political victimization from the Prime Minister Peter Mafany Musonge gang over claims that he attempted to sabotage the appointment of Musonge via an article that was published by the Cameroon Post Group.

By Rita Akana in Yaounde

12, August 2020

Exposed: How CPDM rivalries hamper peace talks ⁰

Peace talks involving the government of Cameroon and Anglophone separatists are at a standstill due to a power struggle playing out between prime minister Joseph Dion Ngute and secretary general of the presidency Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh.

On 2 July, the jailed secessionist leader Sisiku Ayuk Tabe announced on social media that he had taken part in discussions with Cameroon’s government regarding a ceasefire agreement under the auspices of the United Nations.

Subsequently, on the orders of secretary general of the presidency Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, communications minister René Emmanuel Sadi said in a statement that this information was not “accurate”. Since then, the two parties have not been in further contact with one another.

Church provides neutral grounds

However, according to sources, a delegation made up of about 10 secessionist leaders led by Ayuk Tabe did in fact meet on 2 July with Léopold Maxime Eko Eko, head of the Direction Générale de la Recherche Extérieure, Cameroon’s counter-intelligence agency.

Given that the conditions set forth by the Ambazonians included that the meeting take place in a “neutral” setting, the government asked the Catholic Church to allow it to hold the talks at the Episcopal Centre of Mvolyé. Located in Cameroon’s capital, the church was ultimately selected as the site of the negotiations, which were attended by six other government representatives.

At the third such meeting arranged by the government, the duo formed by Dion Ngute and Eko Eko led the administration’s negotiation. A traditional dignitary in the South-West region, the prime minister has a network of local monarchy connections who provides him with a way to engage with separatist rebels.

Eko Eko, a police superintendent and speaker of French and English, was the negotiator who successfully secured the 2008 release of oil workers taken hostage aboard the French vessel Bourbon Sagitta by the Bakassi Freedom Fighters, a rebel group from the Bakassi Peninsula, which Nigeria and Cameroon had disputed.

Secret negotiations

Prior to that, the first meeting with Anglophone leaders had taken place in Ghana, where Eko Eko met with secessionist figures from the diaspora community such as Ebenezer Akwanga and Herbert Boh. The second meeting was held on 13 April in Mvolyé (Yaoundé) and brought together Ayuk Tabe and his allies.

At the end of these talks, some progress was made, as the separatists said they were prepared to abandon their most radical demand, i.e., the departure of Cameroon’s army from the North-West and South-West regions. However, their acceptance of the continued presence of these troops came with the condition that they remain in their barracks since, in their view, the police and gendarmerie forces should be the sole personnel permitted to be deployed on the ground.

Dion Nguté and Eko Eko excluded the rest of the administration from secret negotiations which nevertheless had the blessing of President Paul Biya. Even Ngoh Ngoh was not involved in the discussions, despite the fact that he had been the Swiss government’s primary contact since June 2019.

Yaoundé officially mandated the Swiss government to facilitate talks between the warring sides. Working with the Geneva-based Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD), the Swiss mediators invited several secessionist leaders to participate in a discreet preparatory meeting from 25 to 27 June in Saint-Luc, a small village in the canton of Valais. However, at the end of 2019, the HD-led mediation process ended in failure due to distrust from certain factions of the secessionist movement.

New round of Swiss mediation

After Ngoh Ngoh released a statement by way of Sadi denying that talks had taken place, the Swiss negotiators initiated a new mediation process. On 2 August, a delegation led by Günther Bächler arrived in Yaoundé. The 67-year-old diplomat and former Swiss ambassador to Georgia served as a mediator in conflicts in Darfur, Nepal and in the South Caucasus on behalf of the Swiss Foreign Ministry.

As soon as he arrived in Cameroon, Bächler got in touch with a number of people, not just separatists but also supporters of federalism and proponents of decentralisation. On 4 August, he met with Cardinal Christian Tumi. On 6 August in Buea, the capital of the South-West region, the delegation planned to meet with the lawyer Felix Agbor Balla as well as with other local Anglophone figures.

Culled from Africa Intelligence

11, August 2020

US: Biden picks Kamala Harris as VP nominee ⁰

Former US Vice President Joe Biden has selected Sen. Kamala Harris to be his running mate, elevating a charismatic blue-state senator, former prosecutor and onetime 2020 primary rival who has built a reputation as an unyielding antagonist of the Trump administration.

Harris, the daughter of immigrants from Jamaica and India, was the wire-to-wire frontrunner for Biden’s No. 2 job. Her experience as a battle-tested presidential contender, her efforts leading major law enforcement offices and her political track record of three election wins in California helped her overcome a crowded list of contenders.

Source: Politico