War in Lebialem County: Yaounde would neither confirm nor deny

24, March 2018

War in Lebialem County: Yaounde would neither confirm nor deny 0

A government official was killed and a district administrator wounded on Thursday in an ambush blamed on anglophone separatists in western Cameroon, a human rights activist said. The attack hit a convoy carrying a government official responsible for land ownership issues in part of the Southwest, who was killed.

The area’s prefect survived the attack but was injured, the activist said. The report was confirmed by sources in the security services, but the government in Yaounde would neither confirm nor deny it.

Unrest blamed on armed separatists has increased in recent weeks in the Northwest and the Southwest, two English-speaking territories that became part of the mainly French-speaking country after independence in 1960.

The attack took place ahead of elections to the Senate which are to be held on Sunday, with authorities banning certain types of vehicle on roads in the Southwest and urging people to “remain calm and vigilant”.

Senate elections do not take place by universal suffrage in Cameroon. Municipal councillors across the country vote for 70 members of the upper house, while appointees to the 30 remaining seats are named by President Paul Biya.

On Tuesday, a Tunisian was killed in the Southwest during an operation aimed at freeing four hostages – two Tunisians and two Cameroonians – who were kidnapped by an armed group on March 15, state television reported.

 

Source: News24


Beijing: China’s top legislator meets Biya

23, March 2018

Beijing: China’s top legislator meets Biya 0

China’s top legislator Li Zhanshu met with Cameroonian President Paul Biya on Friday.

Li, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC), said Chinese President Xi Jinping held fruitful talks with Biya on Thursday and they made top-level designs for the development of bilateral relations in the future.

Li said China’s NPC is willing to have more friendly exchanges with Cameroon’s parliament and he called on the two sides to implement the consensus reached by the heads of state.

Li expressed his hope that both sides would support each other on political issues, create a better cooperative environment, and have more people-to-people exchanges.

Biya congratulates Li Zhanshu on his election as chairman of the Standing Committee of the NPC.

Biya spoke highly of China’s foreign policy and appreciated China’s long-term support for Cameroon, calling for more legislative exchanges between the two countries.

 

Source:Xinhuanet



Cameroon: Playing games with our minds

23, March 2018

Cameroon: Playing games with our minds 0

2018 is an election year and it appears all tricks are acceptable, especially when there are no real economic and financial results that can endear a government to its people. True to its philosophy, the CPDM government yesterday March 22 staged a new show, using Vision 4, a local TV channel, to announce that the former minister of water and energy, Basil Atangana Kouna (BAK), who had fled the country last week when news of his impending arrest was released to the public following allegations of fraud and embezzlement when he was the head of Cameroon’s water corporation (CAMWATER) had been brought back to the country.

BAK, as he is popularly called, was until early March the powerful minister of water and energy who had transformed himself into a weapon of mass destruction for young jobless Cameroonians, many of whom have been condemned to wearing diapers for the rest of their lives. BAK has left behind a trail of destruction and corruption wherever he has been to. At CAMWATER, the mess he left behind is still flowing and it has made its way to many neighborhoods. Even in Yaounde, the nation’s capital, there are many neighborhoods without water and electricity and this has gone on for years. BAK had decided to line his pocket instead of using the money for the purpose for which it was intended.

Being aware of the fate that was awaiting him following his dismissal from government, BAK gingerly hatched a plan that would spare him a long jail term. BAK had left Cameroon surreptitiously on board a Turkish airlines flight to Montreal a day before he was expected to appear in court to answer for all his financial and economic crimes. His ordinary and diplomatic passports had been seized a weak before he disappeared. His disappearance was plotted with the connivance of top government officials and senior security and intelligence officers.

BAK’s trip to Montreal had been brought to the attention of Cameroon Concord News Group on the same day he was leaving the country. A former Cameroon government undercover security agent who fled the country, had reliably informed our senior correspondent in the Ivorian capital, Abidjan, where he is living that Atangana Kouna would not be attending the court session scheduled for last Friday. The agent, who is struggling with life in Abidjan, is very bitter with the way things are turning out in Cameroon. He disagrees with BAK regarding the manner in which he has managed the energy ministry and CAMWATER, but points out that there are lots of bad elements in the system.

He argued that corruption had spread across the country like ragweed and if care was not taken, Cameroon could implode. He said many young soldiers had lost their lives in the north of the country and in the Anglophone regions, but the government was keeping things under wraps. He added that some had been killed by senior military officials due to little disagreements. The south region native stressed that the Minister of Defense, Joseph Beti Assoumou, was destroying the military, adding that his new policy of dismissing soldiers and imprisoning others for asking for their money could one day come back to bite the government. He promised to speak to our correspondent on the divisions within the ministry of defense, stressing that he had a lot to spill.

BAK’s choice of Montreal is not in error. BAK owns a mansion in an upscale neighborhood in Canada’s second largest city, Montreal. For security reasons, Cameroon Concord News Group has decided to withhold his home address. His property is estimated at more than one million dollars. Cameroonians in Canada had been planning a huge demonstration to take place in front of his mansion to let neighbors know that they were sharing their beautiful neighborhood with an embezzler and a homosexual whose actions have resulted in many deaths in his native Cameroon.

It should be recalled that BAK is not the first Cameroon government official to escape to Canada following threats of arrest by a government that has the nasty habit of jailing its real and perceived enemies for a long time without trial. Florent Ely Etoga, CRTV’s first general manager who passed away two months ago, had also embezzled CRTV’s budget and fled to Côte d’Azur in France where he lived for many years before returning to Yaounde to spend his last days. Years after, Messi Messi joined the club of embezzlers. He had once headed a prosperous Bank in Cameroon until it was alleged that he had engaged in financial malfeasance. He promptly skipped town and emerged in Montreal.

His saga started on April 19, 1992, when Garga Haman Adji, the then Minister of Public Service and State Control, announced that the Disciplinary Council of the Office of Budgetary Control (IGERA) had charged Robert Messi Messi, the former Director of the Société Camerounaise de Banque (SCB), with embezzlement. Messi Messi had already been fired as General Manager of SCB in August 1988, barely a month before the bank collapsed under the weight of its mountain of bad loans estimated at more than CFAF 150 billion. Over one thousand employees also lost their jobs in the process and many have since died due to stress and frustration.

IGERA had accused Messi Messi of swindling over CFAF 2 billion (CFAF 2,285,178,792 FCFA) and asked him to explain the whereabouts of another CFAF 45 billion missing from SCB coffers. IGERA barred him from holding public office in Cameroon for a 10-year period, and instructed the Minister of Justice to begin judicial proceedings against him. Messi Messi was also handed a CFAF 2 million fine.Instead of accepting his punishment, he simply skipped town, choosing Montreal as his destination of choice. He later sought asylum in Canada on political grounds where he is living today like a lord.

While in exile, he was interviewed in Switzerland by Celestin Monga, today a vice president at the African Development Bank in Abidjan, where Mr. Messi Messi alleged that most of the money had been taken by the country’s first lady and his family who kept on showing up in his office with notes from the Unity Palace that they be given money. The Unity Palace has never confirmed or disconfirmed that information, but what is clear is that the taxpayer had been robbed of a huge amount of money.

Atangana Kouna’s story is a déjà vu. Same people, same comedy. The story about his return to Cameroon on Thursday, March 22, 2018, is more of a distraction and part of a game that is designed to enrich certain people. The government of Cameroon is famous for playing games with the minds of its people. Alcohol consumption, which is a favorite pastime in Cameroon, seems to have reduced the people’s ability to think and analyze issues independently.

The government is aware of this and it is making hay while the sun shines. Elections are in the offing and there is no better way to distract a people who have been rendered helpless due to tough economic times. The government has weaponized poverty and it is using it to keep Cameroonians under control. Poverty can disarm even the bravest and it has indeed robbed Cameroonians of their mental capabilities and dignity. To the developed mind, yesterday’s story has produced more questions than answers. It is hard buying into the story that Atangana Kouna has been brought back to Cameroon “manu militari” from Nigeria.

The pictures of a plane purported to be carrying Basil Atangana Kouna do not tell any story. There were no pictures of BAK. If the photographer could take pictures of the airplane, why could he not take pictures of BAK as he alighted from the Chinese made airplane in handcuffs? Which other way could have been used to convince skeptics about the government’s determination to bring back criminals to Cameroon for them to answer for their crimes?

In all of the noise, nobody, not even those who broke the news, have made mention of the airport whence the flight originated. The story has only been that he has been brought back from Nigeria. From which airport did the flight originate? Cameroon Concord News Group wants to get to the bottom of the matter. It is prepared to send its reporters to gather more information in Nigeria. However, it needs the originating airport in order for it to do a clean job.

After all the buzz about BAK returning to Cameroon and being taken to the famous SED, Cameroon Concord News Group on Friday dispatched its West Africa Bureau Chief, Kingsley Betek,  to SED to talk to some of his contacts who have always elected anonymity. According to one of them “BAK is a huge, handsome, and fair in complexion guy with a physical presence. If he is around, it will be easy to see him even from a distance. I have not seen anything extraordinary around here, but I will have my ears to the ground and will advise you whenever anything pops up.”

BAK’s story is being used by the regime to prove that it is effective. It is seeking to mend the dents its image has taken following BAK’s disappearance from Cameroon under embarrassing circumstances. The country’s intelligence community is still recovering from this embarrassment. However, it is used to such embarrassment. Many government officials have left the country incognito even when the country’s intelligence services are monitoring them. Corruption has finally spread to the intelligence services. Nobody is safe. Even Etoudi knows that with a few millions of francs, the country’s intelligence services could betray it.

The government is at its wit’s end. Its poor economic performance is coming back to haunt it. Corruption has become a norm in the country. As elections approach, the government needs something to distract Cameroonians. The Southern Cameroons crisis has diminished the government’s credibility and it is scrambling for other means that may make it look credible in the eyes of the poor and desperate population. Playing games is its forte. It has been playing games with so many minds. When will it face reality and quit playing games with our minds?

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai and Kingsley Betek with correspondent reports

 


UN says Libya still living with killings, torture, slave markets

23, March 2018

UN says Libya still living with killings, torture, slave markets 0

A UN rights report sheds light on the plight of Libyans seven years after a NATO-led military intervention there, saying rival armed groups in the North African state continue to kill and torture civilians with impunity, while Europe-bound refugees are still being bought and sold in “open slave markets.”

In a report to the Human Rights Council on Wednesday, the United Nations human rights office said ordinary Libyans and refugees in the North African state are still being arbitrarily held in appalling conditions with no access to the outside world.

In March 2011, a multi-state NATO-led coalition began a military intervention in Libya a month into an uprising against the country’s then dictator, Muammar Gaddafi.

That mission, which was said to be aimed at paving the way for a ceasefire in Libya and ending attacks against civilians, came to an end in October that year after the fall and death of Gaddafi amid the uprising.

Seven years on, Libya remains a lawless state, with various rival armed factions vying for power. The country is now split between two governments based in the east and the west.

Libya’s coastlines are also largely in the hands of armed groups who smuggle refugees onto boats heading for Italy and Europe.

“Extrajudicial and unlawful killings are rampant,” UN Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights Andrew Gilmour told the Geneva forum. “In what has become an increasing pattern in and around Benghazi over the last two years, more bodies with signs of torture and hands bound were found in the streets,” he added.

He explained that armed groups are “the main perpetrators of grave human rights violations and act with almost complete impunity.”

According to Gilmour, detention centers run by armed groups, “including those with links to ministries,” have the worst record.

The Libya-Italy route has been one of the major passageways for the asylum seekers attempting to reach wealthier European states.

Amid the mayhem in Libya, a CNN video grabbed news headlines late last year, showing an auction, where refugees captured by traffickers were being sold into slavery.

The report caused international outrage and prompted rights groups to blame Europe for the crisis. They said as long as European countries refuse to create safer and legal means for refugees to reach the continent, people will continue to suffer.

The footage also triggered protest rallies in several European countries, with the participants pointing the finger of blame for the chaotic situation in the state at Europe, which supported the 2011 military intervention.

According to the UN refugee agency, Libya hosts 43,113 refugees seeking to travel to Europe. Up to 90 percent of people taking a perilous sea journey to Europe depart from Libya.

Adel Shaltut, charge d’affaires at Libya’s mission to the U.N. in Geneva, said, “Libya is a victim of illegal migration, it is only a transit country and cannot shoulder all responsibilities. Our coast guards and border guards do not have capacity to face organized crime and terrorism.”

EU diplomat Carl Hallergard said that refugees and activists were subjected to “unlawful detentions, abductions, torture, forced labor and sexual and gender-based violence.”

The European Union said it is “deeply also concerned about reports of migrants and refugees allegedly being sold as slaves and call on the Libyan authorities to investigate and hold persons responsible for those acts accountable.”

 

Source: Presstv


EU recalls envoy to Moscow, member states expelling Russian diplomats

23, March 2018

EU recalls envoy to Moscow, member states expelling Russian diplomats 0

The EU recalls its envoy to Russia over a nerve agent attack on British soil as several members of the bloc consider expelling Russian diplomats.

EU leaders issued a statement in Brussels Thursday, saying it is “highly likely Russia is responsible” for poisoning Soviet-era spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in a British town earlier this month.

The Skripals were found unconscious on March 4 on a bench in the British city of Salisbury. They remain hospitalized in critical condition.

Britain claims the Soviet-designed Novichok nerve agent has been used to poison the pair and points the finger at Russia.

Moscow has rejected the claims as “absurd”, saying the substance used in the attack could have originated from the countries studying it, including the UK itself.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte said the EU leaders at the Brussels summit on Thursday agreed to recall the European Union’s ambassador to Moscow for consultations.

AFP quoted an unnamed EU official as saying that “some member states are looking into possibly expelling Russian diplomats or recalling national diplomats.”

British media reports identified those countries as France and Russia’s closest European neighbors, including Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia and Poland.

The poisoning incident has worsened already tense ties between the EU and Russia.

Britain expelled 23 Russian diplomats in the aftermath of the poisoning incident, and has been pressing its European allies to follow suit.

Lithuania’s President Dalia Grybauskaite said, “All of us we are considering such measures.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May told EU leaders that the poisoning case is part of a “pattern of Russian aggression,” warning that Moscow would pose a “threat” for the “years to come.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May (R) speaks with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker during a round table meeting at an EU summit in Brussels, March 22, 2018. (Photo by AP)

 

Separately, she held talks in Brussels with French President Emanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who also urged a “strong European message” to Moscow.

In accusing Russia, the UK however has not presented any evidence. Earlier this week, experts of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) arrived in the UK for a probe into the attack. They say it could take up to three weeks to analyze the samples gathered from the scene.

As the Europeans deliberated, Russia’s Ambassador to Britain Alexander Yakovenko warned that the UK has “bad record of violating international law and misleading the international community.”

History shows that British statements must be verified,” he added, urging a “full transparency of the investigation” as well as cooperation with Moscow and the OPCW experts.

Moscow has repeatedly called on London not jump to conclusions, offering cooperation with London in probing the case.

Russia responded to the UK’s expulsions by expelling exactly the same number of British diplomats, and has vowed it would hit back if London fails to stop its anti-Moscow measures.

 

Source: Presstv


French Cameroun: Three public figures arrested in Biya’s controversial ‘Operation Epervier’

23, March 2018

French Cameroun: Three public figures arrested in Biya’s controversial ‘Operation Epervier’ 0

Three Cameroonian public figures, including a former minister, were jailed in Yaoundé for alleged financial malpractice in connection with the anti-corruption operation “Epervier”, a judicial source told AFP on Thursday.

Louis Max Ohandja, former secretary of state to the Minister of Public Works, in charge of roads, Jean William Sollo, former boss of a public corporation and Bruno Bekolo Ebe, former rector of the University of Douala, were placed on Wednesday evening in pre-trial detention in Kondengui, the central prison of Yaoundé, the source said.

“They are accused of financial embezzlement, but the amounts will not be known until the judicial information has been opened,” explained an official of the Special Criminal Court (TCS), the judicial body that indicted them.

William Sollo is reportedly the subject of a proceeding for alleged embezzlement within the Cameroon water utilities corporation (Camwater).

From 2012 to 2016, Sollo managed this public company, which recently took over the running water distribution service from a private company.

Bekelo Ebe and Ohandja are suspected of financial misconduct at Douala University. In 2014, the Budgetary and Financial Disciplinary Board, an official body that investigates governance problems in public administrations and companies, declared Bekolo Ebe a debtor of 2.4 billion FCFA (3.7 million euros).

The former state secretary to the Minister of Public Works, Mr Ohandja, was the director of a vocational school at the University of Douala before being promoted to Minister.

A controversial operation

The judicial operation “Epervier” to fight corruption in Cameroon launched in 2006 affected many former heads of public enterprises and former ministers.

A former Prime Minister, Inoni Ephraim was sentenced in October 2013 to 20 years in prison for “embezzlement of public funds” of more than 1.68 billion FCFA (2.56 million euros).

In Cameroon, “Epervier” is controversial, with many perceiving it as a “political purge” operation.

Former government leaders like Marafa Hamidou Yaya, sentenced to 20 years in prison for “embezzlement of public funds”, believe they are victims of political settling of scores.

Yaya was formerly a powerful minister of territorial administration (Interior) and a former Secretary General to the Presidency.

He was cited as a potential successor to Paul Biya notably in American diplomatic telegrams leaked a few months before his arrest.

 

Source: Africa News


Mozambique to receive first ever black female UK ambassador

23, March 2018

Mozambique to receive first ever black female UK ambassador 0

Mozambique will be the host of the United Kingdom’s first ever female ambassador. NneNne Iwuji-Eme, who has spent 16 years in the British Foreign Office, will take up her role as British high commissioner to Mozambique in July, taking over from Joanna Kuenssberg.

The history making career diplomat told British newspaper, The Guardian, that her promotion was ‘ an honor and a privilege’.

‘‘I hope my appointment as the first British black female career diplomat to this position will inspire young talent, regardless of race or background, to pursue their ambitions in the Foreign Office,’‘ said Iwuji-Eme.

Iwuji-Eme who previously worked as an economist in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and for Royal Dutch Shell said she is looking forward to strengthening the ties between the United Kingdom and Mozambique.

“I look forward to forging even stronger connections between Britain and Mozambique, two close members of the Commonwealth family.”

View image on TwitterSince joining the Foreign Office she has held a range of positions from economic adviser for Africa to chief press officer to the Africa minister. Her most recent posting was to Brazil as first secretary prosperity and acting prosperity consul.
Source: Africa News



Southern Cameroons War: Cho Ayaba claims of responsibility are getting more dubious

22, March 2018

Southern Cameroons War: Cho Ayaba claims of responsibility are getting more dubious 0

There’s good reason to be skeptical of the evidence-free claim from the so-called Ambazonia Defense Force headed by Cho Ayaba on the mass shooting in the Lebialem County and in Bechati.  If the Southern Cameroons freedom fighters were under the supervision of the Ambazonia Defense Force as Cho Ayaba and his group claims, no one else in Lebialem seems to have noticed, and Ayaba doesn’t seem to have voiced any support for ADF fighters in Lebialem prior to or during this attack.

Cameroon Concord News can now reveal that Cho Ayaba and his acolytes simply claim credit for any attack that happens.  Ayaba is aware that by constantly making claims that are not easily disproven will never undermine his gang’s credibility. The Lebialem Southern Cameroons forces supported by the Odeshi group from Manyu don’t have any connections to the Ayaba group, but the ADF usually make public enough online record to suggest that they were acting in the best interest of the Southern Cameroons struggle.

But that might be changing. Cameroon Concord News Group London Bureau Chief, Chi Prudence Asong who has family relations in the Southern Cameroons Defense Group in Lebialem said that Ayaba’s claims seem to be getting less reliable.

As his few followers in Manyu and Batibo continues to dwindle, there’s been heavy speculation in Europe and in Southern Cameroons that Ayaba and his men are becoming irrelevant to the struggle and  will refocus their efforts on terrorist attacks against the Interim Government.

Our Chi Prudence Asong reported that the ADF has nothing to do with the happenings in Lebialem. We gathered that the Senior Divisional Officer for Lebialem headed a French Cameroun delegation to the Esoh-Attah locality and conducted senatorial elections and were returning with ballot boxes when they came under attack.

Camcordnews sources in Lebialem hinted that the SDO who originally hails from Batibo and the DO of Fontem were all in the Esoh-Attah campaign delegation. We have not been able to confirm which of the Divisional Officers was shot in the head. What we do know is that the Divisional Delegate for MINAT was killed.

This item is still developing

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai


UN says Southern Cameroonians pour into Nigeria, stretching scant resources

22, March 2018

UN says Southern Cameroonians pour into Nigeria, stretching scant resources 0

As more and more Anglophone Cameroonians flee a violent crackdown in the region and seek asylum in Nigeria, the United Nations refugee agency warned on Tuesday without more funding and assistance, their situation and that of the Nigerian communities hosting them, will become even more desperate.

“Anglophone Cameroonians began fleeing violence in October 2017 and continue to pour into Nigeria’s Cross River, Taraba, Benue and Akwa-Ibom states,” Aikaterini Kitidi, spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), said at the regular briefing in Geneva.

“In total, over 20,000 refugees have been registered in the area. Women and children account for four-fifths of the population,” she added.

A recent assessment by humanitarian groups shows how grim the situation has become – with 95 per cent of the asylum seekers having only three days of food. Most families are down to one meal per day and their coping strategies people are themselves risky, ranging from borrowing money to cutting food portions or saving food only for children.

Most say they have to drink water from streams, ponds and other unsafe sources, because of inadequate or dysfunctional drinking water facilities. “Essential relief items, such as clothing, blankets and plastic sheeting, are available to fewer than 25 per cent of them,” explained Ms. Kitidi.

Moreover, only five in every 100 Cameroonians have proper or independent shelter. The rest have little or no privacy, squatting in rooms with some 10 to 15 people. A lack of protection from the cold is increasing health concerns as the start of the rainy season approaches.

Additionally, malaria is reportedly increasing. Many participants at the assessment were suffering from fear and anxiety, poor sleep and flashbacks. According to UNHCR, about 20 to 30 per cent of the asylum seekers have some kind of vulnerability, such as a physical disability.

Three-quarters of the children who recently fled currently cannot access school, because their families cannot afford to pay for books and uniforms. Adults are also struggling to make ends meet. “A political solution to the situation in Cameroon is urgently needed, so that the Cameroonians can safely and voluntarily return home,” stressed Ms. Kitidi.

“Until then,” she continued, “UNHCR and its partners will continue their efforts to provide assistance and support to this population as long as we are able.” While UNHCR has worked on an $18 million contingency plan to help cover their needs, to date, no funds have been received.

Earlier this month, the Nigerian authorities allocated land to UNHCR for shelters, to ensure the refugees’ safety, security and self-reliance. In line with humanitarian principles, UNHCR acknowledges the authorities’ commitment to assist in moving the refugees at least 50 kilometres from the border.

The UN refugee agency also remains concerned over reports of further Cameroonian nationals’ arrests in Nigeria.

“UNHCR urges the Nigerian authorities to refrain from the forcible return of individuals who may have fled persecution in their country of origin, and to respect the principle of non-refoulement or no forced returns,” concluded the UNHCR spokesperson.

 

Source: The United Nations


Federal Republic of Ambazonia: French Cameroun’s banning and burning of bikes is a crazy strategy

22, March 2018

Federal Republic of Ambazonia: French Cameroun’s banning and burning of bikes is a crazy strategy 0

The policy of burning commercial bikes in villages and banning same in towns and enclave communities is clearly a very primitive and hopeless approach to restore peace and security. For one thing, it provokes anger and a thirst for vengeance in young people in restive areas in Southern Cameroons. By stopping the circulation commercial bikes and setting dozens of such bikes ablaze, the government has put out of business, tens of thousands of young people, many of them university graduates who depend on motor bikes popularly known as “Bend Skin” or “Okadas” as their only means of livelihood. Their families and dependants cannot have good meals and will not be able to pay various bills because their only providers have been artificially incapacitated.

While Divisional Officers (DO), Senior Divisional Officers (SDO) and regional governors west of the Mongo had repeatedly banned motorbikes and ordered night time curfews, the problems they have attempted to solve have not gone away. Rather, their actions have unfortunately created more difficulties and untold hardship for the populations. These actions have also gone a long way in radicalizing even the most moderate minds and pushed young people to invent other ways of hurting the government they so much detest. While, the population and critics have been vocal against the slash and burn strategy of the authorities, the new minister of territorial administration, Paul Atanga Nji, has not made things any better for the restive populations and communities. His first stamp as minister of interior on his own people was the banning of bikes in the main commercial towns of Kumba, Muyuka and other localities in the South West Region.

How insensitive could the new MINAT boss be? How could he place a complete ban on such a huge population and expect the sprawling and volatile city of Kumba to respect the rather punitive order? How could the minister go so low as to ignore the governors, SDO and DOs to ban bikes? What then is the role of the local administrators? His decision has been counterproductive in Kumba and this is having a huge impact on his reputation and authority. Could he risk a mass protest and the chain effect it could have if the “K” Town Boys descend on the streets to protest against any eventual enforcement of the ban? Paul Atanga’s style is reminiscent of the vicious and pitiless reign of terror that Cameroonians knew under Forchive, the then secret police boss of Bamoun extraction (under Amadou Ahijo and Paul Biya, ) who Cameroonians hate to remember. Forchive’s extremely repressive tactics of caging dissidents is a monolithic hang over which Paul Atanga Nji appears unable to shake off. By compelling governors and other administrators to feed him with security reports twice a day, it smacks of a police state of the past whereby innocent citizens were victimized, just to satisfy the bosses and prove that they were working hard to weed out enemies of the state or terrorists and preserve the security of the state.

 

BOOMERANG

Apart from the disgrace inflicted on MINAT by the daring Kumba bike riders, the overwhelming use of force to control movements has given birth to yet another extreme weapon against the government. A campaign to stop state-owned vehicles from plying the roads of Southern Cameroons is now being fanned. This is a first volley the Southern Cameroons pro-restoration campaigners have fired against the Atanga Nji rule. French language daily, Le Messager, vividly captured it well when it said that the Atanga Nji Paul formula could be greatly problematic.

Look back into East Cameroun history and you can easily see how francophone, especially in the Bamileke and Bassa areas, suffered the same atrocities that some Southern Cameroonian villages are currently experiencing. At the time, French soldiers led a bloody campaign against UPC nationalists who were branded as Terrorists or Marquisards. Villages were razed and heads were chopped off and displayed at road junctions to scare people and deter them from joining the revolution against the brutal French rule. Apparently, those ruling this country have forgotten their Cameroon history lessons and are bent on pursuing their “slash and burn” policy to the end. We say it is wrong. It is a wrong strategy to start eating up your own children. The ego of those in power cannot be too big to let go peace and justice. Dialogue, genuine dialogue is the right way to go. Various relevant organizations have echoed this as the right formula to restore lasting peace in the country. They include the UN, Commonwealth, AU, Amnesty International, International Crisis Group etc. But despite this crucial advice, President Paul Biya has remained faithful to his initial position that there will be no discussion on the form of the state. Those championing the crusade for good governance and autonomous rule for Southern Cameroons have been branded as terrorists. They are being hunted down, chased into exile and moderates are being pushed into extremism by the high handedness of administrative and military officials.

It has not been long since President Paul Biya declared war in his country. In effect, this is war on his people. The war is claiming lives and draining the country’s resources, and the end is not in sight. How the government intends to win such a war without the support if the population is what history is waiting to record as the world’s first. The same world history has shown repeatedly that after all the fighting, hatred, killings and excesses would have taken place, the warring parties will inevitably end up at the negotiating table. So why not just go to the negotiating table now and talk instead of the crazy decisions that are being taken on a daily basis?

By Sesekou Ashu Isong


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