13, February 2023

Biya’s 90th birthday marked by cocktail of woes ⁰

Edith Kah Walla was at the front of a crowd of students that welcomed Cameroon’s new president Paul Biya on a tour of the United States in 1984, full of hope that the young leader would bring stability and democracy, and end corruption.

Four decades on, Biya, now the world’s oldest leader, turns 90 on Monday. When he cuts a large cake, as he usually does on his birthday, Kah Walla, who was one of Biya’s challengers in the 2011 presidential election, will not be celebrating.

Her support for Biya evaporated over the years as economic progress stalled, dissenting voices were silenced, and the oil-producing country of 27 million people became split by a separatist uprising that has killed thousands, and Boko Haram attacks in the north.

At 90, Biya should spend his days playing with his grandchildren, she said.

“We live in a violent, brutal dictatorship. Over the past 40 years it has gotten more and more violent and brutal,” said Kah Walla, now a civil society activist. “These 40 years are a huge setback for Cameroon.”

HANDPICKED IN 1982

Biya has repeatedly defended his record in the past and says that the government has made strides to return peace to the minority English-speaking regions where separatists are trying to form their own state.

He touts his Vision 2035 plan as a blueprint to boost development over the next 12 years.

Biya was born in Mvomeka’a, a village in the southern equatorial forest, in 1933, the year prohibition ended in the United States and Adolf Hitler became Chancellor in Germany.

After studying in Paris, he returned to Cameroon in 1962 as a top civil servant and quickly rose to become the Prime Minister in 1975. He was hand-picked as successor after the country’s first post-independence president Ahmadou Ahidjdo decided to resign suddenly in November 1982.

In Africa, only President Teodoro Obiang of Equatorial Guinea has ruled longer.

Millions still support Biya, although international observers have raised doubts about the fairness of elections that he routinely wins with ease. He spends long stretches in comfortable European hotels with his wife Chantal, frustrating many at home who believe the country’s crises require closer attention.

In 2020, he was not seen in public for weeks, prompting speculation that he had died of COVID-19.

Biya has ruled with openness and tolerance, said former minister Elvis Ngolle Ngolle. Old age, he said, has its advantages.

“The more you add up the age, the wiser you become – the more experienced, tolerant, logical you become,” Ngolle said.

AGE OLD WOES

Popular journalist and whistleblower Paul Chouta disagrees. Chouta, an outspoken critic of Biya, has been repeatedly beaten and tortured in recent years. He lives in fear: just the sound of his floorboards creaking sends him into a panic.

On March 9 last year, unknown assailants bundled him into the back of a car and drove him to an isolated spot near Yaounde airport. They beat him with stones and batons and left him for dead, he said.

Chouta is one of several reporters who have been beaten or killed. Two journalists were killed in the last month, prompting condemnation from the United Nations.

“If he (Biya) loves Cameroonians, let him fix things and go. The woes are deep,” Chouta told Reuters.

It is not only well-known reporters who are wary.

Kouam Yves, a motorcycle taxi driver, last week stood at a newspaper stand discussing the news headlines with colleagues. He struggles to make a living and is critical of Biya and what he describes as rampant corruption. But he paused as he spoke, worried about who might be listening.

“I can’t celebrate the Head of State’s birthday. For more than 20 years, I have not seen anything which we have executed in this country that went well like in other countries,” he said.

Source: Reuters

13, February 2023

Ernest Obama in SED: How Amougou Belinga surrounds himself with an elite team of snipers ⁰

The mystery of who killed Brian Fombor, a young man stabbed to death by unknown assailants on June 2020 in the Omnisport district in Yaoundé while in the company of his girlfriend, Ivana Essomba suspected of being the mistress of Jean Pierre Amougou Belinga took a new twist this week when investigators announced they have summoned Ernest Obama, Jean Pierre Amougou Belinga’s right-hand man at the time of the murder.

Cameroon Intelligence Report understands that investigators are trying to untangle the skein to know the role that Ernest Obama would have played in this tragic case.

Ivana Essomba seen here on photo attached to this report became on December 2022, the wife of Bruno Bidjang a young journalist Amougou Belinga recently appointed as General Manager of his privately-owned television channel, Vision 4.

Senior security officials in Yaoundé have hinted Cameroon Intelligence Report that Brian Fombor’s alleged killers were part of a Vision 4 group led by Ernest Obama.

Ernest Obama who now moonlights as spokesperson for the Cameroon Football Federation is wanted in SED after a tip-off following the arrest of Belinga Amougou the owner of the L’Anecdote media group and Raymond Thomas Etoundi Nsoe, a retired colonel and former commander of the presidential guard.

The Francophone mafia boss and business tycoon including his top aide Bruno Bidjang are still being questioned. But Cameroon Intelligence Report has some intelligence that would suggest they have knowledge, perhaps some culpability on the murder of Brian Fombor.

Our Yaoundé city reporter said there was a high probability that Ernest Obama, an anti Anglophone extremist was the masked man who teleguided the murder of Brian Fombor.

Amougou Belinga, Paul Atanga Nji and Laurent Esso have been in the business of killing for decades and it is evidently clear that this time around state security apparatus appear to have done a poor job of protecting this CPDM gang.

The Amougou Belinga-Martinez Zogo affair is extremely sensitive, with news of more arrests emerging.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

12, February 2023

UB Official Says Leaders World University a Blessing to Kumba ⁰

On an inspection visit to the campus of Leaders World University (LWU) in Kumba this February 8, 2023, Professor Chief Nol Alembong, Deputy Vice Chancellor at the University of Buea (UB) its potential mentor, praised the initiative and said the nascent varsity comes as a blessing to Kumba.

“[Leaders World University] is most welcome as Kumba has been without a university,” said Alembong to reporters at the end of the visit.

He was on an infrastructure inspection mission on behalf of the Ministry of Higher Education, the authorizing ministry.

Alembong was accompanied by senior officials of UB from faculties and schools with competence over academic programmes offered by LWU. The UB inspection team was received by senior officials of LWU, including its Provost, Dr Theophilus Mukete, who presented the programmes LWU is offering: Medical and Biomedical Sciences, Computer Engineering, Agriculture and Food Sciences and Business. Finance and Management for a start.

UB’s Alembong (right) speaking to LWU’s Mukete (left, in suit)

Mukete said LWU will engage in food transformation to respond to the food needs of Cameroonians abroad. He later gave the visiting UB officials a tour of LWU infrastructure including a demonstration ward for the medical and biomedical programmes, structures for medical and agriculture laboratories, land for an agriculture demonstration farm and the computer laboratory.

The inspection team said they will submit their report to the minister of state and subsequently come again for an academic inspection.

LWU is the initiative of US-based Dr Ralph Ayuk, its President, CEO, Chancellor and Chairman of its Board of Governors.

Its topnotch staff include Professor Cornelius Lambi (former UB VC) as its Pro-Chancellor, Professor Gilbert Eyabi as Vice Chancellor and Mrs Susan Etchu as Deputy VC in charge of Teaching, Professional Development and Student Life.

By Franklin Sone Bayen

12, February 2023

Yaoundé restricts Equatorial Guinea border activity over fever deaths ⁰

Cameroon has restricted movement along its border with Equatorial Guinea following “several unexplained deaths” from an unknown illness that causes hemorrhagic fever, Minister of Public Health Malachie Manaouda said on Friday.

The restrictions were imposed in view of “the high risk of importation of this disease and in order to detect and respond to any cases at an early stage”, he said in a statement.

Investigations are under way and epidemiological surveillance has been strengthened with the support of experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“At the current stage … there is no reason to be worried,” Malachie said.

Equatorial Guinea said in a statement on Wednesday that it had registered an “unusual epidemiological situation” over the past weeks in its Nsok Nsomo district, Kie-Ntem province, that caused nine deaths in two adjacent communities over a short space of time.

A crisis commission set up by the health ministry reported a tenth death on Thursday.

The symptoms observed were fever, weakness, vomiting blood and diarrhoea. A team was sent to isolate contact cases and take samples that were sent to a regional WHO lab for testing. A woman and her two children were taken to hospital, where they recovered after receiving mild treatment, the statement added.

A WHO spokesperson said the agency was supporting the testing of samples to identify what has caused the deaths and should get results within the coming days.

Cameroon said approximately 20 deaths had been recorded on Wednesday in villages in Equatorial Guinea’s Kie-Ntem province, which borders Cameroon’s Olamze district.

The symptoms of the “non-identified illness” were nose bleeds, fever, joint pain and other ailments that caused death within a few hours, the head of health for the district, Ngu Fankam Roland, said in a statement.

Source: Al Jazeera

12, February 2023

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Five CDC employees killed in Mondoni ⁰

Five employees of Cameroon’s main public agro-industrial group have died after their truck was attacked in the English-speaking west of the country plagued by separatist unrest, the company said Saturday.

“Unidentified armed men attacked a truck carrying workers” on Friday in Mondoni, about 30 kilometres (20 miles) north-west of the economic capital Douala, Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC) managing director Franklin Ngoni Njie said in a statement.

Five employees, including a woman, died and a further 44 were injured, one seriously, according to CDC, one of Cameroon’s largest employers specialising in rubber, banana and palm oil processing.

No motives were given for the ambush which state broadcaster CRTV reported was “suspected of being separatist fighters”.

Cameroon’s primarily English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions have been gripped by conflict since separatists declared independence in 2017 after decades of grievances over perceived discrimination by the francophone majority.

President Paul Biya, who has ruled the central African nation with an iron fist for 40 years, has resisted calls for wider autonomy and responded with a crackdown.

The conflict in the former French colony has claimed more than 6,000 lives and forced more than one million people to flee their homes, according to the International Crisis Group (ICG) think tank.

Civilians have suffered abuses committed by both sides, NGOs and the United Nations say.

Eighty-percent of Cameroon’s population of 24 million is French-speaking.

The presence of the large Anglophone minority is a legacy of the colonial era.

Source: AFP

11, February 2023

Canada Initiative Offers Opportunity for Southern Cameroons Peace Process ⁰

Pre-talks between Cameroon’s government and Anglophone separatists, facilitated by Canada, have opened the door to a long-overdue peace process, but Yaoundé has baulked. The government should embrace these talks, while domestic and external actors should put their full weight behind the initiative.

Having cooperated with efforts to bring Cameroon’s government and Anglophone separatists into formal peace talks, Yaoundé should now commit to participate in them. On 20 January, Canada’s foreign minister, Mélanie Joly, announced that the two sides had agreed to start peace negotiations. The announcement raised hopes that there might be a way out of the grinding seven-year conflict in mostly Francophone Cameroon’s two Anglophone regions, the North West and South West. For months, Ottawa had led secret “pre-talks” that seemingly helped the two sides overcome key hurdles to initiating a formal dialogue. Shortly after Joly’s comments, Anglophone leaders issued a joint statement affirming their commitment to participate in negotiations with Canada’s facilitation. But three days later, Cameroon’s government brushed aside Canada’s efforts, denying that it had asked a “foreign party” to broker a resolution to the conflict. The denial revealed deep divisions among top Cameroonian officials and came as a surprise, given Yaoundé’s previous engagement in the Canada-led pre-talks. While this last-minute rejection after months of careful work was a blow to peace efforts, the government can and should correct its course and get the talks on track.

Yaoundé’s brusque dismissal of Canada’s initiative leaves talks in limbo and risks perpetuating, or even escalating, the conflict. Separatist militias immediately responded to the government’s statement with a fresh campaign of violence in the North West and South West regions, erecting roadblocks and firing rocket-propelled grenades at army convoys. Their leaders started discussing the possibility of bringing the militias under a single command or organising joint operations against security forces under the banner of a united Southern Cameroon military front. In Yaoundé, meanwhile, the defence ministry launched a drive to recruit nearly 9,500 new soldiers. Its special forces stepped up patrols in the Anglophone regions and attacked separatist positions.

After seven years of hostilities in the Anglophone regions, the prospect that the parties might miss an opportunity to put hostilities behind them is jarring. The trouble in the North West and South West regions began in October 2016, when lawyers and teachers led protests calling for a two-state federation to preserve the Anglophone legal and educational systems, which they felt were being encroached upon by the Francophone-led central government. The military’s heavy-handed response to peaceful calls for greater autonomy prompted Anglophones to form militias, leading to armed conflict the following year. Since 2017, the fighting has claimed over 6,000 lives in the Anglophone regions and displaced nearly 800,000 people. Making up 60 per cent of the displaced population, women and children face differentiated risks, including gender-based violence and child trafficking. Recent estimates state that the conflict has disrupted the education of over 700,000 children.

Yaoundé has thus far been reluctant to consider a political settlement with the separatists.

Yaoundé has thus far been reluctant to consider a political settlement with the separatists. Previous peace initiatives have foundered. In January 2017, the government suspended negotiations with Anglophone civil society leaders in the city of Bamenda, in the North West region, before arresting them, triggering widespread Anglophone calls for the two regions’ secession. In 2019, President Paul Biya ignored a Swiss offer to facilitate talks, instead organising what purported to be a national conference, but without inviting the most influential separatist leaders. In April 2020, Cameroonian officials began talks with imprisoned separatist leaders, only to suddenly call them off after a second encounter in July of that year. In October 2022, while again rejecting Swiss efforts to push forward with their initiative, the government started low-level consultations with Anglophone leaders in the diaspora. This time around, the separatists’ discretion and clear commitment to finding a resolution persuaded some in Yaoundé to participate at senior levels in pre-talks, with Ottawa’s facilitation, leading observers to believe that the government was ready to take the next step and fully engage in formal talks.

It should. Committing to the Canada-facilitated peace initiative would allow President Biya to change the perception that he has little interest in a political solution, prevent yet another escalation of the conflict and contribute to stabilising the country ahead of elections that are likely to be fraught. The presidential, legislative and local polls due in 2025 are already fuelling familiar political and ethnic tensions that tend to surface during election cycles. Politicians from rival power blocs are positioning themselves to succeed Biya, who has served as president for 40 years and will turn 90 later in February. Cameroon has not seen a single democratic transfer of power since gaining its independence in 1960 and has a history of contested polls, leaving the 2025 elections freighted with uncertainty. Among other reasons for concern, separatist militias forced many Anglophones to boycott votes in 2018 and 2020.

If formal negotiations proceed, they will benefit from good work done in the pre-talk phase. Those pre-talks set as a priority the establishment of confidence-building measures, such as a cessation of hostilities, protection of the right to education and the release of prisoners. Reaching agreement on some or all of these in the next phase of dialogue could ease the suffering of millions of Cameroonians. Building on these achievements, the talks could then turn to issues that will be at the core of any settlement, such as designing a consensual political reconfiguration of the Anglophone regions; reforming the security sector; disarming the rebels; establishing transitional justice mechanisms to address abuses committed over the course of the conflict; and launching economic reconstruction.

Already the Canada-facilitated initiative has yielded clear benefits.

Already the Canada-facilitated initiative has yielded clear benefits. Anglophone faith leaders (Catholics, Presbyterians, Baptists, Muslims and Anglicans), as well as civil society and women’s groups, are more supportive of the prospective Canada talks than of previous initiatives. More critically, the facilitation has also persuaded rival separatist movements to form an orderly bloc. Drawing on earlier efforts by Swiss facilitators, Canada managed to bring together four major separatist groups, with a fifth announcing its commitment to the peace process after Joly’s statement. In the past, separatist groups appeared too divided to reach consensus among themselves. This time around, their unity offers the Cameroonian government a clear counterpart in negotiations.

Key outside interlocutors – including France, Germany, Switzerland, the UK, the U.S. and the Vatican, and multilateral organisations such as the African Union, European Union and UN – should urge Cameroon not to miss this opportunity. They should underscore the benefits that a commitment to formal talks would bring Yaoundé on the security, humanitarian and diplomatic fronts. Should the impasse be overcome, Canada should convene an inclusive discussion among interested Cameroonian parties that would allow them to agree on a negotiation framework that addresses the two sides’ concerns about the agenda for future talks.

To set the talks up for success, Ottawa should seek a public commitment from the Cameroonian government to stick with the process and clarify misconceptions among some Cameroonian parties that Canada seeks a bigger role than to facilitate or is driving toward a particular outcome. For their part, Cameroon’s government and separatist movements should work closely with faith leaders, women’s groups, civil society organisations and politicians to build domestic support for the talks, as suggested by Yaoundé in its 23 January statement. Outside parties should monitor progress closely and provide persistent support, and France should use its close relationship with Cameroon to press for positive momentum.

Progress toward an enduring settlement has not come easily. The tumultuous relationship between Cameroon’s Anglophones and the central government is marked by years of frustration, mistrust and, since 2017, gruesome violence. Unpacking and addressing the two sides’ differences will take time, effort and good faith. The Canada-facilitated process represents a crucial chance to begin this long-overdue work. All those with an interest in the peaceful resolution of Cameroon’s festering Anglophone conflict should do what they can to ensure this opportunity is not squandered.

Culled from International Crisis Group

11, February 2023

At International Customs Day: SW Customs commune with less privileged in Limbe ⁰

The South West Regional Customs headed by the Chief of sector, Mongue Nyamsi Daniel, on Thursday February 9, 2023 doled out food stuff and financial assistance to Save the Children Alliance orphanage in Limbe.

The items comprised two bags of rice, two cartons of cooking oil, two bags of salt with an envelope pregnant with cash.

Speaking during the event, the Southwest Chief of sector for Customs, Mongue Nyamsi Daniel, said that the donation was in line with the 40th edition of the celebration of the International Customs Day which is commemorated worldwide every January 26, and was celetrated on the theme: ‘Nurturing the next generation: Promoting a culture of knowledge-sharing and professional pride in customs.

The South West Customs boss explained that due to security constraints in the North West and South West Regions, the event had been scheduled for February 8-10.

Mongue Nyamsi added that activities started with sports on Wednesday, February 8, 2023. On Thursday February 9, there were internal meetings with Customs transporters and the event ended on Friday 10 with internal meeting with Customs staff. A gala night is expected to close the evening.

“World Customs Day was initiated by the World Customs Organization (W.C.O.) in 1983. This day celebrates all the customs officials and agencies which toil day in and day out to ensure effective world trade management,” the sector chief said.

“Customs officials ensure smooth functioning of trade operations across international borders and put people at the very center of the transformation process,” Mr. Mongue Nyamsi explained.

For his part, the Coordinator of Save the Children Alliance, Ivann Ngale, said that “We are so happy that these children are getting a touch of the government’s feeling within their premises through South West Customs. Thank you so much for this unprecedented visit which I know it was led by the heart.”

He also said that, they empowered the children with entrepreneurial skills to produce hair oil, vaseline among others

“God should take you to ministerial positions with your colleagues. With such hearts you people are helping. The Cameroon Government should give you people more responsibility to enable you reach out to more under-privileged children in our society,” Ngale Ivann prayed.

By Cecilia Manjang

10, February 2023

Yerima says crisis-hit Biya French Cameroun regime doomed to disintegrate and decay ⁰

The Vice President of the Ambazonia Interim Government, denouncing the murder of General Transporter of Greater Meme Area recently by French Cameroun army soldiers says the crisis-stricken Biya French Cameroun regime is doomed to degenerate and decay.

In a press statement released on Thursday, Comrade Dabney Yerima said the vexatious measures by the occupying Francophone troops against Southern Cameroons Self Defense groups will fail to avert its imminent collapse.

“For a 40-year-old criminal regime beset with an array of domestic crises including the assassination of two journalists and two prominent lawyers in a week and facing a Southern Cameroons uprising on multiple fronts, vexatious moves against Ambazonia Revolutionary Guards will be of no avail,” Vice President Dabney Yerima stated.

“Decline and disintegration are inherent in the nature of the bogus Biya French Cameroun regime” Vice President Yerima furthered.

The Yaoundé criminal regime’s aggression in rural areas of Southern Cameroons has assumed alarming proportions recently with a spate of military raids and targeted attacks resulting in the cold-blooded killing of a number of young Southern Cameroonians in Akwaya, Menchum, Meme and Bui.

The Biya Francophone regime regularly carries out raids on various towns and villages in Southern Cameroons on the pretext of detaining what it calls “separatists fighters”. These raids usually trigger violent confrontations with armed Southern Cameroons Self Defense Groups.

Dabney Yerima in the communiqué condemned the brutal aggression of French Cameroun soldiers against Southern Cameroons women in rural areas in Ndian, Kupe Muanenguba and Mezam after a report by the Ambazonian Intelligence Services said that girls were assaulted and beaten violently.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

10, February 2023

All About Dr Michael Bisong’s Book I need access to my children ⁰

A US publishing house has released a book I NEED ACCESS TO MY CHILDREN: A father’s guide to regaining access to his children after a separation.

The book is described as a frank and thoughtful key to understanding how dads can get access to their kids after a divorce.

Born in Cameroon, Dr Michael Bisong a former football player and Indomitable Lions of Cameroon hero is also the CEO of Bisong Foundation.

Here’s the full synopsis from the publishers:

Help! I need access to my children

Did you know that according to the National Center for Fathering, about 24.7million children (33%) live in the absence of their biological father? This is challenging for many fathers, as building a family is the most fulfilling experience for most men. It is almost impossible for a man to think of what happens if they denied him access to his children.

For most men, accessing their children after a separation is often a challenge. This often leads to desperation that may even aggravate situations. Across the world today, many men are on the verge of losing access to their children because of one reason or the other. I have been there, and I was also opportune to regain access to my children.

The strategies shared in this book have helped many other fathers regain access to their children after a separation. It gives a step-by-step guide that will help you do the right thing and provide adequate support to your child throughout their development.

Don’t waste another moment of investing your money and effort in the wrong direction. The solution you need is in this book.

10, February 2023

Laurent Esso should step down as Martinez Zogo murder probe deepens ⁰

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) can reveal that the contents of mobile phones and interrogations have yielded new, very incriminating evidence in the investigation into journalist Martinez Zogo’s murder in Cameroon. Businessman Jean-Pierre Amougou Belinga is more deeply implicated than ever and the net is closing on justice minister Laurent Esso, one of the pillars of the Cameroonian government.

The joint gendarmerie-police investigation is moving ahead quickly and, at this rate, is liable to eclipse President Paul Biya’s 90th birthday on 13 February. It is Biya, Cameroon’s president since 1982, who ordered the investigation into Martinez Zogo’s abduction, beating and murder by intelligence officers on the evening of 17 January. But he must surely realize to what extent the case is liable to cast a heavy shadow over the final period of his presidency and perhaps remove one of its most loyal allies.

As RSF already revealed, the initial arrests of around 20 members of Cameroon’s General Directorate for External Investigations (DGRE), including its boss, the feared Maxime Eko Eko, and its special operations director, Justin Danwe, led to the arrest on 6 February of Belinga, a prominent businessman, who owns the newspaper L’Anecdote and the TV channel Vision 4.

RSF has been told in confidence that evidence of Belinga’s role as the leading instigator of Zogo’s murder has continued to grow. The statements provided by the six members of the unit who abducted and killed Radio Amplitude FM’s director – and who were mainly recruited from outside Yaoundé, the capital, as RSF has now learned – have corroborated the staggering statement made by Danwe, which RSF already reported.

Their statements and other evidence have also confirmed Belinga’s presence at the scene of the murder. And examination of the phones of the suspects has confirmed that calls were made between Belinga and Danwe, and between Belinga and justice minister Laurent Esso, on the evening of the murder. In view of the growing volume of evidence, a reconstruction of the murder – envisaged in recent days – no longer seems to be a priority for the investigators, RSF has learned.

He “wanted to finish with him”

Sources very close to the investigation report the discovery of damning new evidence of a payment of 35 million CFA francs (about 53,000 euros) from Belinga to Danwe. This money allegedly passed through the account of Retired Colonel Etoundi Nsoé, the former presidential guard commander who is Belinga’s father-in-law and unofficial head of his security. Nsoé was arrested on 6 February, as was Bruno Bidjang, the head of the Belinga’s media group, who is reportedly cooperating with the investigators. A face-to-face confrontation between these two men was scheduled to take place today.

Finally, RSF has interviewed two people in the past two days who say Zogo had been threatened by Belinga or people close to him. And RSF has heard a recording in which Zogo voiced concern on 9 January – eight days before his murder – about the fact that he had been contacted by a man “very close to [Belinga].” This man had told Zogo that Belinga “wanted to finish with him” and with at least eight other Cameroonian journalists.

When contacted by RSF, Belinga’s lawyer, former bar association president Charles Tchoungang, claimed that no legal procedure had been respected since the start of what he called a “unilateral investigation.” He insisted that “warrantless searches” had been carried out, that the prosecution case was “empty,” and that it had the subject of a “manipulation unacceptable to public opinion.”

Sights now turned on Laurent Esso

The investigators are now focusing on the role that Esso, the justice minister, may have played. “We have proof that he was deeply involved,” said one of the investigators, refusing to elaborate. A government minister in six successive administrations since 1996 and one of President Biya’s oldest political allies, Esso has been under close surveillance in the past few days. Gendarmes were posted close to his home although there was no question of any threat to his security.

Belinga, who is being held in a cell at the defence ministry, has asked several times to call Esso, but his request has not been granted. RSF has meanwhile learned from a very reliable source that Belinga spent more than an hour in Esso’s office on 3 February, several days after first falling under heaving suspicions.

Despite several attempts, RSF has not been able to reach Esso.

Purveyors of disinformation identified

The evidence against Eko, the DGRE’s boss – who is being held in a cell near Belinga’s – also seems to be damning. He is the owner of the Prado SUV used to abduct Zogo. “It’s hard to imagine his men borrowing it without telling him,” one of RSF’s sources said. He also “had his share,” the source added, alluding to the sums of money paid to the participants in the operation.

The military justice system and the Government Commissioner are now in charge of the case. The 31 suspects already in provisional custody should be charged and placed in pre-trial detention, probably in Yaoundé’s main prison, by the end of the week. Who will join them? How high does the level of complicity go? The investigation is continuing and around 100 people are now regarded as “persons of interest” in the case.

Those who have been taking turns to spread disinformation since the start of the case – and who have targeted RSF, among others – could also be questioned. The investigators say they have found evidence of payments – ranging from a few hundred to several thousand euros –made by Belinga associates with the aim of discrediting reports unfavourable to him, rehabilitating him or creating diversions in order to influence the investigation or public opinion. At least 18 persons had been identified by yesterday evening.

Culled from RSF