6, July 2020

Covid-19 pushes US hospitals to the brink ⁰

Officials warned on Sunday that US hospitals were in danger of being overwhelmed by the upsurge in cases as countries around the world are battling surges in the coronavirus, with more than 11 million people now infected in 196 countries and territories.

The US has struggled to respond to the devastation wrought by the virus, with its national death toll rising to near 130,000 out of 2.8 million confirmed cases, and many states hit by increasing infections after lockdowns were eased.

Hospital beds are full in parts of Texas, while calls for fresh stay-at-home orders are growing. Some mayors say their cities reopened too early, as President Donald Trump tries to downplay the disease that has gripped much of the country.

Across the US, the annual July 4 holiday weekend was overshadowed by growing evidence that the country’s fractured response has exacted a heavy price across the south and west, after previous hotspots such as New York emerged from the worst of the virus.

“Our hospitals here in Harris County, Houston, and 33 other cities… they’re into surge capacities. So their operational beds are taken up,” said Lina Hidalgo, chief executive of Harris County, which includes Houston, Texas.

“Restaurants are still open. Indoor events can take place no matter the size,” she told the ABC TV channel. “What we need right now is to do what works, which is a stay-home order.”

Steve Adler, the mayor of Austin, Texas, also expressed concern that the healthcare system could buckle as the disease spreads rapidly.

“If we don’t change the trajectory, then I am within two weeks of having our hospitals overrun. And in our ICUs, I could be 10 days away from that,” he told CNN.

Phoenix city mayor Kate Gallego said, “We opened way too early in Arizona” state. She suggested that a new stay-at-home order should be issued.

The US is now recording 40,000 new cases a day, with a peak of 57,000 on Friday alone.

The pandemic has killed at least 531,789 people worldwide since it surfaced in China late last year, according to an AFP tally on Sunday based on official sources.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)

6, July 2020

Bundesliga: Former Bayern doctor says he quit because Guardiola ‘knew better’ ⁰

German Hans-Wilhelm Mueller-Wohlfahrt has said he quit as Bayern Munich team doctor in 2015 amid a spat with Pep Guardiola because the Spaniard “knew better”.

“I couldn’t put up with the fact that a young coach (Guardiola) — who was very successful and who is probably one of the very, very big names — interfered in medical matters and knew everything better than I did,” Mueller-Wohlfahrt told broadcaster BR24.

The 77-year-old German has a reputation as one of the world’s top sports doctors, whose list of superstar clients included retired sprinter Usain Bolt.

Bolt dedicated his 2016 Olympic gold medal after the men’s 100m final to him for helping him overcome a calf injury.

Mueller-Wohlfahrt started working with Bayern in 1977, but resigned abruptly five years ago.

At the time, he said it was because then-Bayern coach Guardiola blamed the club’s medical department for a Champions League defeat at Porto.

Mueller-Wohlfahrt only returned to Bayern in 2017, after Guardiola had left to join present side Manchester City, and stepped down again as club doctor last month.

However, he refers to his time at Bayern under Guardiola as a “black spot”. Mueller-Wohlfahrt says the pair have since buried the hatchet.

“We have met since and talked things over. It’s over now,” he added.

Guardiola won the Bundesliga title in each of his three seasons at Bayern from 2013-16 and has since lifted the Premier League trophy twice with Man City.

As well as Bayern, Mueller-Wohlfahrt also worked with the Germany national team from 1995 until after the 2018 World Cup in Russia.

Source: AFP

6, July 2020

Ambazonia: Vice President Yerima says Sisiku Ayuk Tabe will spare no effort to fight off French Cameroun ⁰

The Vice President of the Southern Cameroons Interim Government, Dabney Yerima has assured the people of Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia that as always, President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe is carrying them along with him and will not forsake the duty of getting Ambazonians to Buea.

Dabney Yerima made the remarks to a cream of reporters late on Sunday in Holland. The exiled leader revealed that he was satisfied with the briefing he got from President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe immediately after the meeting with French Cameroun government officials in Yaoundé.

Yerima furthered that the Southern Cameroons Interim Government stays true to the struggle in line with the founding fathers of British Southern Cameroons and also in keeping with the value-based principles laid down for the Interim Government by the late Mola Njoh Litumbe.

Vice President Dabney Yerima also underscored the importance of strong communication among Southern Cameroons front line leaders and groups and on a humorous note he observed that “The meeting in Yaoundé with French Cameroun representatives was not to decide who controls My-Trip-To-Buea Funds but to put in place a mechanism that will foster dialogue to be chaired by the United Nation.”

By Chi Prudence Asong in Den Hague

5, July 2020

US Politics: Trump to hold outdoor campaign rally in New Hampshire ⁰

US President Donald Trump will host an outdoor campaign rally in New Hampshire, his team said Sunday, following a flopped rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma against the backdrop of COVID-19.

The “Make America Great Again” rally will take place on July 11 in Portsmouth, his campaign said in a statement.

“All attendees will be provided a face mask that they are strongly encouraged to wear,” the rally announcement said.

The billionaire Republican, who is seeking reelection on November 3, had made his grand return to the campaign trail on June 20 in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

But images showed the stadium was filled to less than a third of its capacity, despite the president’s campaign boasting of huge interest ahead of time and more than a million ticket requests.

Pictures of Trump’s return to the White House in the middle of the night, with a worn-out air and his tie undone, cemented the image of a failed comeback.

With just four months left before election day, Trump — criticized for his response both to the coronavirus pandemic and to anti-racism protests — has been lagging for weeks in the polls behind his presumptive Democratic rival, Joe Biden.

While there have been calls for caution in interpreting the poll results, observers have noted that Biden’s lead over Trump is far greater than the one held by Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton at the same point in 2016.

Source: AFP

5, July 2020

Biya Regime: Making the Cameroonian poor poorer ⁰

Millions of French and Southern Cameroonians continue to become direct casualties of President Paul Biya’s misrule of the renowned United Republic of Cameroon. Today, the situation has become more intractable with the coming of the coronavirus.

For 37 years, the economy under Biya has grounded to a near standstill due to corruption, tribalism, nepotism imposed by the ruling CPDM crime syndicate. As a result, almost 10 million people in Cameroon have become unemployed with thousands migrating to neighboring countries.

Covid-19 has made thousands redundant overnight in Yaoundé, Maroua, Garoua, Edea and Bafoussam while thousands more have lost their livelihoods in the war ravaged Southern Cameroons and in the Douala metropolis.

President Biya’s failed policies had heralded many Cameroonian families into financial hardship before the pandemic hit. Now they have been pushed into abject poverty.

Cameroonian families are now struggling to provide just a meal a day for their children. Many now rely on their relations living in Europe; South Africa and North America.

From every indication, the economy will never pick up under Biya as many are still without work even after the Yaoundé Ali Baba launched the 2036 Emergence Program.

The threat posed by the secession war in Southern Cameroons and succession crisis in Yaoundé including a second wave of the coronavirus will only foster mass layoffs in Guinness, Dangote, and Brasseries groups.

By Isong Asu

Cameroon Concord News Group

United Kingdom

5, July 2020

President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe’s Yaoundé meeting cruelly exposes the timidity of disgraced Sako Ikome and Chris Anu ⁰

The meeting between representatives of the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime and the President of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia, Sisiku Ayuk Tabe including eight members of his government to explore ways and means of ending the war in Southern Cameroons marks a remarkable step in the transformation and healing process of the two Cameroons. There could be further steps to come, including Southern Cameroons emergence as a source of stability in the Gulf of Guinea rather than conflict in the region. After four turbulent years with no support from the international community, Southern Cameroonians and their jailed leaders have emerged stronger politically.

French Cameroun under Paul Biya with all its so-called military might supported by the French government of President Macron and the Buhari gang in Abuja is torn by internal conflicts which now include the army and the elite force-the Rapid Intervention Battalion.

French Cameroun political elites from the South Region are slowly but surely abandoning their strategy of forcing other French Cameroun tribes and political groups to support the choice of Franck Biya, President Biya’s eldest son as the next head of state.

The much publicized anti corruption campaign and economic reforms in French Cameroun are making no progress and living standards are falling at catastrophic rapidity. With Equatorial Guinea already building a Berlin Wall aim at preventing French Cameroonians from entering their country, the Central African Republic in the middle of an unresolved armed conflict, Gabon absorbed in its own problems after a failed coup and Chad struggling to contain the fallout from the war in Libya, the Southern Cameroons Bloc has emerged as an effective power in the CEMAC region and now remains the only hope for stability when Biya finally falls.

The security situation in Yaoundé is deteriorating and international investors are leaving in their numbers! French Cameroun has many problems but keeping Southern Cameroons as an integral part of their one and indivisible nation and getting a replacement for Mr. Biya are top on Yaoundé’s agenda. Perhaps the most important factor behind the shift that has taken place and led to the Southern Cameroons-French Cameroun meeting is that, despite much repression of Anglophones in French Cameroun and the genocidal war currently going on in Southern Cameroons, Biya and his men have now come to the conclusion that for La Repubique du Cameroun to remain a country with a genuine political culture – an authentic nation with a history of its own, Ambazonians must be a part of it!

Swiss, German, French and US delegations have been in Yaoundé in recent months but Biya has ignored all peace initiatives including that ordered by the United Nations.

The President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and Biya regime meeting confirms that some western nations are now prepared to break ranks and to think beyond the current backing of the crime syndicate in Yaoundé by Paris. The meeting, which is carefully labelled as provisional, shows that the Southern Cameroons Interim Government headed by President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe has regained its nerve and ambition, and has understood that the solution to Ambazonia quest for an independent state can only be gotten through intensive and productive discourse. The meeting cruelly exposes the timidity of disgraced leaders like Sako Ikome and Chris Anu, who are now playing catch up and fighting to be relevant to the Southern Cameroons struggle.

Money is needed now to rebuild not only the basic structures of a society destroyed by four years of a senseless war but also to organize all Ambazonia Restoration Forces into a kind of revolutionary guard force-Vice President Dabney Yerima and his cabinet offers by far the easiest way to raise and secure that money.

Having been a destabilising force in the Southern Cameroons revolution for most of the four years, Cho Ayaba, John Mbah Akuro and Ebenezar Akwanga could now find it convenient to use their undoubted power and reach to be agents of stability. A strategic realignment of all Southern Cameroons interest groups that only a year ago would have seemed fanciful is now entirely possible.

Long Live the Federal Republic of Ambazonia

Short Live the Struggle

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Chairman/Editor-In-Chief

Cameroon Concord News Group

5, July 2020

Ghana president self-isolates despite negative virus test ⁰

Ghana’s president has gone into self-isolation for two weeks as a precautionary measure despite testing negative for coronavirus, the government said, after one of his contacts was confirmed to have the illness.

President Nana Akufo-Addo began his quarantine on Saturday and will be working from the presidential villa in Accra, capital of the West African country, the information minister said in a statement.

“The president has elected to do so after at least one person within his close circle tested positive for COVID-19,” the minister said.

“(The president) has, as (of) today, tested negative, but has elected to take this measure out of the abundance of caution.”

Ghana has reported more than 19,300 cases of the new respiratory disease and 117 deaths, and has lifted its strict lockdown although social-distancing measures remain in place.

The announcement came a day after the presidency said a junior minister had resigned for failing to self-isolate after testing positive.

There was no official indication the events were linked.

Since the pandemic erupted, a number of senior political figures worldwide have caught the disease, including British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who was hospitalised and has now recovered.

Senegal’s President Macky Sall also went into a preventative quarantine last month, despite testing negative, after coming into contact with a coronavirus case.

Source: AFP

5, July 2020

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Why the pushback! ⁰

Ever since news broke out that a meeting had taken place between the Yaoundé government and Ambazonian leaders, some members of the Southern Cameroonian community have been questioning why people who are in chains should be the ones to negotiate for those who are free. This situation is not without a precedent. Mandela did it for South Africa and this rainbow nation is eternally grateful to a man who placed his country’s interest above his personal interest.

This question is indeed out of place given that for more than three years, many Southern Cameroonians, especially those in the Diaspora, have been arguing that if the Yaoundé government had to negotiate, it must do so with their leaders who are in jail in Yaoundé.

The Yaoundé government has been falsely arguing that there is nobody to talk with as there are many factions fighting a regime that has functioned for decades on divide and rule. Due to enormous international pressure, the government now believes that the time has come for talks with the people it tagged as terrorists, and it is honoring the wishes of most of the Southern Cameroonian population which has put its trust in the Nera 10 led by the President, Julius Ayuk Tabe.

Nine of the Nera 10 participated in the informal talks which President Julius Ayuk Tabe promptly reported through a tweet to clearly demonstrate the transparency and honesty of his team. The team was invited and it honored the invitation, especially as the international community was involved. Through their leader, the Ambazonian leaders raised four points and this was to ensure that Southern Cameroonians got ready for the talks and that other factions got involved.

The demands of the leaders include calling for a ceasefire which will require the military to go back to the barracks. This action will make it possible for Southern Cameroonians who have been traumatized for years to be psychologically liberated to go about their businesses without fear of sudden aggression.

The leaders also called for the unconditional release of all those who have been detained and imprisoned as a result of the crisis as well as a declaration of general amnesty for all Southern Cameroonians in the Diaspora, making it possible for them to visit their homeland without any embarrassment from the Yaoundé authorities.

The leaders also called on the Yaoundé government to participate in a genuine, open and inclusive dialogue without preconditions, with a timetable and venue, in the presence of an independent and impartial mediator acceptable to both parties.

It should be recalled that the meeting was a response to a call by the United Nations Secretary General for a ceasefire and these measures are designed to build confidence with a view to creating an environment for a successful and sustainable peaceful negotiation.

Despite the transparency, this news has rattled and ruffled a few feathers and there has been a lot of writing and talking over the last two days, with many Southern Cameroonians insisting that the fighting must continue even when the fighters are demonstrating some signs of fatigue and the resources are dwindling, as many Southern Cameroonians are not putting their money where their mouths are.

Some Southern Cameroonians, especially those living abroad, think that the Yaoundé government could be defeated in the battlefield. Many are not aware of the reality on the ground. The local population is suffering, and the military is exploiting the people. The Southern Cameroonian leadership is aware of the people’s pain and it thinks talks and negotiations could also deliver the same results. The fact remains that no war has ever been ended in a battlefield. Supporters of Southern Cameroonian independence must understand that most wars end with talks and negotiations.

The Treaty of Versailles was the most important of the peace treaties that brought World War I to an end. The Treaty ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919 in Versailles, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, which had directly led to the war. For the Second World War, it ended with two major conferences. The Yalta and Potsdam Conferences which served as a framework for the definition of the relationship between Europe and Germany once Hitler was out of the picture.

It therefore goes without saying that the Southern Cameroons crisis cannot be ended without talks, and the talks will not require everybody but those who have clearly demonstrated that they have the charisma and the people’s confidence. In this case, President Julius Ayuk Tabe and his team will be articulating the Southern Cameroonian dream and they will be paving the way for others to join the talks whenever a neutral place will be agreed upon.

At this time, not everybody who is involved in the crisis can travel to Cameroon and President Ayuk Tabe and his team are fully aware of this constraint and that is why they are calling for the negotiations to take place in a neutral place to ensure that more Southern Cameroonians participate and share their views without fear. Like Mandela, Julius Ayuk Tabe is paving the way for talks and negotiations that will surely define the fate of Southern Cameroons. This is the time to demonstrate unity. No Southern Cameroonian should be driven by greed and envy. Southern Cameroons needs that unity of purpose and those who seek to split the people of Southern Cameroons will end up on the wrong side of history. The world is watching!

By Dr. Joachim Arrey

4, July 2020

Bundes: Bayern wins 20th German Cup to complete double ⁰

Robert Lewandowski passed the 50-goal mark this season as Bayern Munich completed the double with a 4-2 victory over Bayer Leverkusen behind closed doors to win a 20th German Cup on Saturday.

Bundesliga champions Bayern dominated at Berlin’s Olympic Stadium as David Alaba smashed home an early free-kick before Serge Gnabry added the second goal in the first-half.

Lewandowski has 51 goals in total this season after scoring twice in the second-half either side of a Sven Bender header for Leverkusen.

Kai Havertz converted a penalty deep into added time for Leverkusen.

Bayern, crowned Bundesliga champions for the eighth straight year last Saturday, have won all of their 11 games since the season resumed in mid-May after a two-months hiatus due to the coronavirus.

They could finish the season winning the treble as they are among the favourites for the Champions League finals in Lisbon next month.

This was the 13th time in the club’s history they have won the double.

Lewandowski, crowned Bundesliga top-scorer for the fifth time last weekend, netted six times in the cup, has 34 league goals and 11 more in the Champions League this season.

Leverkusen completed a hat-trick of defeats after also losing the 2002 and 2009 cup finals in Berlin.

When Lewandowski was clattered by defender Edmond Tapsoba on 16 minutes, it was Alaba who swung the resulting free kick inside the post to give Bayern the opening goal.

They doubled their lead after Joshua Kimmich won the ball in midfield eight minutes later.

His pass split the defence, Gnabry sprinted onto the ball and fired past Leverkusen goalkeeper Lukas Hradecky to make it 2-0 at the break.

With players’ calls echoing around the near-empty terraces of the cavernous stadium, where Germany head coach Joachim Loew was one of a handful of guests, the tempo dropped after the break.

Having skied a shot at goal moments earlier, Lewandowski made it 3-0 when he controlled a clearance kick by goalkeeper Manuel Neuer and tried a long-range speculative shot at Hradecky.

The Leverkusen keeper parried the shot, but watched in horror as it rolled behind him and over the goal line on 59 minutes.

It fired life into Leverkusen, whose centre-back Sven Bender slipped his marker Leon Goretzka and headed home on 64 minutes.

Leverkusen nearly got a second moments later when Kevin Volland and Havertz both failed to connect with a cross.

Lewandowski claimed his second when he fired home Ivan Perisic’s pass on 89 minutes.

Bayern defender Alphonso Davies conceded the penalty in the fourth minute of added time which Havertz converted just before the whistle.

Source: AFP

4, July 2020

Biya regime says it stepped up security after bombings in Yaounde ⁰

Cameroon says it has deployed more troops in the capital Yaoundé after yet another bomb exploded, leaving at least 20 people severely wounded. No one has claimed responsibility, but it is suspected that separatists fighting for the creation of an English-speaking state in Cameroon and people who escaped from prison a month ago are responsible.

Naseri Paul Bea, governor of the Central Region, where Yaoundé is located, says he convened a security meeting Friday night because there has been mounting insecurity in the capital city. He says he is calling on the clergy and traditional rulers to help bring peace back to the city.

“I instructed them to control those who sell arms, to include the traditional rulers to be able to know the new people who come into their quarters so that if there is any person who looks strange, they can be able to inform the forces of law and order{military},” said Bea.

The government said on Thursday night, yet another bomb exploded in the Damas neighborhood, severely wounding five people. 15 others with wounds were later discovered in their houses.

Bea says he has information that some prisoners were organizing the attacks from their detention centers.

“Some of the organizers are in the prisons and they have people outside who are doing it {planting the bombs} for them,” said Bea. “I instructed the penitentiary administration to put their ears to the ground to be able to get those information and sensitize the population to know that the security of the country is their own security.”

Bea said the bombs were locally made. It was the third locally made bomb to explode in a popular neighborhood in Yaoundé within two weeks. At least 37 people were wounded in the three explosions. No one has claimed responsibility.

Rights activist Edwin Ayuk of the Cameroon Human Right Center says it is imperative for the government to open negotiations with English speaking separatist leaders who are detained at the Yaoundé-Kondengui prison if they want peace to return. Speaking via a messaging application from the English-speaking northwestern town of Bamenda, he said the government should also investigate the activities of former ministers arrested and detained at the Kondengui prison by Cameroon president Paul Biya for corrupt activities.

“We have been calling on the government to call these individuals, sit with them on the table and let them discuss their differences so that the atrocities that have been going on can come to an end,” said Ayuk.

Innocent Ngono, a peace and development lecturer at the university of Yaoundé says Cameroon should handle the insecurity in its capital city with care since it already has many security challenges.He says if Cameroon has been able to resist the security challenges it has been facing since 2013, it is because the population has supported the military through information sharing. He says he is afraid Cameroonians may now be reluctant to assist the military because the government is not showing serious signs of wanting to solve the crisis the country is facing.

Since 2013 Cameroon’s eastern border has suffered a spillover of the carnage in the Central African Republic with regular intrusions of rebels. Boko Haram terrorism on Cameroons northern border with Nigeria has entered its 10th year with at least 3,000 people killed. A separatist crisis in the English-speaking western regions of the French majority state has left at least 3,000 people dead and 500,000 displaced. The Cameroon military has been deployed to handle border disputes with Equatorial Guinea.

Many civilians say if the attacks on the capital city Yaoundé are not stopped, the military may be overstretched.

Source: VOA