Yaounde: Southern Cameroons leaders to make Court of Appeal appearance today 0

President Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe and his top aides shall be appearing before a panel of French Cameroun judges at the Court of Appeal in the Centre Region in Yaoundé today Thursday 16 July 2020.

Ambazonia Interim Government sources in French Cameroun say the leaders will attend the session which is for hearing of their appeal against the judgment of the Yaoundé Military Tribunal which sentenced them to life imprisonment in what the international community described as a sham trial.

President Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe, and nine of his senior advisers were convicted of charges including terrorism and secession and given a fine of $350m (£286m) after an all-night sitting by the French Cameroun court.

The severity of the sentence has failed to stop the bloody conflict playing out in Southern Cameroons between Ambazonia Restoration Forces and the Cameroon government military.

A ghost town operation is expected to greet the leaders hearing throughout Southern Cameroons this weekend.

In January 2018, President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe was arrested with 46 Southern Cameroonians in NERA hotel in the Nigerian capital, Abuja by Nigerian Special Forces. They were then handed over to the Biya Francophone regime in French Cameroun – a move that was ruled illegal by a Nigerian court in March this year.

The Southern Cameroons leaders have refused to recognize the right of the French Cameroun military tribunal in Yaoundé to try them. Their lawyers drafted an appeal, which was filed to the Appeal Court in the French Cameroun’s Central region.

By Isong Asu