About soter

Posts by :

4, September 2019

UK’s Johnson faces new Brexit vote after stinging defeat ⁰

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson braced for another showdown in parliament on Wednesday after a humiliating defeat over his Brexit strategy, with MPs set to vote on a law aimed at blocking a no-deal departure.

Johnson has said he will seek an early general election if MPs vote against him again, intensifying a dramatic political crisis ahead of his October 31 Brexit deadline.

Johnson has vowed to take Britain out of the EU on October 31 whether or not a divorce deal with Brussels is in place, more than three years after the referendum vote to leave the European Union.

But his opponents warn that Brexit without a deal will have disastrous economic consequences and must be avoided.

In a sign of the government’s determination, finance minister Sajid Javid will also on Wednesday unveil another £2 billion (2.2 billion euros, $2.4 billion) of funding to deal with Brexit, including for new port infrastructure.

– ‘Johnson loses control’ –

But Johnson’s Conservative government is in disarray.

It lost its working majority in parliament on Tuesday after one of its MPs switched to the anti-Brexit Liberal Democrats and, a few hours later, it expelled 21 MPs from the party for voting against the government.

“Humiliation for Johnson as Tory rebels turn against him,” read the front-page of the left-wing Guardian newspaper, while The Independent wrote: “Johnson loses control”.

But the strongly eurosceptic Daily Express said rebel MPs had voted “to betray Brexit” and called Tuesday’s vote “another shameful day in our so-called democracy”.

The rebels included Conservative Party grandees such as Ken Clarke, the longest-serving member of parliament, and Nicholas Soames, Winston Churchill’s grandson.

They joined with opposition lawmakers to inflict a first blow against Johnson’s hardline Brexit strategy.

That opened the way for a vote on Wednesday on a law which would force Johnson to delay Brexit by three months if he does not strike a deal with the EU by October 19.

MPs are due to finish voting on the law by around 1800 GMT.

After a lengthy and heated session of parliament, Johnson said that the proposed legislation would undermine his discussions with Brussels on a new divorce deal and would cause “more dither, more delay and more confusion”.

But Johnson’s critics say his claim that he wants a new deal with Brussels is a sham and the EU has said Britain is yet to come forward with “any concrete proposals”.

“I don’t want an election but if MPs vote tomorrow to stop the negotiations and to compel another pointless delay of Brexit, potentially for years, then that will be the only way to resolve this,” Johnson said on Tuesday.

– ‘Take no deal off the table’ –

Aides have previously said that any poll would be held before a crucial EU summit on October 17 and 18.

Under British election law, a parliamentary majority of two-thirds is required to hold an early election meaning that the main opposition Labour Party must support it.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn on Tuesday said he was in favour of an election but only once the legislation was passed “in order to take no deal off the table”.

The decision on whether or not to extend the October 31 deadline has to be taken by all 28 EU leaders unanimously.

Johnson caused widespread anger among parliamentarians last week with his decision to drastically reduce the number of days MPs will be able to meet before the Brexit deadline in what was seen as a move to try to curb his opponents.

A judge is due to issue a ruling on the decision later on Wednesday in one of three ongoing legal challenges.

Source: AFP

4, September 2019

French Cameroun must halt harassment of Ambazonia children ⁰

Southern Cameroons Vice President Dabney Yerima has called on French Cameroun officials to put an end to their continued harassment of Ambazonia children with their so-called back to school policy. Vice President Yerima observed during a recent meeting with the exiled Southern Cameroons cabinet that French Cameroun’s attempt at stifling the Ambazonia resistance through a corrupt back to school program has met with a stone wall.

French Cameroun authorities deployed hundreds of army soldiers to Southern Cameroons lately in an ill-disguised attempt at placating the international community that the crisis in Southern Cameroons was finally over. The Biya regime imposed a travel ban on all Anglophone teachers and donated Chinese made academic materials to some pupils to encourage Southern Cameroons parents to send their kids to school.

The French Cameroun military surrounded some of the Ambazonia schools used in staging the back to school campaign and disappeared immediately after the administrative authorities left. Southern Cameroons schools harboring French Cameroun children are permanently under surveillance by agents of the so-called Rapid Intervention Battalion, (BIR) who have been harassing and molesting Ambazonian women and children.

Roman Catholic Bishops have called on the Southern Cameroons Interim Government to halt the harassment of teachers and students, and to guarantee a successful academic year.

Elsewhere, French Cameroun prison officials have put the Ambazonia leader President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and 9 of his top aides into solitary confinement following a life sentence handed them by the Yaounde Military Tribunal.

Thousands of anti- French Cameroun regime protesters have held demonstrations in Europe and the USA on an almost daily basis ever since a popular uprising began in Southern Cameroons three years ago. They are demanding that the Biya Francophone regime release all detained Southern Cameroonians and allow a Southern Cameroons state now referred to as the Federal Republic of Ambazonia to be established.

Yaounde has gone to great lengths to clamp down on any sign of dissent killing 4000 Southern Cameroonians and burning down hundreds of villages. President Biya approved the trial of Southern Cameroons civilians at military tribunals in Yaounde and Douala in a measure blasted by human rights campaigners as being tantamount to imposition of an undeclared martial law.

By Sama Ernest and Rita Akana

4, September 2019

US: Catholic school priest bans ‘Harry Potter’ books ⁰

Exorcists advised a Nashville school priest to ban the Harry Potter books, over fears the popular children’s novels could be used to summon spirits.

Reverend Dan Reehil contacted exorcists in Rome and the US, who recommended removing the fantasy novels from St. Edward Catholic School’s library in Tennessee.

Launched in 1997, the series of books spins an epic tale of good and evil focused on the adventures of the eponymous bespectacled young wizard as he struggles against the dark wizard Lord Voldemort.

“The curses and spells used in the books are actual curses and spells; which when read by a human being risk conjuring evil spirits into the presence of the person reading the text,” the reverend said in an email obtained by local media.

Rebecca Hammel, the superintendent of schools for the Catholic Diocese of Nashville, told the newspaper The Tennessean that Reehil had “canonical authority to make such decisions.”

Although the school used to stock the books, it will not offer them to pupils in its newly opened library, Hammel said.

A global success, the Potter series by British author J.K. Rowling has been repeatedly banned from schools in the US and Britain, mostly for allegedly promoting satanic values or black magic.

(Source: AFP)

3, September 2019

South Africa President Says No justification for xenophobic attacks ⁰

South African president Cyril Ramaphosa has reacted to xenophobic violence in parts of the country condemning the incidents as unacceptable and without any justification whatsoever.

In a video posted on his personal Twitter handle, Ramaphosa stressed the importance of restoring peace and security as quickly as practicable.

“I condemn the violence that has been spreading around a number of our provinces in the strongest terms,” he said.

He added that he was convening all ministers in the security cluster today to make sure that a very close eye was kept on what he described as “acts of wanton violence” and find ways of stopping them.

Ramaphosa said it was not right for locals with grievances to attack other nationals. He tasked security forces for their efforts at restoring order in Kwa Zulu Natal and Guateng provinces.

He also cited the fact that with an increasingly integrated Africa, South African workers also risked being attacked in other countries if others are to met out the same treatment South Africans are exhibiting today.

Source: Africa News

3, September 2019

Grave Questions About Fairness of Trial: Ambazonia Leaders Appeal Conviction ⁰

Ten leaders of the separatist Ambazonia Interim Government in Cameroon lodged an appeal on August 26, 2019, against their August 20 convictions and life sentences by a military court following a trial that raises serious concerns of due process and violations of fair-trial rights.

Although the trial, on charges including terrorism, rebellion, and secession, commenced in December 2018, all the alleged evidence against the men was only presented to the defense in court during a single 17-hour overnight hearing that started on August 19. The court admitted thousands of pages of statements and documents as evidence against the accused and over 1,000 items of forensic evidence, such as guns, spears, and laptops, that defense lawyers told Human Rights Watch they did not know about and were unable to examine, discuss with their clients, or effectively challenge.

“It appears that the military court handed down a hasty verdict and sentence without giving the accused any meaningful opportunity to defend themselves,” said Lewis Mudge, Central Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “This process has been plagued by pretrial abuses and serious allegations of fair-trial breaches that warrant independent and impartial judicial review, which we hope will happen under appeal.”

The trial, which was conducted in French without adequate translation though the defendants were entitled to a trial in English, their mother tongue and an official language in Cameroon, took place after serious violations of the defendants’ rights in detention. Defense lawyers accused the judges of bias and withdrew from the proceedings after the main military judge threatened them with arrest for raising objections.

Sisiku Ayuk Tabe, head of what is known as the “Ambazonia government,” and nine other leaders had been arrested in January 2018 in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, and forcibly returned to Cameroon, in an extrajudicial transfer that was denounced by the United Nations Refugee Agency as violating the fundamental principle of non-refoulement – the practice of not forcing refugees or asylum seekers back to a country where they risk persecution, torture, or other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment. The forced return of the 10 leaders was also declared illegal by a Nigerian court in March 2019. The men were then held in incommunicado detention at the State Defense Secretariat detention facility (Secrétariat d’État à la défense, SED) for six months, during which they had no access to their lawyers and families. Human Rights Watch has documented that torture and other abuses are endemic at the SED.

Fru John Nsoh, lead counsel for the separatist leaders, told Human Rights Watch that while the trial of his clients started in December 2018, all hearings prior to August 19 focused on peripheral procedural matters. He said that defense lawyers had no prior knowledge of the evidence presented to the court by the prosecution, and were not given any chance to view, comment, or object to the evidence, nor were they permitted to cross examine the four witnesses called by the prosecution.

The men were also tried before a military tribunal, despite international standards deeming the trial of civilians in military courts, in principle, to be incompatible with the right to a fair trial. Cameroon has been condemned by the UN Human Rights Committee for prosecuting civilians before military tribunals. The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has also repeatedly reinforced that under regional human rights standards, including the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, the trial of civilians in military courts is prohibited without exception, and that the only purpose of military courts should “be to determine offences of a purely military nature committed by military personnel.”

The crisis unfolding in Cameroon’s Anglophone regions broke out around October 2016, when students, teachers, and lawyers from the region took to the streets to demand greater respect for their rights. In response, security forces unlawfully killed and arbitrarily arrested peaceful protesters, escalating the crisis. Since then, numerous separatist groups have emerged, taking up arms and calling for the independence of the North-West and South-West regions, which they call “Ambazonia.”

Armed separatists have committed numerous abuses against civilians, including kidnappings for ransom, torture, and unlawful killings. They have also attacked dozens of school buildings and occupied them. They have also enforced a boycott of schools, disrupting the education of thousands of children since 2017. Human Rights Watch cannot comment on the credibility of the charges brought against the men in connection with any crimes committed by armed separatists.

The Cameroon military court also ordered the 10 men to pay fines totalling 262 billion CFA francs (US$442,000) for civil damages and court costs.

“To conduct a trial with these kinds of due process violations is no way to uphold rule of law and human rights in the midst of an escalating crisis in the Anglophone regions of Cameroon,” Mudge said. “The Cameroonian authorities should focus on addressing the legitimate grievances of its Anglophone population and make sure that members of the security forces who are responsible for abuses are held accountable.”

Source: Human Rights Watch

3, September 2019

Cameroon’s back-to-school crisis: Stay home or risk being shot ⁰

The lessons at Seraphine Akwa’s house were supposed to be secret. She had been teaching at a primary school in Bamenda, in anglophone Cameroon, but repeated threats had forced the headmaster to shut the school’s doors.

The threats were from the “Amba boys”, separatists who have been fighting a two-year battle with Cameroon’s francophone government to break off and form their own state, Ambazonia. They enforced a school boycott to protest against educational injustices against English-speakers.

Thousands of schools were closed. Many were burned and now lie in ruins or are being swallowed up in weeds. Teachers have left the anglophone regions in droves.

Cameroon’s government launched a back-to-school campaign over the summer, but ongoing gun battles mean that any children walking to school at the start of term this week run the risk of being shot, and there is no clear end to the conflict in sight.

Akwa was struggling to make ends meet, so when several parents approached her, anxious for their children to receive an education, she agreed to take seven private pupils in secret.

This had been going on for several months when one Saturday, five Amba boys came to her house. Akwa was cleaning vegetables, and as soon as she saw them, she stopped what she was doing.

“They said they had been told that I continued to teach children at home. I lied that they were my neighbours’ children,” she said. “One of them asked me to shut up. He was the youngest of them all. He said I should stop it immediately, because they have declared no school in Ambaland. I was afraid. My neighbours were watching from afar. I apologised to the Amba boys and they left.”

Schoolchildren’s studies are collateral damage in many conflicts, but in anglophone Cameroon, education was a major trigger for the crisis, and schools and those teachers still trying to work are themselves a target.

Only 100 schools of 6,000 remain open, according to the Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa – the other 5,900 have been closed down. Unicef said 80% of schools were shut, 74 destroyed and 600,000 children affected by the school ban. The head of basic education for the north-west said school attendance had gone down from 422,000 in 2017 to 5,500 children today.

An abandoned school building in anglophone Cameroon. — An abandoned school building in anglophone Cameroon

Government officials have put the number of closed schools at around 3,000 and said around 200 had been burned. The government claims it was separatists that torched the schools, but the separatists say military forces destroyed many of them when they found they were being used as rebel bases.

After the Amba boys left, Akwa immediately cancelled all her classes and left Bamenda, ending up in Logbessou, a neighbourhood of Douala. She found work, but struggles to make enough to live in Cameroon’s biggest city. She cannot grow beans and corn there as she did in her garden at home, so she has to buy them.

Sometimes she thinks about the pupils she left behind – like Noela, who was in primary school when the crisis began, and should have been well into secondary by now. She is not going to school. “Her mother told her to learn a trade,” Akwa said.

The consequence of so many girls being out of school is that the rate of teenage pregnancy has shot up, community leaders say.

Many of the older boys whose studies were abruptly stopped began driving motorbikes to make a living. When the government banned motorbikes in much of the north-west region for several months, residents of the city of Kumbo say, many then joined the separatists.

Fifteen-year-old George, whose name has been changed, said he had not been recruited by separatists because they valued physical strength and he was small for his age. He still wears his old blue and white school pullover to keep warm but has not been to school since 2016, instead spending his days hunting animals to sell and learning how to farm.

“I want to learn. I want to be educated, because I want to help myself in future,” he said. But if school does not resume this year, he could be well into adulthood by the time he has caught up on the lost years.

Whether they should support the back-to-school campaign has split anglophone separatists and protest leaders. A local chief was kidnapped last month as he oversaw the clean-up of one high school, according to the Cameroonian journalist Mimi Mefo.

Others who spearheaded the schools boycott now advocate its end, saying the long break in education has further marginalised the anglophone regions.

“The protest was to improve what we had, not to destroy the little we had,” said Mancho Bibixy, one of the most prominent protest leaders.

The headteacher of one primary school in Kumbo is thinking about reopening in September, but is caught between the demands of the government and separatists’ threats.

“We had meetings [with the government] and we were told that schools must resume this year,” said the headteacher, who asked not to be named. “Parents want their children to stay in school but the [Amba] boys have been threatening. If security is ensured, many parents will send their children.”

Security is by no means ensured, many residents of the anglophone regions say.

“No action is being taken to really prove they want children to go back to school. There’s no preparation,” said one community leader in Kumbo, who requested anonymity so he would not be targeted for speaking out. “If Unicef and other bodies could call for a ceasefire, school could resume, no problem.”

He has been holding a few conflict-specific lessons, training children to drop to the ground when they hear gunshots, and not to see joining the Amba boys as an attractive prospect.

One head teacher has tried everything to keep her school open, but parents in Kumbo have been keeping their children home because they are worried that they will get caught in one of the gun battles between the military and rebel fighters.

“We were able to register some 43 pupils last year at the beginning of the school year but some of them stopped coming. So we finally closed the school again,” she said.

Struggling even before the crisis, many teachers now cannot make ends meet. The Kumbo headteacher even offered lessons in the holidays – mainly to try to supplement her teachers’ dwindling incomes – but worried parents forbade their children from attending, and none showed up.

Others sent their children to Douala and Yaoundé, Cameroon’s two major cities.

“Even if we start this year, where would we take children from?” she asked. “They are all gone.”

Source: Guardian

3, September 2019

The Holy Father’s visit to Indian ocean nations ⁰

Pope Francis’ visit to the African nations of Mozambique, Madagascar and Mauritius, will feature some interesting highlights as the head of the Catholic Church continues to show solidarity with people living in difficult conditions.

The Sept. 4-10 trip will take him to the capitals of the three countries, Maputo, Antananarivo and Port Louis.

Mozambique

The pope recorded a video message in Portuguese for the people of Mozambique ahead of his tour.

The pope is coming to tell people to keep fighting for those who are forgotten.

The pope will regrettably not visit the city of Beira which was hit by the devastating Cyclone Idai killed at least 600 people and left hundreds of thousands homeless in March.

“I was hoping the pope would come and walk on Beira’s soil,” 45-year-old Maria da Paz told AFP, while taking comfort in the fact that some victims of the disaster would be in Maputo to meet the pontiff.

The pope, in his video message, anticipated the disappointment.

“Although I am unable to go beyond the capital, my heart reaches out to all of you, with a special place for those of you who live in difficult situations,” he said, adding: “You are all in my prayers.”

Madagascar

In Madagascar, the pope will celebrate mass with one of his former students, Father Pedro Opeka.

Opeka studied theology under the future pope in their native Argentina before dedicating his life to building communities for the families of Madagascar, one of the world’s poorest nations.

“The pope is coming to tell people to keep fighting for those who are forgotten,” he said.
“The pope will comfort them.”

Over the last 50 years, an organisation founded by Opeka has built homes for 25,000 people, 100 schools, six clinics and two football stadiums. Next year they will build a college for paramedics.

The 82-year-old leader of the world’s 1.3 billion Roman Catholics will also visit the presidential palace and a seminary.

“We have prepared for 800,000 people to turn out at the great mass celebrated by the pope” on the diocesan grounds of Soamandrakizay, said Gabriel Randrianantenaina, coordinator of the local episcopal conference.

Local organisers have cleared 60 hectares (150 acres) of land for the event in the north of the capital Antananarivo.

The pope will also travel in a locally-made vehicle, made by a Madagascar company called Karenjy.

“It’s with great joy that we present you the popemobile,” the apostolic nuncio, or Vatican envoy, to the island, Paolo Rocco Gualtieri, told the press ahead of the visit.

“Pope Francis will be delighted to visit Madagascar in this car.”

Mauritius

Pope Francis will end his tour with a brief stay in the relatively prosperous and stable Mauritius, a small island nation east of Madagascar, where the local Catholic community plans to plant 200,000 trees in his honour.

While Mauritius is around 50 percent Hindu it has a substantial Christian minority of about 30 percent, most of whom are Catholic.

Agencies

3, September 2019

Biya regime declares Southern Cameroons, Far North region “economic risk zones” ⁰

Cameroonian Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute on Monday signed a decree declaring the troubled Northwest, Southwest and Far-North regions “economic risk zones.”

Companies operating in the economic risk zones will benefit from tax exemption for three years, according to the decree which did not specify additional measures.

In July, Cameroon’s Minister of Economy, Planning and Regional Development Alamine Ousmane Mey said the country’s sustainable development goals were facing “significant obstacles” as a result of the insecurity in the two Anglophone Northwest and Southwest regions where separatists want to create an independent nation, and the insurgency of Boko Haram in the Far-North region.

Conflict in the Anglophone regions has led to the “partial or complete” closure of about 20 companies, according to government statistics.

Source: Xinhuanet

3, September 2019

Xenophobic Attacks: Nigeria govt warns South Africa, Says ‘Enough is enough’ ⁰

The Nigerian government says it will take further steps to ensure safety and protection of its citizens in South Africa. The position comes in the wake of a round of xenophobic attacks that hit Johannesburg on Monday.

The government described the incidents as unacceptable adding: ‘Enough is enough. Nigeria will take definitive measures to ensure safety and protection of her citizens.’

Leaders of the two countries – Muhammadu Buhari and Cyril Ramaphosa are scheduled to meet in October for bilateral talks and also on matters relating to security of Nigerians in South Africa.

The two met on the sidelines of the 7th Tokyo International Conference on African Development, TICAD ; held last week in the Japanese city of Yokohama.

Another government to have reacted to the Johannesburg chaos is Zambia which tasked all its drivers plying the route to and from South Africa to suspend their trips till further notice.

Zimbabwe’s Cross Borders Transportation Association also warned that it could halt all South African cross border transport over the situation.

The provincial and national governments have called for restraint in the affected communities and cautioned against use of criminal avenues to express grievances.

The ruling African National Congress, ANC, also expressed their worry over the situation as has the main opposition Democratic Alliance and the Economic Freedom Fighters.

This criminality has been essentially driven by pure criminals against properties of foreign nationals and South Africans alike.

We call on SAPS (police) to take charge of the streets and decisively restore order. Most importantly, we call on South Africans to stop their violent intolerance of black foreign nationals, the EFF statement read in part.

Source: Africa News

3, September 2019

Ambazonia threats scuttle school reopening in Southern Cameroons ⁰

Empty schools in the English speaking region of Cameroon marked the opening of the academic year due to tensions in the region.

Residents have either fled or are hiding in their homes as the Anglophone separatists battle with government forces.

The rattle of gunshots in the north and southwest regions meant that whiles students in other parts of the country went to school, the situation was different in parts of the two regions.

The state-owned CRTV on the first day of reopening (September 2) admitted that classes had began in areas of the northwest but amid tight security. Separatists had warned they will disrupt any attempts to reopen schools.

As at today (September 3), CRTV reported that reopening of schools in the northwest had been timid but encouraging. Local newspapers are reporting a mixed reopening day.

Whiles one led with “Top départ” referring to the reopening day boom, another led with “Black to school” instead of “Back to school.”

Gustav Okuyu, resident of Bamenda told reporters why his kids had not gone to school: “My children have not gone to school, because… Look, one: my house has been burnt. Some of them are in the bush. Where will I take the other ones?

“I don’t even have money to send them to school. That’s why my children have not gone to school… I don’t even have a house and the others have run. I am an IDP (internally displaced person).”

After two years of conflict, a solution to the war between those calling for independence of the region and the government seem far from being found.

“The government has to bring eveybody to the table, so that everything can be OK. Many people have said it, France has said it, America has said it: to the dialogue table. What is the problem with dialogue? Everybody wants dialogue, who doesn’t want peace in his house?” Gustav quizzed.

Tensions have risen following the sentencing of the separatist leader Julius Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and others to life in prison by a military court sitting in Yaounde.

Naseri Paul Bea, a governor of the central region in an interview with CRTV said schools in his region were a little overwhelmed especially because of IDP students.

He added that upgrades on facilities and other plans by government will help ease the burden. He also said his outfit were yet to ascertain exactly how many IDPs had enrolled.

Source: Africa News