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18, July 2019

IMF Executive Board Completes Fourth ECF Review for Cameroon and Approves US$76.2 Million Disbursement ⁰

The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) completed the fourth review of the arrangement under the Extended Credit Facility (ECF) for Cameroon on July 17, 2019. The completion of the review enables the disbursement of SDR 55.2 million (about US$76.2 million), bringing total disbursements under the arrangement to SDR 372.6 million (about US$514.5 million).

The Executive Board also approved the authorities’ request for a waiver for the non-observance of the performance criteria pertaining to the external arrears’ accumulation and the ceiling on net BEAC financing, based on the corrective actions taken by the authorities.

Cameroon’s three-year arrangement was approved on June 26, 2017 for SDR 483 million (about US$666.9million, or 175 percent of Cameroon’s quota—see Press Release No.17/248.) The arrangement aims at supporting the country’s efforts to restore external and fiscal sustainability and to lay the foundations for a more sustainable, inclusive and private sector-led growth.

Following the Executive Board discussion, Mr. Mitsuhiro Furusawa, Deputy Managing Director and Acting Chair, made the following statement:

“Cameroon’s performance under the ECF-supported program has improved from a year ago. Most end-December 2018 targets including on the fiscal deficit have been met, and structural reforms are advancing.

Cameroon continues to play a leadership role in the rebuilding of CEMAC’s fiscal and external buffers. Going forward, the Cameroonian authorities’ continued support of the implementation of the BEAC’s foreign exchange regulation will be essential to ensure full repatriation of foreign exchange receipts.

Enhanced fiscal discipline is key to reaching the end-2019 program targets and mitigating risks from external shocks and security challenges. Reducing recourse to exceptional spending procedures and completing the Treasury Single Account reform will support the steadfast implementation of the 2019 budget while improving cash management and the transparency of budget execution.

Refraining from new non-concessional borrowing and strictly adhering to the disbursement plan for contracted-but-undisbursed loans are essential to preserving debt sustainability. Further project prioritization and enhanced investment efficiency will help address developmental needs while supporting prudent debt management. Improving the financial viability of key public enterprises through performance contracts and targeted reforms of administered prices will reduce reliance on subsidies and mitigate risks from contingent liabilities.

Enhancing financial inclusion, the business climate, and governance remains central to promoting private sector development and boosting competitiveness. In particular, further strengthening EITI compliance and the AML/CFT framework are essential to promoting private sector-led growth and attracting foreign investment.

Cameroon’s program continues to be supported by the implementation of supportive policies and reforms by the regional institutions in the areas of foreign exchange regulations and monetary policy framework and to support an increase in regional net foreign assets, which are critical to the program’s success.”

IMF Communications Department

18, July 2019

Cameroon fires Seedorf after early exit at African Cup ⁰

Cameroon has fired coach Clarence Seedorf and assistant coach Patrick Kluivert after the defending champion’s early exit at the African Cup of Nations.

They had been in their jobs for less than a year but were removed Tuesday, just over a week after Cameroon lost 3-2 to Nigeria in the round of 16 at the African Cup in Egypt.

The failed African state is due to host the next African Cup in 2021.

Seedorf was an outstanding player who won Champions League titles with Ajax, Real Madrid and AC Milan.

He’s found coaching much more difficult.

The 43-year-old former Netherlands international also had unsuccessful spells in charge at Milan, Shenzhen in China and Deportivo La Coruna. He lasted less than six months in each of those club jobs.

Source: AFP with additional editing from Camcordnews

17, July 2019

Nigeria: 13 dead in building collapse, rescue underway ⁰

Rescue team search for survivors in Jos, Central Nigeria following a three-storey residential facility collapse that killed 13 people on Tuesday.

An official of the Red Cross said 7 survivors are receiving treatment at a local hospital.

Taiye Segun Folorunsho is resident in Jos. He was injured in the incident. This thing that happened to our neighbours and our loved ones is heartbreaking.

“I was in the shop working with my dad, suddenly we just saw the building collapse. I stood up and tried to run and I fell down and I could not move my legs”, Folorunsho recounts.

“This thing that happened to our neighbours and our loved ones is heartbreaking. The house that they were living in collapsed leaving some of the occupants injured and some dead’‘, said Jos resident, Ali Baba Mairam.

Nigeria frequently witnesses building collapse in a country where millions of people live in dilapidated buildings and building legislation is regularly flouted.

In March, 20 people died when a building housing kindergarten and primary school pupils collapsed in Lagos.

AFP

17, July 2019

Amba leadership Crisis: The Tassang Wilfred Letter reveal a man unable to resolve the many conflicting aspects ⁰

Deacon Tassang Wilfred one of Southern Cameroons detained leaders has again released a letter from the Kondengui High Security prison. The former head of SCACUF observed in “As Though We Were Dead” that Southern Cameroonians should consider the NERA 10 as nonexistent.

Deacon Tassang Wilfred is a very brilliant Southern Cameroons trade unionist. He helped shape the character of the Ambazonian revolution and started seeing himself as the leader when he was elected to head SCACUF. He even at one point contradicted Tapang Ivo and Mark Barata during their days at the top and like the Prince of Peace; he observed that “Southern Cameroonians should forgive Tapang Ivo and Mark”. All these constituted a bargain at a discounted price that was surprisingly available for the renowned Deacon Tassang Wilfred, one of Southern Cameroons revolutionary bells.

Tassang’s style is sometimes colourful sometimes chatty, and in many occasions consistently inconsistent. It is as if the election of Sisiku Ayuk Tabe to head the Interim Government did not go well with him. He writings including his most recent “As Though We Were Dead” indicates that the much respected Ambazonian like some of the fake leaders in the Diaspora is more interested in creating a political space for himself.

His writings have always carried a mixture of analysis blowing hot and cold of failures in the Southern Cameroons quest for independence and accompanied by some uncomfortable moralizing. Tassang’s approach has always been thematic and not chronological. You need a pretty good knowledge of the Southern Cameroons leadership crisis to make sense of it sometimes and the teacher has a capacity for self-diversion.

But as his most recent letter “As Though We Were Dead” immodestly reveals, Deacon Tassang Wilfred no longer has the remarkable influence on the Southern Cameroons war of independence and politics both domestically and internationally.

Where Tassang can now be challenged is the assertion that Southern Cameroonians should “Consider the Nera10 as dead. Negotiate as though you were seeking retribution for the more than 30,000 wasted Amba souls. Go for La Republique’s balls (excuse my French). We all (Nera10) put together, are not any more deserving of Ambazonia than angel Martha, most brutally butchered in babyhood by the evil from Yaounde.” The Tassang approach begs the question of who is actually the face of the Ambazonia revolution and who will be on the Southern Cameroons negotiating table?

Tassang seems to argue against a rules-based system of international relations which provides for any revolution or struggle to have a symbolic personality at the head. To be sure, Tassang’s letter writing policy will be both his legacy and epitaph in his relations with the Ambazonian people and the NERA 10.

So much has been written about the relationship between the Ambazonia leader Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and Deacon Tassang Wilfred. Both men have respectively displayed their particular talents – President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe has his natural guile and persuasiveness and Tassang his intellectual firepower. If the relationship is one of marriage then no court in Southern Cameroons will deny Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and Deacon Tassang Wilfred divorce or dissolution.

Tassang cannot be blowing hot and cold at same time. Saying the Ambazonia leadership should not rule from prison but gives directives and funny instructions now and then from the same prison paints a picture of a man who is either committing the same errors or falling into spectacular new ones.

Now Tassangs says the NERA 10 should be assumed dead or nonexistent by the so-called free leadership …so where does he belong? When he was Chief Executive of SCACUF there was no issue but as soon as Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe took over his attitude has been anything but collaborative!!

The battlelines between his supporters and the Southern Cameroons Interim Government currently under the stewardship of Vice President Dabney Yerima are firmly drawn. But he was and remains a consistently inconsistent phenomenon.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

17, July 2019

Ambazonia Restoration Force says it killed 13 French Cameroun soldiers in Agborkem attack ⁰

Ambazonia Restoration Forces in the Manyu County said on Monday its Akwaya branch carried out an attack on an army boat in Agborkem and that its fighters killed 13 Cameroon government army soldiers.

A Cameroon military source who spoke to our Mamfe correspondent on Tuesday put the toll higher, saying up to 7 soldiers were still missing after Southern Cameroons fighters attacked the troops on patrol. He said fighting lasted for about five hours. A Roman Catholic priest said he saw the bodies of eight dead Cameroon soldiers at the banks of the Agborkem River.

The attack in the historic Southern Cameroons village of Agborkem, in which the Manyu Defense Council said the army post also came under attack, followed a similar assault on French Cameroun soldiers in Batibo. The attacks raise questions about Biya regime assertions to have almost defeated the Ambazonia Self Defense fighters.

Yaounde did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The war in Southern Cameroons has killed more than 3000 Ambazonians and displaced about half a million since 2017. President Biya won a 7^th term after a counterfeit elections condemned by the international community.

By Rita Akana in Mamfe

17, July 2019

Internet a distant dream for many in oil-rich Equatorial Guinea ⁰

Equatorial Guinea is awash in oil, although little of the wealth has trickled down to the poor.

Yet one of the most glaring inequalities here is access to the internet.

Other parts of the world are pushing ahead with plans for fast, free — or at least low-cost — universal online access. Equatorial Guinea, a small reclusive state on the coast of central-western Africa, seems stuck in a timewarp.

With rare exceptions, sluggish speeds and stratospheric bills are the daily lot of people who want to search for information on the web, use social media, email, messaging and the myriad of other internet activities that are routine elsewhere.

“The internet in Equatorial Guinea is still a big-money business, reserved for those who can afford it,” said Mboro Mba, 35, seated on the ground behind a hotel as he tried to hook into a free wi-fi service with his smartphone.

Equatorial Guinea has the most expensive internet in the world after Zimbabwe, according to a list published this year by Ecobank, a pan-African bank.

One gigabyte of mobile data — roughly equivalent to watching an hour of television on Netflix — costs an eye-watering $35 dollars (31 euros).

By comparison, the average monthly pay of a manual worker or restaurant waiter in Equatorial Guinea is between 100,000-150,000 CFA francs ($170-260, 150-230 euros).

“For 2,000 CFA francs (3.40 euros), I can’t even download an 80-second video,” a local journalist told colleagues from central Africa who had come to Malabo to cover a regional meeting and found themselves caught out by internet problems.

“You really have to be patient to work with the internet in this country,” said a visitor from the Republic of Congo, unsuccessfully trying to send files to his editor.

The barriers to internet access here are so high that the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a UN agency, estimates that just a quarter — 26 percent — of Equatorial Guineans go online.

The authorities have set up a “free, public internet network” along the Paseo Maritimo, a seafront six kilometres (3.5 miles) long in Malabo that is also used for sporting activities and leisurely strolls.

“I come here almost every evening to talk on WhatsApp to my mother who is in Spain,” says Filomena, 32, a clothes vendor.

“I don’t have the money to have an internet connection, so I come here often with my friends to use the wi-fi,” schoolboy Jorge Obiang says, leaning against a tree with several young companions, all glued to their screens.

A former Spanish colony, Equatorial Guinea is nominally one of the richest states in Africa thanks to oil income.

By next month, its president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema, will have ruled with an iron fist for 40 years — the longest tenure of any African leader alive today.

He has long been criticised for corruption within the regime and lack of openness to the rest of the world.

The slow service is especially paradoxical since “the country is situated in the Gulf of Guinea and so has access to a number of seabed cables”, said Julie Owono of Internet Sans Frontieres (Internet Without Borders), an NGO.

Equatorial Guinea — consisting of an island where Malabo lies and a forested territory on the African mainland that hosts trading capital Bata — is connected to three undersea fibre optic cables supplying internet service.

In neighbouring Gabon, internet access is five times less expensive on the scale drawn up by Ecobank.

– No competition –

The sky-high price of the internet “is explained by the very strong presence of the state (telecom) company on the market and lack of competition,” Owono said.

“Everything here is centralised, political decisions depend on one person, or a family, and it is difficult to establish a competitive market.”

The state telecoms agency GITGE, which sets tariffs, declined to respond to AFP’s questions.

Another disincentive for competition is internet blackouts ordered by those in power, she said.

In November 2017, on the eve of parliamentary elections, access to WhatsApp was blocked and social media became unavailable for five months.

“We’re living in the information era — the government is applying an enormous brake,” said Owono.

AFP

17, July 2019

US House passes resolution condemning Trump’s ‘racist’ tweets ⁰

The US House of Representatives has passed a resolution officially condemning President Donald Trump’s racist comments against four minority Democratic congresswomen.

The resolution passed on Tuesday denounces Trump for his “racist comments that have legitimized fear and hatred of New Americans and people of color.”

Referring to Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Rashida Tlaib Michigan and Ayanna Pressley Massachusetts, Trump wrote on Twitter Sunday, “Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.”

So interesting to see “Progressive” Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly……

Three of the four Representatives were born in the United States, but all are US citizens. Omar, a Muslim congresswoman, was born in Somalia’s capital Mogadishu and immigrated to the US as a refugee.

Speaking on the House floor prior to Tuesday vote, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi urged both Democratic and Republican lawmakers to “join us in condemning the president’s racist tweets.”

“To do anything less would be a shocking rejection of our values and a shameful abdication of our oath of office to protect the American people.”

Meanwhile, a growing number of Republicans, after initial hesitation, began to openly criticize Trump.

Texas Representative Will Hurd, for example, described Trump’s tweets as “racist and xenophobic” and “unbecoming of the leader of the free world.” Also, after one Ohio Representative, Mike Turner, called Trump’s words “racist,” four other Republicans from the same US state joined him in condemning the comments.

Nonetheless, some other Republicans continued to support Trump, with Representative Dan Meuser, Republican of Pennsylvania saying, “What has really happened here is that the president and his supporters have been forced to endure months of allegations of racism.”

“This ridiculous slander does a disservice to our nation,” Meuser said.

Trump, in response to the vote, said on Twitter that “those Tweets were NOT Racist,” adding, “I don’t have a Racist bone in my body!”

Source: Presstv

16, July 2019

Southern Cameroonians split on Swiss mediation ⁰

The split within the Cameroonian English-speaking secessionist movement over the choice of Switzerland as the mediator in its dispute with the Yaoundé government threatens to derail the initiative.

The about-face came just as final adjustments for the talks were being made. The Swiss claim the initiative has the support of the international community and denounced these new maneuvers, saying it would be a step back in the dialogue process.

There have been growing doubts, however, about the neutrality of the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD Centre), the institution mandated by the Swiss authorities to conduct the talks. The main grievance relates to possible collusion between Geneva and Yaoundé.

Facilitator or mediator?

At the beginning of July, when President Paul Biya was in Geneva on a private visit, the secessionist leader of the Ambazonia Governing Council (AGC) Lucas Ayaba Cho issued a statement denouncing the “too close” relationship that he held existed between Geneva and Yaoundé.

He called on Switzerland to clarify its position. “[It] must clearly tell us if they are just a facilitator or a mediator. We will agree to work with Switzerland if it agrees to discuss with the mediator who will speak on behalf of Ambazonia, while it represents Cameroon,” he said. The AGC is one of the secessionist factions with an armed wing on the ground in Cameroon.

Apparently, during discreet preparatory meetings on 25 and 27 June, there was no direct dialogue between the English-speaking separatists and Cameroonian officials. The Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA) clarified its role as mediator in a communiqué on 27 June, stating that it had been “mandated by a majority of the parties to facilitate an inclusive negotiation process”.

A source within the HD Centre, supported this, claiming that it was the main separatist groups “who approached Switzerland first” in order that it could open up a path of dialogue with the Cameroonian government.

Transparency should be the rule

The source went on to state that: “Our work has consisted in making contact with the multitude of groups that abound in the diaspora, in order to have a fairly representative range of the Ambazonian movement. We invited about ten of them and had two meetings with them. We also made an offer to the Cameroonian authorities through their ambassador, which was endorsed by the President of the Republic.”

The Swiss FDFA said it adhered to “the principle of discretion, in order not to compromise the process”. It further stated: “Discretion was a request from both parties to avoid controversy in the contact phase, to protect the process and to allow everyone to agree on the basis.”

This so-called discretion, however, is at the root of the suspicion of some participants, who believe that “transparency should be the rule”. The Consortium of Anglophone Civil Society Actors (CACSC), the organisation behind the first political demands made 2016, stated in a press release on 8 July, that transparency is a guarantee of trust.

“Trust is essential when engaging in such debates because it is only what can ensure that all parties accept the conclusions,” said the CACSC in its statement.

Call for mediation

There has been silence in Yaoundé about the follow-up to the first steps of the dialogue initiated by Switzerland. Having returned from his private trip to Geneva disrupted by Cameroonian political opponents, President Paul Biya has yet to comment on the subject.

Within the Cameroonian administration, however, the dissent expressed by secessionist groups did not go unnoticed. “These secessionists are making an unhealthy overbid,” said an anonymous official from the Ministry of Territorial Administration. “It is purely bad faith, they were all unanimous when they called for dialogue. They say they are fighting for their people, but in reality they do not care about them at all or they would not make that kind of decision when we are on the way out of the crisis. Mediation is the only way to resolve the conflict and end the violence.”

Swiss approach not inclusive

Geneva has not commented since its last communiqué but has received the support of the international community, including the United Nations and the United States, whose leaders have welcomed the initiative. Swiss officials anonymously condemned “false information that tends to undermine the credibility of the process”. They also indicated that the time is right for the final adjustments, and that talks should begin “within three months at the latest”.

On the ground, however, local observers point out that, despite it being a positive initiative, the approach by the Swiss mediators has its limitations. Joseph Léa Ngoula, a security expert, said the Swiss approach is not sufficiently inclusive to allow all parties to express themselves.

“The Swiss approach, although beneficial, remains insufficient to stop the spiral of violence that is spreading to the different regions of Cameroon,” he said. “It includes only a limited number of actors, leaving aside all the social and political forces that have a very important role to play in stabilising crisis zones in Cameroon.

Source: The Africa Report

16, July 2019

Rubber, Palm-Oil Output Slashed by Ambazonia Revolution ⁰

Cameroon top state-owned agribusiness said the Anglophone crisis in the country has had a “disastrous” effect on its operations, cutting output of palm-oil and rubber and leaving most of its banana plantations destroyed. The majority of about 22,000 workers at the Cameroon Development Corp., the country’s biggest employer after the state, are no longer going to the company’s plantations and haven’t been paid for months, Director-General Franklin Ngoni Njie told reporters on Sunday.

Sixteen workers have been killed by separatist fighters since the crisis erupted almost three years ago, and 98 others have been assaulted or maimed, he said. The CDC grows and processes rubber, palm-oil and bananas on about 42,000 hectares (104,000 acres).

Most of its plantations are in the Southwest and Northwest regions, where Cameroon’s minority English-speaking population lives. Economic activities in the two regions have been paralyzed by rebels who want to break away from the larger French-speaking area in the central African nation.

The unrest has left only four out of 11 rubber estates functional, halted operations at two palm-oil mills and slashed output to 2,100 metric tons, from an expected 17,400 tons, the CDC said. Agriculture Minister Gabriel Mbairobe said on July 5 that President Paul Biya would take “urgent measures” to ensure a resumption of activities at the company.

Source: Bloomberg

16, July 2019

The Butcher of Yaounde postpones local elections again ⁰

Cameroon President Paul Biya said Monday he was delaying local elections to 2020, a declaration read on the radio said Monday, the second time in two years that the poll has been postponed.

“The mandate of municipal councillors elected on September 30, 2013 has been extended until February 29, 2020,” Biya declared, which essentially sets the poll back until that date. No reason was given for the extension.

On July 11, 2018, the elections were postponed a first time using the same method. Biya, who is 86, has been in power for 36 years.

Legislative elections could now be delayed as well because the government wants to hold them at the same time to cut costs, deputies told AFP.

Cameroon is in the midst of a security crisis that has pitted separatist English-speaking regions in the west against the French-speaking population elsewhere. In the north, the Nigerian jihadist group Boko Haram stages regular armed attacks meanwhile.

The country is also facing political ructions, with the head of the opposition Movement for the Rebirth of Cameroon, Maurice Kamto, and about 100 of the party’s supporters still in jail after their arrest in January.

(AFP)