Bishop Bushu and Governor Okalia deadlocked over strikes in Southern Cameroons ¹

Governor Bernard Okalia who was appointed to the South West region due to his family ties with the first lady of La Republique du Cameroun, Chantal Biya has seen his effort to stop the strike by the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium ended in fiasco as a closed-door meeting held between him and His Lordship Bishop Bushu of the Buea Diocese was deadlocked.

At the meeting convened by the loud sounding nothing governor and attended by Francophone security agents serving in the South West, Bishop Bushu informed Mr Okalia that the leadership of the Consortium has vowed to continue with the strike including a massive civil disobedience campaign.

The governor and the mayor of Buea had faked a press release as coming from the Bishop’s House ordering the Catholic University to resume classes. The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium had on Monday announced that ghost towns will be staged for a period of one month with the possibility of an indefinite extension.

The Southern Cameroons strike action that has paralyzed all academic establishments came over the failure of the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime to implement the demands made by the Consortium. But in a swift reaction, the Yaounde government mandated its tribal secret service to intervene in the matter and arrested the Anglophone leaders including a judge of the Supreme Court of Cameroun.

Both the Roman Catholic Bishop and the appointed Francophone governor agreed at some point in the meeting that the 83 year-old Paul Biya should restate genuine dialogue with the Consortium and open a window for solution to be found. Ghost town returns on Monday and Southern Cameroonians have been told to listen to the interim leaders of the Consortium.

By Rita Akana in Buea