In its report on the world’s most neglected crises, the Norwegian Refugee Council highlighted Cameroon, a country struck by two conflicts that barely make the headlines.

The major crises dividing Cameroon remain largely unnoticed on the international agenda, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) noted in its June 3 report. Almost no one mentioned the war or the Lake Chad crisis impacting the two Anglophone regions since 2017.

Anglophone rebellion

The conflict in the Northwest and Southwest Anglophone provinces began in 2017 following a crackdown by security forces on the 2016 protests, which demanded an end to the marginalization of Anglophones in this predominantly French-speaking country. In response to the military and police brutality, an Anglophone independence movement took up arms and attacked government representatives. This led to the military’s mobilization and intervention in the two provinces. Since then, violence has continued between both sides, with each committing atrocities and holding the population hostage.

Schools especially targeted

The Anglophone crisis has claimed over 6,000 lives since 2016, according to Human Rights Watch. The crisis has displaced 638,000 people within the country. Schools are a particular target for the separatists: 2,245 schools, or 36% of the educational institutions in the anglophone region, have been forced to close. The NRC noted that residents suffer terrible hardships, ranging from murder to kidnapping.

Cameroon is grappling with deteriorating security in its northern region bordering Nigeria and Chad. Since 2013, the area has been disrupted by attacks from the Nigerian-based jihadist group Boko Haram. The group’s presence was bolstered by the Cameroonian government’s inability to secure its borders with Nigeria and Chad and its failure to develop the region increasingly affected by climate change, leading to youth unemployment and poverty.

Impact of the crisis in the Central African Republic

Cameroon has also been dealing with the influx of refugees fleeing neighboring countries, primarily the Central African Republic. According to the UNHCR, there are 332,000 refugees, mostly settled in towns and villages in eastern Cameroon. Additionally, nearly 120,000 Nigerian refugees are living in the Far North region. “52% of the refugees are women and girls, and 55% are children,” the UNHCR reported.

“The prolonged crisis is increasingly taking on a socio-economic dimension, with all sectors of the economy affected and rising food prices exacerbating rampant food insecurity. At least 2.5 million people are dangerously short of food,” the NRC observed, noting that only “32% of the humanitarian response plan was covered by international donors, the lowest rate since 2016.” The NRC concluded: “The growing levels of unmet needs, coupled with a lethargic response from the international community, mean that another difficult year awaits Cameroon in 2024.”

Each year, the NRC publishes a report on the ten most neglected crises affecting displaced people worldwide. It aims to highlight the plight of the displaced who rarely make international headlines, receive little or no aid, and are ignored by international diplomacy.

Culled from Crux International by Besong Eunice Nchong

The bruising fight between FECAFOOT’s President, Samuel Eto’o, and the Minister of Sports, Moelle Kombi, finally played out in public today with the minister’s technical adviser asked to leave  FECAFOOT premises.

The matter did not end there. The minister’s appointed coach was also given a beating and reminded that he had an interest in attending the meeting with FECAFOOT officials, an idea which did not go down well with the Belgian who saw his technical staff refused entry into the FECAFOOT building.

In this fight, it is Cameroon’s football which will suffer as Eto’o and minister Kombi engage in a struggle which could have been avoided if the laws had been respected. Cameroon’s laws are, at all levels, like shifting sands or a maze, and this unfortunate situation is hurting Cameroonians.

The frustrating thing is that Eto’o cannot be dismissed even by the country’s president. He was voted while the minister was appointed. In this confusion, FIFA might step in with a normalization committee which will see Eto’o out while the minister could be fired by the president for not posting acceptable results.

The mess playing out in the football sub-sector in Cameroon is simply the tip of the massive iceberg which is buried in the ocean of corruption, incompetence and influence trafficking.

Cameroon appears to be a rudderless ship for decades. For many years, the country has been ruled by decree or what is known in Cameroon as HIGH INSTRUCTIONS, something which clearly points to the fact that the country has drifted into a full-blown dictatorship.

Nobody respects the constitution. Nobody cares about the good running of the system. When a minister wants to implement his private agenda, he immediately invokes the famous high instructions. Everyone sings the president’s praises to hide their crimes and sins, and nothing gets done.

Cameroon is sinking and it appears there is no rescue squad. With the fight between Eto’o and Kombi playing out live, it is clear that those high instructions can be torn and put in the garbage bin. It is clear that the era of HIGH INSTRUCTIONS is coming to an end.

Cameroon needs principled people. The group of hypocrites surrounding the president have steered the country down a chaotic and dangerous path.

If Cameroon has to come out of its current mess which has lasted for almost five decades, a new system needs to be engineered and that system must rules-based with a clear separation of powers.

Cameroon’s highly centralized system has created more problems without even seeking to address old issues. A federal structure, especially a parliamentary system which allows only elected officials to exercise power will not only reduce the type of fights we are now witnessing, it will also reduce abuse and corruption which have been huge constraints on Cameroon’s economic and political development.

Cameroon simply needs a new system. High instructions clearly belong to the past. Repairing Cameroon will be an uphill climb but the job must be done and all those who have participated, directly or indirectly, in reducing Cameroon to an Augean Stable should be clearly cut out of the new system.

By Dr Joachim Arrey

In the forthcoming presidential elections in 2025, the front runner is a 94 years old sickly candidate who has been in power for close to 50 years and is the only leader the youth have known in many generations.

The image of him presented by the state-controlled media is far from reality, that of a youthful and energetic individual, rather than the geriatric patient that should be left to rest.

It’s therefore not surprising that a survey of youths across the main cities of the country has revealed that 97% of youths want to leave the country given the slightest opportunity.

This mindset in the youths in every way reflects the success of the 50 year old Biya regime in stirring up ambition and hope in the majority of Cameroon’s youthful population to seek for a better prospect in foreign lands. They are now leaving the country at a rate estimated at 6,000 each year.

There couldn’t be a better measure of the success of Biya’s ruler ship of 50 years, if there were any doubts as to why he should not be given another 7 years term.

Voting will be ceremonial in Cameroon as the lead candidate is head of state, supreme commander of the arm forces, first magistrate, creator of Elecam (election governing body), the real coach of the Indomitable Lions, captain of the Indomitable Lions, player , referee , match commissioner and spectator. All 10 regions are under his command.

It would be another testimony to the enactment of the kleptocratic credentials of the country whose constitution was changed to enable Biya to rule for life in 1996.

By Kcastech Ra

The Biya Francophone regime in Yaoundé habitually dodges voting at the UNGA either by abstaining to vote or by simply absenting itself when a vote is being taken on some matter. But last week, the Francophone dominated ruling CPDM crime syndicate cast a vote that in effect supported Israel in what many characterize as an Israeli war of genocide against Palestinians. The vote also opposed sovereign statehood for Palestine. It amounted to a constructive support of Israeli apartheid and colonization in the occupied territories of Palestine.

According to unverified sources, Arab and Muslim countries in the world and other friends of Palestinians have taken note of the Biya French Cameroun provocative vote.  La Republique du Cameroun has for the past eight years been openly committing genocidal in the former British Southern Cameroons, the Anglophone country of Ambazonia. French Cameroun is also opposed to sovereign statehood for Ambazonia-a territory that some decades ago, French Cameroun seized through fraud, violence, and terror and brought under its colonial occupation and subjugation. The pro-Israeli voter therefore comes as no surprise to the Biya Francophone Beti Bulu regime watchers. Birds of the same feather, it is said, flock together.

There are many reasons why the Yaoundé vote came as no surprise to many observers. Israel is the main supplier of the Biya regime means and methods of violence. Like the Netanyahu regime in Israel, Biya and his Francophone regime continues to colonize, occupy, and subjugate the people of Ambazonia, subjecting the people to extreme repression and servitude. Many French Cameroun crooks, corrupt political cronies, and thieving regime bigwigs have stashed away their looted money in Israel, and some have even hidden their families in that country.

Israel is a prop of highly authoritarian regimes and life-long rulers in Africa such as Biya. It is a merchant of death and desolation. Its principal export consists of selling the means and methods of death to the old, putrid, and blood-soaked 42-year-old regime of 92-year-old of Biya who has very diminished cognitive ability and can hardly stand or walk for more than a couple of minutes. The creation of French Cameroun’s infamous Brigade d’Intervention Rapid (BIR) and the sadistic methods it commonly uses are the brainchild of Israel and fashioned after those of the Israeli Defense Force. The BIR is notorious for the systematic odious torture of its victims, the assassination of perceived regime opponents, egregious atrocities, and military terrorism in Ambazonia – the systematic murder of civilians, including children and babies.  

Israel gets away with genocide in Gaza. It does so even in the face of a UNSC vote for a ceasefire in Gaza, and an ICJ decision calling on Israel to refrain from committing further widespread and indiscriminate killings in Gaza. By getting away with genocide, Israel indirectly lends moral and armed support to a French Cameroun engaged in perpetrating genocide. This amounts to encouraging the brutal French Cameroun dictatorship not to resolve the Ambazonian Decolonization Question peacefully but rather to demonize British Southern Cameroonians as an ‘inconvenient people’ and expendable people to be exterminated through wholesale industrial slaughter without fear of any repercussions.

Israel is one of the countries to which Western weapons are sold and in which they are battle-tested. Not surprisingly, one of Israel’s biggest exports to La Republique du Cameroun is military expertise. They train Special Forces for the old elderly President Biya. They provide personal security for him and so dictate his allegiance. They also provide militarized training to the French Cameroun police. The brutality of the methods of that militarized police is the daily complaint of the people of that country precisely because the line between the methods and means of the military and the police in that country is very thin.

Israel also sells advanced surveillance technology that the Biya despotic regime uses, hoping to track opponents and keep tabs on them. The highly violent and repressive tribal regime of Biya is comforted by the fact that Israel helps it stay in power indefinitely. That is why that pernicious tribal regime is so warmly in bed with Israel.

Israel has created a situation that endangers all post-WW2 international organizations. It continues to defy them. Israel spits in their faces. Israel rips their letter in public and insults them. Israel insults and ridicules the ICJ. Israel makes a mockery of the UN itself. In relation to America, Israel is the tail that wags the dog. It has pushed America to cheapen the veto power in the UNSC by its whimsical, abusive, and irresponsible veto at every turn in blind support of Israel. As a result, the UN and other international organizations are steadily losing credibility. No one will be surprised if some other countries engaged in international delinquency like Israel does. No one will even be surprised if some states start withdrawing their memberships of some international organizations or start reneging on their international obligations.

Israel defies the UN and gets away with it. There is no reason to expect some other country not to follow suit. For example, authoritarian regimes might behave like Israel by committing pogroms on perceived inconvenient people without being held to account. A case in point is La Republique du Cameroun’s ongoing genocide in Southern Cameroons, like Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza. Furthermore, the Biya regime in Yaoundé celebrated when Russia launched its war on Ukraine, and unverified reports have it that there are French Cameroun troops fighting on the side of Russia. Further still, Yaoundé excitedly celebrated when Israel launched its war on Gaza, and it is happy with the progress of the Israeli genocide campaign. The Biya regime takes these amoral positions because in the present world context it knows no one cares about its campaign of extermination in Southern Cameroons. Unfortunately for Mr Biya and his acolytes, every dog has its day. In the final analysis the human spirit remains unconquerable, as Napoleon Bonaparte of France and Hitler of Germany learnt after years of conducting massive and widespread human butchery.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Chairman/Editor-In-Chief

Cameroon Concord News Group

In a bustling classroom at the University of Buea in southwestern Cameroon, students are immersed in learning the Chinese language. Their teacher, known as Sema, originally studied physics but found a passion for Chinese language and culture at the Confucius Institute.

After obtaining a master’s degree in Chinese language in China, Sema returned to Cameroon, where he now teaches Chinese language and culture at the university.

Sema expressed his deep connection to Chinese culture, saying, “When I was in China, I felt like I was a Chinese person because their culture is very similar to African culture.”

He emphasized the opportunities that speaking Chinese has brought him, including a significant increase in income. “When I returned from China, I started with 500,000 francs CFA (about 814 U.S. dollars) as monthly salary working as an interpreter for some Chinese. That is a lot of money for a Cameroonian,” he said.

Completing a Chinese language course opens up a wealth of opportunities. Graduates can pursue careers as interpreters or explore various fields beyond language, and moreover, they have the option to further their studies in China in any discipline, Sema said.

Sema gives a Chinese language class at the University of Buea in southwestern Cameroon, April 18, 2024. (Xinhua/Muleng Timngum)

Rokis Petou, a business manager for the Chinese firm Sinohydro Corporation Limited in Yaounde, the capital city of Cameroon, also highlighted the advantages of learning Chinese.

In 2017, Petou traveled to China for PhD research studies in geophysics and geological engineering. Despite pursuing his research without a language requirement, Petou recognized the value of speaking Chinese in his professional life.

He said his ability to communicate in Chinese has not only provided him with a well-paid job but has also elevated his social standing. “Being able to speak a language that very few people understand in my environment makes one be treated with special attention,” he added.

Similarly, Eric Sama Doh found employment in 2014 working with Chinese engineers on a construction project in Cameroon.

“When some of my Cameroonian colleagues see me, they always say ‘ni hao’ (hello),” said Doh who has been working with China Machinery Engineering Corporation.

“With this job, I am able to feed my family and send my children to school. In fact, I am living a comfortable life thanks to the opportunity that Chinese language has offered me,” he said.

These stories are just a few examples of how learning Chinese has opened doors for Cameroonians in a challenging job market. According to Didier Nama, national pedagogic inspector of Chinese Language in the Ministry of Secondary Education of Cameroon, there are nearly 20,000 Chinese learners in the country, with nearly 200 secondary schools providing Chinese courses.

Nama highlighted the government’s efforts to promote Chinese language learning, with several state universities now offering Chinese courses and hundreds of Cameroonians trained to teach Chinese in schools across the country.

Sema gives a Chinese language class at the University of Buea in southwestern Cameroon, April 18, 2024.(Xinhua/Muleng Timngum)

In 2008, only one state university in the country offered a Chinese language diploma. However, as of now, four other state universities have formally applied to offer Chinese courses, Nama said, adding that nearly 300 Cameroonians, co-trained by the University of Maroua and the Confucius Institute, are currently teaching the Chinese language in schools nationwide.

Sandra Mefou and Viviane Limunga, two students attending Sema’s lecture, expressed their intentions to pursue further studies in Chinese language and linguistics in China after graduation, citing the limitless opportunities that speaking Chinese provides.

“Chinese-owned companies are everywhere in Cameroon and across the African continent. I want to learn the language to work with them,” Mefou said.

“I plan to pursue further studies in Mandarin and linguistics in China after graduation,” Viviane Limunga added.

“These young people represent a growing trend of cultural exchanges and understanding between Cameroon and China,” Sema said. 

Cameroonians are sick and tired of seeing their country in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons and they are all blaming the country’s long-serving and sit-tight president, Paul Biya, who has run the country’s economy aground and made corruption the hallmark of his 42-year-long presidency.

Today, Cameroonians want to leave their country for greener pastures, including the old and sick who are not receiving any form of assistance from the state. The country’s pension plan is anything but effective and many retirees are dropping dead like flies just a few years after heading into retirement.

For the sick, they know they are on their way to a lonely and miserable grave as the country’s hospitals have been transformed into businesses where the sick must fund the luxurious lifestyles of the few medical doctors who have opted to live in Cameroon. There are more Cameroonian medical doctors out of the country than in Cameroon and many are not thinking of returning to their country anytime soon, except Mr. Biya dies and, from every indication, Paul Biya is not in a hurry to leave this planet. He is determined to die in power and the longer he stays in power, the more pain he inflicts on the people he is supposed to serve.

Mr. Biya’s incompetence is legendary and his management style has left the country in the throes of a long and painful economic disaster which has been around for 42 years. Biya is not in the mood to walk away from the Unity Palace, the presidential palace which he thinks belongs to him and his family although it was built by his predecessor.

Mr. Biya’s health has been failing for more than 15 years now, but he is not throwing in the towel and his Swiss doctors are doing their best to keep him alive given that he is their ATM. The Swiss medical experts spend most of their time praying for the corrupt and irresponsible Biya to be sick but stay alive so that they too can continue bilking the Cameroonian taxpayer.

Cameroonians are going through tough times. The economic disaster engineered by Biya and his collaborators is biting and this can be seen on many faces as many Cameroonians are aging prematurely. Mr. Biya seems to have put Cameroonians on a diet and many are losing weight at a disturbing pace. While the Swiss doctors are praying for Mr. Biya to be alive, Cameroonians are praying for him to die as his death might put them out of their economic sorrows and psychological torture.

Strangely, both parties are praying to the same God and, from every indication, God is listening more to the Swiss doctors and this has triggered a wave of prayers in Cameroon, with many Cameroonians praying aloud and crying as if God is deaf. Many Cameroonians hold that Biya has overstayed his welcome and should retire to his village, but his supporters are already calling for him to run again in the 2025 presidential election which he will win with a comfortable margin as the country’s constitution and electoral laws have been tailored to suit his intentions.

Though all the odds are stacked up in favor of Mr. Biya, there are some politicians who hold that they can legally and legitimately take the ailing and mentally disoriented Biya out of power. The Cameroon Concord News which is Cameroon Anglophone’s best and most popular news platform has decided to profile some of those who think they can take the bull by the horn even when they know that the 900-pound bull can send them to an early grave. This month, the Cameroon Concord News will profile Barrister Akere Muna who has opted to engage in a fight against Biya and his intentions are bringing some hope to the confused and desperate people of Cameroon. Cameroonians hope he understands the risk associated with taking the bull by the balls.

Akere Muna has his eyes set on next year’s presidential election and his intention is clear – unseat President Paul Biya, who has led the country since 1982. A lawyer by training, Akere has been active in the global arena, serving as an elected Vice-Chair for Transparency International where his involvement in rights issues resulted in the formation of the Transparency International Working Group which helped draft the AU Convention on Preventing and Combating Corruption.

He has also served as the President of Transparency International Cameroon; Cameroon Bar Association President; President of the Economic, Social and Cultural Council of the African Union and the President of the Pan African Lawyers Union. In January 2010, he was elected to the Panel of Eminent Persons which oversees the African Peer Review process.

After having served the world, he has turned his eye to his country, Cameroon, where he has been calling out the country’s government for its corrupt practices, especially recently following the condemnation of Glencoe, a global firm charged with corruption in the UK and the USA for is acts of corruption in several African countries, including Cameroon where millions of dollars were alleged to have been given to officials of the country’s oil refinery, SONARA, and SNH.

On paper, Barrister Muna has all what it takes to beat Mr. Biya in a free and fair election. His career is what many around the world would dream to have. However, having a brilliant international career is not synonymous with beating Mr. Biya in an election whose results are already known. The odds may be stacked up against Barrister Akere Muna, especially as the political landscape is crowded with small parties, many of which have been created by the ruling party, the CPDM, just to ensure that genuine opposition parties do not coalesce around one candidate against Mr. Biya, but he holds that if the people go out to vote and protect their votes, things might turn out differently. Barrister Muna knows that the system is built for purpose – to favour Mr. Biya and it is “tailored to be tweaked to make sure he wins,” but he is not giving up without trying.

Barrister Muna has already been talking to other political leaders like Cabral Libii and Maurice Kamto who is clearly a more popular political leader in Cameroon. He has a tough job convincing other political leaders that he is the right person to wrestle Biya out of Etoudi though the rules give Mr. Biya a massive advantage. Besides the tailored laws and constitution, Barrister Muna has an uphill task to persuade Cameroonians that he will be the right person to challenge Biya as the population has doubts about him.

He is loved as a human rights advocate and a critic of the system, but beyond that role, many Cameroonians believe that he has an elitist mindset, having grown up in Yaoundé where his father, the late Solomon Tandeng Muna, was once a vice president of Cameroon and before that, he was a first prime minister of West Cameroon. Barrister Akere Muna seems to be totally disconnected from the suffering masses in Cameroon as he has never lived their lives and does not know how it feels to go to bed without a meal.

His father has been part of the mess that has transformed the country into the land of the rich and he himself has been working with the same government on some legal issues which many think are anything but transparent. His sister was once a minister in the same regime and it is hard for the Muna family to clearly and honestly dissociate itself from a government which has weaponized poverty just to keep the people of Cameroon in check.

But it is in the Southwest region of Cameroon where it will be most challenging for him to win hearts and minds. Taking his political agenda to that part of the country will be like taking his eggs to the wrong market. South Westerners still hold that Solomon Tandeng Muna and John Ngu Foncha, both from the Northwest Region of the country, actually betrayed them when they took Southern Cameroons to East Cameroon.

That decision has never gone down well with the people of the South West Region. Southwest politicians who openly called on Southern Cameroonians to join Nigeria in a referendum which reunited the two Cameroons were cut out of politics and many were made to languish for the rest of their lives. EML Endeley, the man who openly opposed the stance Solomon Tandeng Muna and John Ngu Foncha took was impoverished and made to pay for his political views. N.N Mbile, Chief Nyenty and Chief Ayamba all from the Southwest Region of Cameroon paid a huge price for their political stance against Amadou Ahidjo, Cameroon’s first president who took Foncha and Muna to Yaoundé after the massive betrayal of South Westerners.

However, Barrister Muna is not his father. The crimes and sins of his father should not be his. He has time to demonstrate that he is different and his integrity should be seen as an asset in a country where corruption is widespread.

Barrister Muna should start building a huge political platform which should be inclusive and national in character. The presidential election may be eighteen months away, but there is a lot to be done. Barrister Muna must get in touch with the country’s Diaspora and must clearly make his stance known. He has to condemn the mistakes of his father in public to win hearts and minds in the country’s South West Region and he has to shed his elitist mindset to convince Cameroonians that he understands the country’s economic realities. In eighteen months, a lot can be done to make Barrister Muna marketable even to his worst opponents. The ball is in his court.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Cameroon Concord Group Chairman and Editor-in-Chief

Today, U.S. Senator Ben Cardin (D-Md), Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, issued a statement following the killing of Bate Urgessa, a leader of the Oromo Liberation Front, in Meki in Oromia.

“The killing of Bate Urgessa on Tuesday night was shocking and upsetting. I offer my deepest condolences to the family for their loss, and urge Ethiopian authorities to allow a credible, neutral international body to conduct a thorough investigation into Mr. Bate’s death. Extrajudicial killings, harassment, and political repression have, for far too long, been common place in Oromia.

The Abiy regime has clamped down on political opposition, the media, and dissidents not only in Oromia, but throughout Ethiopia, contributing to the country’s widespread insecurity and overall instability. It is past time for those responsible for the policy of repression and abuse to be exposed and held accountable for their actions.”

THIS IS TO ADVISE THAT A COALITION OF THE BRAVE IS LOOKING FOR YOUNG CAMEROONIANS IN THEIR 40s AND EARLY 50s WHO ARE POLITICS-SAVVY AND WOULD BE INTERESTED TO PARTICIPATE IN THE 2025 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION IN CAMEROON.

THE CHOSEN CANDIDATE WILL BE ARMED WITH THE FINANCIAL RESOURCES NECESSARY TO ENABLE HIM OR HER PUT UP A GREAT FIGHT DURING THE CAMPAIGN.

THE COALITION WILL SOON COMMENCE CAMPAIGNING USING SOCIAL MEDIA AND PERSON-TO-PERSON CONTACTS TO RUN AN EFFECTIVE CAMPAIGN IN LINE WITH THE LAWS OF THE LAND.

PLEASE INDICATE YOUR INTEREST BY CONTACTING THE CHAIRMAN, CAMEROON CONCORD NEWS GROUP.

FOR

THE CHAIRMAN, THE COALITION OF THE BRAVE