Of late there has been a ‘back to school’ chorus in the media. But the simple questions I have asked over the past few weeks but received no answers for them are the following:

1. We have children agonising in the refugee community in and out of camps. We have children battling with disease and other survival issues among the IDP community in the forests, hills and caves. So which children is the ‘back to school’ advocacy targeting?
2. In the past five decades French Cameroun has actively pursued a deliberate policy of and adopted measures aimed at pauperisation of the people of Ambazonia. Grinding poverty is evident everywhere in Ambazonia. French Cameroun’s genocidal war in Ambazonia has aggravated the humiliating condition of abject poverty of the people of Ambazonia. In the face of this excruciating poverty situation it comes to me as a huge surprising and disappointment that the advocates of ‘back to school’ have maintained a shouting silence on the economics of ‘back to school’: fees of all kinds, learning resources and uniforms. If the advocacy were sincere why is it not accompanied by advocacy for free education. Owners of schools, religious bodies and others, would be hard put to deny the charge of being interested only in unjustly enriching themselves from the poverty and humiliation of the generality of the masses.
3. This whole matter cannot be divorced from evident security, safety, human resource and infrastructure issues.

Ambazonia is occupied by French Cameroun troops. These are on the prowl. They are marauding troops. They rape, muder, burn, maim and abduct indiscriminately. Not even children are spared. Not even babies are spared. So in what conducive environment would schools reopen? These troops and the groups they have created as so-called “counter-terrorism measures” are preying around. They are ready and willing to murder those they chance upon.

Further, there are education-related human resources issues: teachers. Hundreds of school teachers have either been mudered or disappeared or abducted and illegally locked up or become IDPs or refugees. No one has so far talked about the teachers who are to teach children.

And no advocate of ‘back to school’ has said anything about the content of the education they are trying to compel children to submit to. It is often forgotten that one of the immediate triggers of the Ambazonian Revolution is massive and legitimate dissatisfaction with the the education for ignorance that French Cameroun has sought over the years to impose on Ambazonian children. That ‘Bantustan’ education project has not been fixed. If anything it continues to be pursued by French Cameroun and has evwn gone even gone on a higher gear. A telling random example is the deliberately misleading ‘English’ version of examination questions asked school children and students.

Further still, not a small number of schools have been razed to the ground by French Cameroun arsonist troops or have been converted into troop camps by those forces. Our advocates of ‘return to school’ have also maintained something of a conspiratorial silence over this matter. They also continue to be silent over classroom equipment, learning resources, and PTAs that play a key role in the governance of schools in their communities.

1. Finally, there are credible insider intelligence on the sinister plot by French Cameroun that hinges on its counter-intelligence strategy that hinges on ‘back to school’. Hence their ‘back to school’ campaign using various agents. We know what that strategy entails. The people of Ambazonia will not be made a fool of again and shall not suffer our children to be put in harm’s way under the very thin disguise of ‘return to school’.

By Prof. Carlson Anyangwe

25 YEARS AGO: WHY FONCHA , MUNA AND 5 OTHER SOUTHERN

CAMEROONIANS WITHDREW FROM THE

CONSULTATIVE COMMITTEE ON CONSTITUTIONAL

REFORMS.

On the 4th of Dec 1994, Paul Biya signed a decree creating the Consultative Committee on Constitutional  Reforms. The committee was headed by Achidi Achu to window dress it as being Controlled by an Anglophone. Of the 58 members of the committee, only 14 were Southern Cameroonians. 7 out of the 14 later withdrew from the deliberation process in committee. Among them is Pa Foncha and Muna. It should be borne in mind that the 1996 constitution of la Republic was born out of this charade.

The unbalanced representation and failure to address the Southern Cameroons question compelled

FONCHA , MUNA and Five others to withdrew. An Excerpt of what Foncha wrote in his withdrawal

letter ..

“Mr. Ahidjo publicly stated to the people of southern Cameroons during successive visits to that territory in 1960 and 1961 that unification would not mean annexation, that its modalities would be negotiated between representatives of Southern Cameroons and those of La Republique du Cameroun and that to render unification viable and useful; a flexible and federal form of the state which he qualified as unique and diverse, was envisaged…

I can state here and now that the People of southern Cameroons would never have voted in favour of

Unification if it had not been for the assurances given that the resulting union would take the form of

a federation…

The hounourable S. T. Muna and I have often been accused of having allowed this situation [i.e.

‘annexation of Southern Cameroons’] to come about. At this point in time I do not feel the necessity–nor, I suppose, does the Honourable S. T. Muna– to defend myself against these accusations, unjust though they are. What is important is that the Good Lord who, in his infinite wisdom determines the

affairs of each man and of each people, has preserved me long enough to have the opportunity of pleading before the Cameroon Nation for the correction of the wrongs which have been done, over the past three decades and more, against an unsuspecting and trusting people that I, acting in good faith and as a Cameroonian patriot, led into

What I was assured would be a union of equal partners, but which has since turned out to be an arrangement for the annexation, subjugation and domination of one of the partners by the other…

I responded to the invitation of the President of the Republic to attend this Committee in the confident expectation that the deliberations of the Committee would offer us the opportunity to correct the wrongs which I have referred above.

For nearly two years, the people of Southern Cameroons whom I led into the union with La Republique du Cameroun have, through the All Anglophone Conference- AAC (now the Southern Cameroons People’s Conference-SCPC) carefully studied, responsibly formulated, and respectfully submitted to government, substantial constitutional proposals.

These proposals are aimed at ensuring a better governance of the entire united Cameroon, while also putting an end to the annexation, subjugation and domination of one of our two territories by the other, thus restoring the spirit and intent of the union of 1961…

In any event, in the proposals that have been submitted before us, I do not see any provisions at all which go in the direction of making even a token attempt to respond to the grievances of the Southern

Cameroonian People…

Mr. Chairman,

In the final analysis, the people of Southern Cameroons never participated in the elaboration and adoption of the supposed federal constitution of 1961 which was adopted by the National Assembly of La Republique du Cameroun on September 1, 1961, that is to say, one month before the birth of the federal Republic of Cameroon. These same people never participated in drawing up the unitary constitution of 1972 which was imposed upon them in a nationwide referendum.

Bearing this in mind, I had hoped that the present constitutional reform process would provide the people of Southern Cameroons the opportunity, for the first time since independence of our respective territories and the reunification of our fatherland, to contribute effectively to the elaboration and adoption of a truly Cameroonian constitution which responds to their aspirations as well…

I feel distressed that the constitutional proposals put before this committee do not offer the opportunity for us, as a nation, to address our minds to, and resolve, the genuine and legitimate grievances of the Southern Cameroonian people in particular and the Cameroonian people in general. I feel all the more distressed that this should be happening under the chairmanship of a son of Southern Cameroons whom, I believe, is as sensitive as any one of us to the injustices which his People and their Territory have suffered in more than three decades. Today, he has been designated to preside over the completion of the process of annexation of that People and that Territory.

For this, He shall tomorrow stand accused by his People, as I stand accused today. However, whereas in 1961 the bitter experiences of Southern Cameroons lay in the future that we could not predict, in 1994 we have behind us thirty-three years worth of these experiences, with the prospect of more to come unless something is done now. In the light of these experiences, we have no reason in

1994 to repeat the mistakes of 1961″

Dr. John Ngu

Through:

The Prison Superintendent,

Prison Principale Kondengui, Yaoundé,

La Republique du Cameroun.

Sir,

DECLARATION OF HUNGER STRIKE BY SISIKU AYUK TABE AND OTHER AMBAZONIANS IN ‘PRISON PRINCIPALE’ KONDENGUI YAOUNDE

This is to bring to your attention our decision to protest by way of a Hunger Strike, beginning at midnight today.

This strike is triggered by the disappearance of our compatriots from the Kondengui Central prison and the Buea Central Prison, following their peaceful protests on the 22nd July 2019 and 23rd July 2019 respectively. This strike will go effective if by the close of business today, 30/07/2019 ourlawyers do not confirm that they have met some of our people, particularly,Mancho Bibixy, Penn Terence, Tsi Conrad, Ngalim Felix, Tita Tebit, Che Luther, Tang George, among others.

Other reasons for the strike include:

1. The brutal torture to comma of a member our defense team, by elements of the Gendarmerie and threat by security agents on the lives of other members our defense team. It should be noted that earlier on security agents in Bamenda Commercial Ave fired live ammunition it Barr Awah Joseph’s car missing him and another colleague returning from office narrowly!!!
2. The profiling of Ambazonians (British Southern Cameroonians) in Yaoundé at the behest of the Minister of Territorial Administration – Mr Atanga Nji Paul, is a clear call for the intensification of genocide on Ambazonians,
3. Theongoing genocide in Ambazonia perpetuated by the military, police and Gendarmerie of La Republique du Cameroun,
4. The flagrant violations of the rights to fair trial as well as the abusive Court martial of Ambazonians in Cameroun Republic against international conventions and treaties duly ratified by Cameroun.
5. The overcrowding, malnutrition, cruel and degrading detention conditions in prisons,
6. The direct threats on the lifes of our families and friends by Cameroun security agents if they ever show up again in our public hearings at the Yaoundé Military Tribunal,
7. The refusal by the Military State Counsel to issue “Visitor’s Passes”or “Permits”to our families and friends who are supposed to bring us food,
8. The non-implementation of the 1st March 2019 Federal High Court of Abuja judgements requesting that we and other refugees abducted in Nigeria and illegally deported to Cameroun be returned to Nigeria as our abduction and deportation was illegal and a violation of our fundamental rights and International law.

Please take note that this strike will be called off only after our Lawyers confirm that they have met our compatriots and when modalities to address all the above issues are agreed upon.

Yours Sincerely,

Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe.

Cc:

• United Nation Secretary General
• African Union
• European Union
• Commonwealth
• Embassy of the United States of America, Yaoundé;
• British High Commission, Yaoundé;
• French Embassy Yaoundé;
• German Embassy, Yaoundé;
• Nigerian High Commission, Yaoundé;
• Other Diplomatic Missions
• International and National CSO;
• International and local Press Agencies.

The downfall of Sudan’s military leader, Omar al-Bashir follows the same trajectory with that of Algeria’s 82-year-old Abdelaziz Bouteflika who was forced to resign, following mass protests against his regime. It was a popular and principled uprising, which shook the Algerian and Sudanese political establishment to their foundations. The denouement also sent a strong message to other African despots who promote the ignominious narrative that government should be at the whims and caprices of selfish and deluded individuals. The era of sit-tight leadership is over. Truly, sit-tightism has lost traction because it adds no value to good governance. Africa has only a few left, tired old men with a messianic complex who believe the nation would end without them. Presidents Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea (in power since 1979); Paul Barthelemy Biya’a bi Mvondo of Cameroon (since 1982), and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda (since 1986) are chronic cases of Africa’s leadership tragedy. Hopefully, these holdout dictators can hear the fire engines and begin charting ways for a smooth change of leadership.

The initial demand of the Algerian protesters was that Bouteflika should not stand for another five-year term after a 20-year rule. His first reaction was to resist this demand. But when the pressure became overwhelming with the army high command speaking in favor of resignation due to poor health, the beleaguered president caved in to the peoples’ demand. For all intents and purposes, this was the height of peoples’ power and a quintessential demonstration of the capacity of the people to have their way in a democracy. After his resignation, the people did not stop there: they specifically called for a purge of the Augean stable by ridding the state of all vestiges of the old brigade, including all those who served with Bouteflika and entrenched corruption.

After Bouteflika, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir was ousted in a military coup and he became the second African president to fall in the wake of a tsunami of protests. Tens of thousands of Sudanese took to the streets in the center of Khartoum in jubilation, dancing and chanting anti-Bashir slogans.

Currently the wind of change is blowing in Cameroon where an 86-year-old octogenarian; in power for 37 years and counting is facing an armed insurgency in the Anglophone regions where pro-independence Ambazonia fighters have all but rendered the two Anglophone regions ungovernable. The regime seems to have run out of ideas on how to handle the crisis and its resort to a scorched-earth policy of collective punishment and genocide against innocent civilians has further alienated the local population and put the government on the defensive.

Biya thinks he is running down the clock but time is no longer on his side. The grotesque campaign of human savagery and barbarism in which soldiers burn down whole villages and kill innocent civilians like game, has reached the point of no return and the so-called national unity is now held at the barrel of the gun. It is just a matter of time for the situation to explode as the country sits on a keg of gunpowder after the regime arrested and detained Prof. Maurice Kamto, presumed winner of the last presidential election, which the Biya-controlled election machinery declared him winner.

It can only be expected that the wind of time will blow in the direction of sit-tight African leaders who should learn the hard way like Bouteflika and Bashir. Bouteflika had come to power in 1999 when the political fortunes and structures of the country were unstable. He quickly stabilized the situation and embarked on projects, which gave the country the platform for growth and development. But he got bitten by the African disease of self-perpetuation in office. In 2013 he suffered a massive stroke and virtually disappeared from public view because he was wheelchair-bound. In spite of his poor health, he wanted to contest a record fifth term in office and the people said enough is enough!

Bashir, a former paratrooper who seized power in a bloodless coup in 1989, has been a divisive figure, who has managed his way through several internal crises while withstanding attempts by the West to weaken him. Sudan has suffered prolonged periods of isolation since 1993, when the US added Bashir’s government to its list of terrorism sponsors for harboring Islamist militants. Washington followed up with sanctions four years later. Bashir has also been indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague over genocide in Sudan’s Darfur region during an insurgency that began in 2003.

It is instructive that neither the Algerian nor Sudanese people waited for the ballot box to rid their countries of deluded and self-perpetuating leaders. They knew Bouteflika and Bashir have the power and machinery to manipulate the system by rigging election results. They then decided to prevent that familiar scenario recurring. Thousands of persons from different backgrounds and professions came together in one spirit to put an end to official impunity and corruption by taking to the streets. The spirit of revolution, as demonstrated in Algeria and Sudan, subsumed ethnic or religious differences. The unifying factor, a common denominator in the struggle was resistance to oppression and impunity.

The drama is yet unfolding in Cameroon. After 37 years, Biya; aka the “Sphinx” the ailing octogenarian is frail, weak and tottering on the borders of senile decay, but insists on leading Cameroon to his grave. At this juncture, it is therefore relevant to ask: Where has courage, conscience and character gone? Why have long-suffering Cameroonians, especially Francophones not shown sufficient anger to rise up in protest and topple the vampire regime?

Doubtless, the Algerian model has shown that when governance fails, the people react. Some dictators often react to protests with violent clampdown, arresting leaders and killing citizens. One of the legacies of Bouteflika is that he never ordered his security forces to mow down innocent protesters though some were injured and a few killed. Behold, the people are crucial and central in any democracy. Elected leaders in Cameroon invariably treat the people with great contempt. They seem to think the citizens are mere tools to be discarded after rigging and winning elections.

The truth is that democratic ideals are not alien to the people of Cameroon, nay Africa. Cameroonians must understand that docility is antithetical to the tenets and development of democracy. Apathy is worse. It allows mediocrity to thrive. If Cameroonians decide to remain aloof and believe that the fortunes of the country will change, then they are not ready for change. Finally, Bouteflika and Bashir are at long last, out of power. Like Biya, both men started well and indeed meant well for their people. But like Biya, they became victims of self-perpetuation. If they had taken a bow and quit the stage when the ovation was loudest, they would not have become victims of the anger and power of the people. This is the object lesson for all leaders, elected and appointed.

At 86, it leaves much to the imagination, what Biya still desires, by his tenacious hold on power. Biya belongs in the class of self-serving leaders who changed their countries’ constitution to remove term limits mostly against the will of helpless citizens. By their action or inaction, leaders like Biya are under-developing Africa and their countries in particular. It is an ugly trend, and the African Union has a duty to arrest the rape on democracy in member states in order to lift the continent’s image.

Biya should walk the path of honor and make way for a younger generation to take on the reins of power. He should think Cameroon; not himself. The country will outlive him. He should not sow seeds that will create permanent instability as the experience in Zaire has shown. Biya must reassess his obsession with power and stop the mockery of democracy and embarrassment to the country. His advanced age and sit-tight disposition is a constraint for fresh impetus for Cameroon’s progress.

Personalizing government has been detrimental to the growth of Africa. We should build institutions that can survive the test of time and stimulate economic prosperity. Even in the advanced nations that have stable institutions there are presidential term limits. This is basic common sense. Institutional governance should not be centered on one person: It should center on the rule of law and respect for the constitution. So, Cameroonians should wake up, freeze their complacency and take back their country from the rubble of the years of locusts that Biya has nurtured. At 86 years, Biya is officially sub-Saharan Africa’s oldest leader and has joined the league of sit-tight leaders who in spite of age and infirmity continues to cling to power. This indeed, is a scandalous development that diminishes Cameroon’s prestige in the comity of nations.

In perspective, Biya is an anachronism, an ugly image from the ugly past of Africa that people would rather forget. History, it has been said, first comes as a teacher; when it comes again it is in form of a rebuke. No dictator who saw himself as indispensable has lived to tell a good story. Biya is therefore advised to take urgent steps to avert the ignominy which befell characters like the Mobutus, the Mugabes, and the Bouteflikas and Bashirs in recent African history.

By Valerian Ekinneh Agbaw-Ebai

Switzerland has agreed to mediate talks between the government of Cameroon and separatist leaders aimed at faciliating a peaceful resolution to a three-year conflict. This is welcome news, says Nkongho Felix Agbor Balla.

The conflict in Cameroon has engulfed the country’s English-speaking northwest and southwest regions since late 2016. It is one of the world’s most neglected crises, despite a magnitude of violence, inflicted by both military and armed separatist groups, causing unimaginable suffering. The military has committed crimes against humanity against civilians in the English-speaking regions, as documented in a report co-authored by the Cameroon-based Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa (CHRDA) and the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights (RWCHR) in Canada.

Soldiers routinely torch entire villages to the ground — this has become an established and systematic military tactic. They indiscriminately shoot at civilians, at times leaving bodies piled in the streets. Astonishingly, more than 200 villages have been set ablaze, with a continuously increasing pace of attacks. As a result, many people are burned alive in their homes, such as a 70-year-old man who did not hear his neighbors’ warnings due to a hearing disability.

Civilians, including journalists covering the crisis, have been rounded up, arbitrarily detained and tortured, without charge or access to lawyers. Sexual and gender-based violence has also become rampant, often targeting girls below the age of 18. Cameroon now has the sixth-largest forcibly displaced population in the world, with approximately half a million people — one tenth of the region’s population — living in the bush without sufficient food, water or protection from exploitation. There are more than 1.3 million Cameroonians in urgent need of humanitarian aid in the English-speaking regions alone.

Nkongho Felix Agbor Balla While the crisis is rooted in a complex colonial history that birthed the current bijural and bilingual country, it is important to consider how the crisis spiralled from its peaceful origins into the catastrophe it is today.

How the crisis began In late 2016, Anglophone lawyers and educators peacefully demonstrated for basic civil and political rights after years of marginalization in the majority French-speaking country. In particular, Anglophone lawyers and educators were protesting the imposition of French-speaking judges and teachers in English-speaking courts and schools. What started as a simple request for the recognition of rights based on legitimate grievances morphed into a conflict enveloping nearly the entire English-speaking region.

Moderate voices were swiftly drowned out by radicalized forces calling for the creation of a separate country. Hate speech surfaced in both media and government discourse in a disturbing trend that, as history warns, can quickly translate into mass atrocity and even genocide. It is, therefore, encouraging that Switzerland has agreed to mediate a dialogue in the pursuit of peace and reconciliation.

However, the conflict’s underlying causes will only be addressed and redressed by an all-inclusive dialogue that represents the various shades of opinion in Anglophone Cameroon. The Swiss mediators should ensure that they invite a variety of Anglophone voices, certainly not just those who have taken up arms. Switzerland should also invite other bodies to participate as mediators, particularly the African Union which recently mediated a power-sharing agreement between military and civilian leaders in Sudan. Canada is also an ideal candidate to lead the process, given its bijural, bilingual character and long-standing bilateral relations with Cameroon.

Role for the UN and AU The dire situation on the ground, however, demands coordinated international attention and action, even if a political solution to the underlying conflict is not imminent. First, the UN Security Council should add Cameroon to its agenda as a regular stand-alone item, as nine different human rights organizations have recommended in an open letter. Second, the African Union should establish a panel of independent international experts to investigate evidence of crimes against humanity in Cameroon, as the Organization of American States did regarding atrocities in Venezuela. Third, states should increase funding for the UN’s Cameroon Humanitarian Response Plan. As it stands, the Response Plan is severely underfunded. Key frontline humanitarian organizations will be forced to withdraw if additional funding does not reach them soon, according to the UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator.

Finally, individuals and collectives must continue to shine a protective spotlight on the victims of the Cameroon crisis, whose pain and plight can no longer go unheard, unnoticed or unaddressed. The children of Cameroon at the mercy of this raging violence, including the more than 600,000 currently prevented from going to school, deserve no less.

Nkongho Felix Agbor Balla is the founder and director of CHRDA. Culled from DeutcheWelle

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