Life

24, June 2023

Yaoundé moves to protect children Online as exploitation, abuse worsen ⁰

Last Tuesday, Cameroonian parliamentarians and META experts met to proffer ways to protect children from cyberbullying. This was spurred by several cases of minors in the country being exposed to harm on social media.

The most recent case involves the posting of a video recording of two young girls saying they were raped by a police officer in Beau, in the southwestern region of the country.

The girls said the man raped them in a taxi and threatened to harm them if they told anyone.

It is not clear who recorded the video, but when it was being shared online, attempts were not made to blur or hide the faces of the girls in any way to protect their identities even though they are minors. This has subjected them to even more attacks on social media. Many social media users have been evaluating the victims’ facial expressions, and the grievous nature of the crime committed against them is not getting as much attention.

The young girls have received more insults and attacks online than sympathy and support.

As the case is being followed by civil society actors at the police station in Buea, others took turns on social media to condemn this act, blaming those who filmed the video for deliberately exposing the victims to public scrutiny.

Taryang Tabe, a women’s rights activist, said those who created the content possibly did not understand the implications of showing the faces to these young girls.

“When I saw it on Facebook, I knew it had gone out of control. We must now only use the anger in advocating for the perpetrator to face the law. This may reduce the trauma in both girls when justice is served,” he said.

Children’s agency, UNICEF, says more than a third of young people in 30 countries report being cyberbullied, with 1 in 5 skipping school because of it.

“Children may be victimized through the production, distribution and consumption of sexual abuse material, or they may be groomed for sexual exploitation, with abusers attempting to meet them in person or exhort them for explicit content,” it added.

Similar cases

Some Cameroonian TV stations last year exposed the faces of children who were caught up in a group sexual act in Yaoundé last year. Women’s rights activists condemned the media organisations as well.

Pictures of children who go through domestic violence have been shared often on social media platforms and media outlets as well.

The meeting

The meeting between parliamentarians and META experts on Tuesday was meant to build capacities on best practices of child safety online and seek proper legislation to protect children in Cameroon.

Zondol Hersesse, President of the Committee on Constitutional Law, Human Rights, and Freedoms at the National Assembly said there is a growing need to protect children on the internet. Children, he said, are the most vulnerable on social media.

META experts present at the meeting said it has become very easy for children to be exploited online and are now trying to put measures in place to protect children from violence, exploitation and abuse on the internet.

Source: Humangle media

22, June 2023

Orphan Kids Help Foundation to fund annual scholarships to 100 secondary school students ⁰

As part of its 10000 Kids Education Project, the board of directors of the Orphan Kids Help Foundation has announced plans to provide annual scholarships to poor and needy secondary school students in the Republic of Cameroon.

Cameroon Concord News understands the scholarships will pay for 100 school students to study science, technology and global health.

A statement released by the Orphan Kids Help Foundation revealed that the students will be given enough money to cover the costs of tuition and accommodation throughout the period of their studies.

The money will come from the Orphan Kids Help Foundation that has for the past thirteen years provided resources to orphanages in Africa enabling children to sustain their physical, emotional, and spiritual needs.

The scholarships are expected to be formally announced in Cameroon next week by Dr. Ngasu Betek Etengeneng– a senior Lecturer at the University of Douala. Dr. Ngasu has also been tasked to actively recruit qualified students and to make sure that all candidates must be orphans or poor and needy individuals. In addition, the students must be of good moral and academic standing and above all, must be of Cameroonian nationality.

Orphan Kids Help Foundation is known in Cameroon and beyond as one of the philanthropic foundations based in the United States of America supporting orphans all over Africa. Some of the orphanages that have benefitted from the Orphan Kids Help Foundation in Africa include Love kids orphanage (Ghana), Little Saints Orphanage (Nigeria), Footprints Orphanage (Kenya), Mission of Hope Orphanage (Uganda), Hoptec Orphanage (Cameroon), Wellington Orphanage (Sierra Leone), Rainbow Orphanage (Cameroon), Amity Social Assistance Family (Cameroon) and St. Arnile Orphanage in Cameroon.

The donation to fund the scholarships in Cameroon will be the largest given by Orphan Kids Help Foundation for any single cause.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai with files from our US Bureau

21, June 2023

Southern Cameroons Crisis: Bill passed to recognise English and French as two sub-systems ⁰

Cameroon’s Parliament has approved a higher education reform bill aimed at modernising and improving the quality of university education – and, significantly, it will officially recognise the two sub-systems of public university education in the country – one English, and one French.

According to officials, two key reforms the new legislation envisages include the strengthening of the economic autonomy of universities and addressing the challenge of having a public system in which nine institutions are francophone and two are anglophone.

“The higher education system used this far was developed since 2001. After 22 years, things have evolved in university programmes. That is why we had to introduce some innovations. There was also a need to address the concerns of the English sub-system of education,” said Wilfred Gabsa Nyongbet, secretary general in the ministry of higher education.

The 2001 higher education law and the 1998 law to lay down guidelines on education in Cameroon (which covers early childhood, primary, secondary, technical, and teacher training education) existed, he said, after the bill was defended in parliament on 16 June.

Recognising two sub-systems

Article 4(3) of the 2023 Higher Education legislation now provides that “the state shall ordain and organise the system of higher education by taking into account the specificities of the two education sub-systems, Anglo-Saxon and francophone, as a contributing ingredient to the influence and performance of the higher education system”.

Each sub-system, according to the lawmakers, is “characterised by a body of specific and cohesive principles, which reflect its historical, cultural and philosophical peculiarities”.

According to Professor Simo Bobda of the University of Yaoundé 1, there has been no recognition of the existence of two education sub-systems in higher education (universities) in Cameroon prior to the bill.

By contrast, as far back as 1998, the law that governs the other tiers of education (primary, secondary, teacher training) had already explicitly recognised that Cameroon had two education sub-systems, each preserving specificities in its certification and assessment methods (as well as in pedagogic approaches), he explained.

Prior to the June 2023 bill, the only texts which recognised the existence of sub-systems in higher education were the decrees establishing the universities of Buea and of Bamenda (in 1993 and 2010 respectively) which chartered them as universities “in the Anglo-Saxon tradition”.

Language division contributes to conflict

Only on the basis of this provision was it obtained that English would constitute the language of instruction in both universities, for all substantive programmes other than French language learning. He said that injustice and discrimination, especially in the higher education sector, has proved a flashpoint in the ongoing anglophone crisis.

“This discrimination has been one of the causes of Cameroon’s anglophone crisis, which started off in the education and legal sectors before spiralling into political demands, strikes and armed activity in 2016,” Bobda said.

The anglophone crisis running for its seventh year is a source of turmoil in the two English-speaking regions of the Southwest and Northwest with armed groups and government forces in continuous battle.

Separatists, who have violently enforced a boycott on education since 2017, continued to attack schools, students and education professionals, destroying buildings and depriving hundreds of thousands of children of their fundamental right to education, according to a Human Rights Watch 2023 report.

He added that the fact that the recognition of the two systems and the recognition of common law as the legal system in anglophone regions built up resentment among Anglo-Saxon higher education lecturers, leading to a public protest in 2017.

“We had to go to the streets in protest, especially after the union got information of plans to harmonise the two curricula of all state universities in Cameroon. The reason the government advanced, was to enhance student mobility between universities,” he said.

The lecturers’ union at the universities of Buea and Bamenda objected, on grounds that harmonising their programmes directly with the other French-speaking universities would dilute their Anglo-Saxon specificities, especially since the templates for harmonisation used were strongly inspired by the French-dominant universities, Bobda said.

“After a hard struggle, we obtained the resolution to allow the universities of Buea and Bamenda to harmonise their programmes between themselves (and future universities in the Anglo-Saxon tradition could harmonise their programmes within them). We are happy the new law now comes to lay to rest the long-existing discrimination,” Bobda said.

Protection of both sub-systems

Experts say the new law will protect the Anglo-Saxon system of education from abuse just as the reforms that recognised the common law did in the legal system.

“Before the crisis, we had cases of French-speaking lecturers sent to teach in the two English-speaking universities, French-speaking magistrates who could not express themselves in English were sent to work in the anglophone regions, with challenges in communication.

The new law will protect each of the systems and prevent any unwarranted invasion or dominance of one language over the other,” Dr Livinus Esambe Njume, a lecturer and a member of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative Cameroon, told University World News.

Another key innovation in the June 2023 higher education reforms is the creation of entrepreneurial universities. The new law permits universities to create and run their own businesses.

“The government cannot do it all alone with the surge in university population and unemployment challenges. Building en entrepreneurial spirit in our universities provides opportunities for additional sources of income for them,” Jacques Fame Ndongo, the minister of higher education, explained after defending the bill in parliament.

Fame Ndongo said innovation in higher education is a continuous process that must reflect the realities of every country. “Higher education reforms are the key to quality growth. We are permanently in this process, moving at a pace that reflects the realities of the country,” he said.

Source: University World News

20, June 2023

Cough syrup suspected of killing 12 kids in Cameroon might be Made in India ⁰

A variety of cough syrup suspected by Cameroonian authorities of killing a dozen children in the central African country in recent months bears markings indicating it was made in India.

Photographs of a box of Naturcold medication show a manufacturing license number matching that of Riemann Labs Pvt. Ltd., based in Indore in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. The photos, provided by Eko Eko Filbert, a regional health official in Cameroon, don’t show a manufacturer’s name.

The drugs in the photo “look like ours,” said a director at Riemann, Navin Bhatia, in a phone interview. He said Riemann follows strict quality controls and couldn’t have made tainted medicine, and that counterfeiting is common.

The revelation raises the prospect of a third mass death event linked to exported Indian cough syrups in less than a year. Medicines from two other Indian companies killed more than 60 children in Gambia and about 20 in Uzbekistan last year. In those cases, the syrup medications were found to have been contaminated with two toxic chemicals, ethylene glycol and diethylene glycol. Two more Indian companies are suspected of making similarly tainted syrups found in Liberia and in the Marshall Island.

“Based on your questions, we have sent a team to investigate and we are waiting for the reports,” an official at the Madhya Pradesh Food and Drugs Administration told Bloomberg.

The Cameroonian authorities are still investigating the cause of the outbreak and plan to test the Naturcold samples connected to the deaths, Filbert said in a text message on June 5. The death toll stood at 12 children as of that date, he said.

Filbert said the medicine was not authorized to be imported into Cameroon and was probably smuggled into the country. He said authorities don’t have information about the drugs’ origin.

According to the product label visible in the photos, the bottle of cough syrup was made in March 2022. It bears the name and logo of Fraken International, a marketing company with a UK address. Attempts to reach people at that address by email and LinkedIn messages were unsuccessful.

Bhatia said that Riemann last produced a batch of Naturcold under contract for Fraken in early 2022 and provided it to an exporter who reported sending it to Cameroon. Riemann is one of several Indian companies that have made the product, he said.

Propylene glycol and glycerin are key raw materials for syrups. Riemann buys these chemicals only in sealed containers from name-brand manufacturers, and then hires a third-party lab to test them prior to use, Bhatia said.

“We pay extra attention to quality,” he said. “Everything is done to ensure safety.”

Duplicacy, a term for when a drug is disguised to look like another company’s product, is common in some parts of Africa, Bhatia said.

“They look like ours, but we cannot be sure. There is so much duplicacy there. Based on the quality of our product, it is doubtful,” he said. “I am 110% sure that my product is not contaminated — what we sent from here.”

Culled from Bloomberg

16, June 2023

Amid Sex Scandals: Biya regime seeks to reshape higher education system ⁰

The Cameroonian government has submitted to parliament a draft bill aimed at reshaping its higher education system.

The new guidelines will advance modern higher education reform and improve the quality of compulsory education, said Wilfred Gabsa Nyongbet, secretary general of the Cameroonian Ministry of Higher Education, while defending the draft bill on Friday.

“The education system we have used so far was developed in 2001, but in 22 years higher education has evolved. That is why a lot of innovations have been introduced in the new draft law,” Nyongbet told reporters after the bill was presented to the National Assembly in the capital of Yaounde.

Nyongbet said Cameroon will create entrepreneurial universities to increase the possibility of universities having additional sources of income. This means that universities could have the leeway to create and run businesses. He stressed that the new system will allow more students to become job creators rather than job seekers.

The professionalization and overall development of students will be a priority, and these efforts must reach every student at every university, according to officials.

These changes are coming at a time when the Higher Education Ministry has been hit by many scandals over the last decades but none has been as big as the one that might take down the country’s higher education minister, Jacques Fame Ndongo, who is being described by his collaborators as a ‘man on a diet of sex.’

The minister’s office has become the theatre of multiple sex sessions designed to satisfy Mr. Ndongo’s out-of-control libido.

Mr. Ndongo seems to be shooting pornographic movies in his office as he has transformed his office into his own Hollywood.

Young girls, some as young as 21, are permanently streaming to Prof. Fame Ndongo‘s office and the soundtracks emanating from that office shortly after those girls walk into that “Hollywood studio” are always unsettling to the minister’s collaborators who simply want to do their job and head home to their wives and children.

Prof. Fame Ndongo’s sexual misconduct has reduced the higher education ministry into a playground for people to whom sex is medicine.

Some of the minister’s closest collaborators, most of whom are women, have been bedded by the satyr who passes off as a minister.

Some of these women are today senior officials of the ministry and since they are out of favor with the minister due to their ages, they no longer feel valued and are doing their best to sabotage the minister’s work.

According to an official of the Higher Education Ministry who spoke to the Cameroon Concord News correspondent in Yaoundé, Rita Akana, on condition of anonymity, said that some of the disgruntled women who have lost their shine and charm of yesteryears even challenge the minister to the face, causing him to lose authority among his staff.

The source, a man who will soon be retiring and is terribly bitter about the way his career has gone, is now singing like a canary and he is very willing to lay bare everything happening in a ministry which, in his opinion, has been terribly mismanaged by Prof. Ndongo who has run the ministry for close to 20 years.

Reported by Xinhuanet and Camcordnews

14, June 2023

Grammy Awards: Africa finally gets its own category ⁰

The American music industry’s Grammy Awards announced on Tuesday that they will be awarding a gramophone to the best African music performance at their next edition, a further sign of their quest for diversity and a consecration for the genre.

The new award covers a wide range of styles, from Afrobeat and Afro-fusion to Kwassa Kwassa and Ndombolo from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana drill, Afro-House and South African hip-hop, said the Recording Academy, which brings together music industry professionals, in a press release.

The category will reward “recordings that use the unique local expressions of the African continent”, the Grammys organisers added.

Long accused of not sufficiently reflecting the diversity and evolution of the music industry, the Grammy Awards have been seeking for years to broaden the range of styles and registers of awards. The category of best soundtrack for a video game was added in 2022.

Musicians from African countries, such as French-Beninese singer Angélique Kidjo (5 wins, 14 nominations) and Nigerian singer Burna Boy (one win, 6 nominations), regularly dominate the Grammy world music categories.

At the 65th edition on 5 February in Los Angeles, a trio led by South African DJ-producer Zakes Bantwini, a pillar of local house music, won thanks to a track in Zulu in the best world music performance category.

The 2024 edition will also honour two other new categories: best alternative jazz album and best dance pop recording. In 2023, 91 awards were presented in as many categories, including pop, rock, classical, hip-hop, gospel and country.

Source: Africa News

3, June 2023

CPDM Crime Syndicate: Probe after student’s alleged torture and death ⁰

An investigation has been launched into the death of a student who died in military custody in Buea, in the south-west region of Cameroon, and the ongoing detention of his roommate.

Galax Yves Landry Etoga, the minister in charge of the national gendarmerie, has ordered the probe following the death of Ngule Linus Fontec, a fourth-year student at the University of Buea.

Barrister Amungwa Tanyi Nicodemus, the lawyer of the deceased student, said this development comes more than two months after Fontec, a student in the university’s department of international relations, was declared dead on 16 March 2023 while in military custody for alleged terrorist activities.

“We have waited for a long time for this authorisation to investigate the suspicious death of the student. The truth has to prevail,” he told journalists on 29 May.

According to media reports and the university authorities, Fontec and Mboh Giress, a sixth-year student, were taken into custody by SEMIL, a secret service agency of the Cameroonian army, during a raid by the military of the university’s residential area for students.

According to Professor Horace Ngomo Manga, the vice-chancellor of the University of Buea, the two students were apprehended by the forces of law and ordered to assist them in their investigation of some terrorist activities.

“Unfortunately, Linus Ngule died while in custody,” he said.

Allegations of torture

Human rights groups and the lawyer of the deceased student allege they were severely tortured by the military.

“There were signs of torture of both students, [which is the] reason why we requested an autopsy of the deceased,” said human rights lawyer Agbor Balla.

The University of Buea authorities, rights groups and lawyers have all been clamouring for access to and release of Fontec’s roommate.

“We had to write to the ministry of defence to receive the family of the deceased and to open up an investigation into the circumstances of his [Fontec’s] death,” Amungwa said.

A meeting involving the military, the family of the deceased and the legal representative was held. “We insisted on our desire to see light shed on the death of Linus,” Amungwa said.

Internal conflict

According to Balla, since the Anglophone crisis started in 2016, students from the two universities in the English speaking regions, Buea and Bamenda, have been victims of torture and rape, arrest and illegal detention by the military who accuse them of communicating with separatists fighters.

“The abuses of university students during this crisis have been from both sides, the separatist fighters and the regular state army. We condemn these acts and have been calling on government to investigate and punish the perpetrators,” Agbor Balla said.

The abuses have continued to rise, according to a 2022 human rights group report.

The 2022 Human Rights Watch report says the conflict has witnessed some major human rights violations, including killings, torture, kidnappings, illegal arrests and detention.

Most of these incidents are believed to have remained unreported, especially the violations in remote areas where there is no mobile network, nor are there good roads or accessibility.

The group in their report published at least eight incidents with the aid of videos and pictures aimed at documenting abuses committed against civilians by both warring parties in the conflict and to promote human rights and peace.

It revealed verified reports by the above-mentioned parties pertaining to the excessive use of power by the security forces during the student protest at the University of Buea in 2020 leading to the arrest and detention of many.

Activists have called on the international community to intervene in the ongoing crisis and bring a lasting peace.

“We are appealing to the international community to step in and put a stop to the several killings going on in the two Anglophone regions,” said Akem Kelvin Nkwain, rights officer at the Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa, or CHRDA.

English-speaking students go to French-speaking universities

Akem said his life has been threatened several times by the state security for his outspokenness on the crisis and has equally appealed for genuine dialogue between the two fighting groups.

“Only genuine dialogue can bring lasting peace. This is what obtains in other conflicts around the world.”

Amnesty International has also called for dialogue to create an enabling environment for students to study in peace.

In a 2022 report, it called on the warring factions to down their tools and for the government to end threats against activists who expose violations and abuses in the Anglophone regions.

The alleged abuse of students appears to be forcing parents from the English-speaking regions in the country to rather send their children to French-speaking universities for safety reasons because of the security situation in English-speaking regions.

“We are having an influx of English-speaking students in universities in Francophone regions for security reasons. They are bound to cope with the language challenges,” said Dr Essambe Livinus Njume, a lecturer at the University of Yaoundé 1.

The recent incident in the University of Buea is not the first case of student arrest by the military that ended in death while in detention.

In 2020, Human Rights Watch also reported similar cases at the University of Bamenda.

Activists hope the Buea investigation will come up with the truth and the criminals sanctioned. “We look forward to knowing exactly what happened and hope the criminals will face the law,” Balla said.

Source: University World News

3, June 2023

Cameroon: Cholera death toll rises to over 420 ⁰

A further 26 people have died in Cameroon’s ongoing cholera outbreak in the past two weeks, taking the overall death toll to 426, a health ministry official said on Thursday.

The outbreak was declared in October 2021 and has seen a strong increase in cases since late March of this year after a period of low transmission, according to the World Health Organization.

The number of confirmed cases in Cameroon now stands at 1,868, said ministry official Linda Esso.

Cholera can cause acute diarrhoea, vomiting and weakness and is mainly spread by contaminated food or water. It can kill within hours if untreated. Fourteen African countries have reported cases since the start of 2023, the WHO said in a report on Thursday.

It said it was particularly concerned as many countries were reporting higher case fatality ratios than in previous years.

In Cameroon, “more than 79% of cases reach health facilities in a moderate or severe state,” increasing the chances of the cases proving fatal, the health ministry said in situation report, seen by Reuters.

Source: Reuters

29, May 2023

King Salman Humanitarian Aid: Over 500 patients examined in voluntary surgical program in Cameroon ⁰

The King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center (KSrelief) continued to implement a voluntary surgical program in Cameroon, which has so far examined more than 500 cases in different clinics.

The campaign runs from May 20 to May 31, 2023, in cooperation with Al-Baslam International Organization. Since the start of the campaign, the volunteer medical team of the KSrelief has examined 532 cases in different clinics.

KSrelief also hosted in Riyadh on Sunday the European Union Special Representative for the Horn of Africa, Annette Weber, and her accompanying delegation.

During the meeting they discussed concerns related to humanitarian and relief affairs. They also discussed ways to support humanitarian work in the Horn of Africa region.

Elsewhere, KSrelief continued implementing a project to enhance health care services for Syrian refugees and the host communities in Akkar Governorate, Lebanon.

During April 2023, 822 patients were received, and 1,464 services were provided across various clinics.

In Tajikistan, shelter aid, including blankets, heating coal and water heaters in the districts of Temurmalik, Baljuvon, Khatlon and Tojikopod, benefiting 330 individuals from the neediest groups.

Source: Arab News

26, May 2023

Cannes spotlights Mambar Pierrette: ‘It’s high time Cameroonian stories influence world cinema’ ⁰

In the Directors’ Fortnight, which runs parallel to the main festival, Rosine Mbakam’s “Mambar Pierrette” painted an intimate portrait of a Cameroonian seamstress and single mother struggling to make ends meet against a backdrop of social hardship and the threat of floods.

Pierrette Aboheu Njeuthat stars as the titular character, a mother of three who works tirelessly at her sewing machine to provide for her children while customers and neighbours linger in her small shop, sharing their joys and disappointments in a deftly woven tapestry of communal life in the city of Douala.

A remarkable debut feature based on the life of Mbakam’s seamstress cousin, “Mambar Pierrette” draws on the director’s experience of documentary filmmaking, which has previously explored the themes of kinship and migration to Europe. FRANCE 24 spoke to the filmmaker about her focus on character studies and her commitment to promoting African stories in the moviemaking industry.

“Mambar Pierrette” is your first feature-length fiction film, although it is based on your cousin’s life. Where do you draw the line between documentary and fiction?

I drew inspiration from Pierrette’s life to write the script, placing it at the very heart of the film. Once we started shooting, the other characters also added their input, bringing the screenplay closer to their own lives.

Fiction never takes over. Its role is to add substance to the narrative and provide more context. In particular, the fictional element helps underscore the fact that Pierrette’s social predicament is not only a result of her small income, her husband’s irresponsibility or Cameroon’s politics. It is also derived from an enduring neo-colonialism that leaves swaths of the population in poverty.

The fabric shop is at the heart of your film. What does it symbolise?

My film tells the story of Pierrette, who is a seamstress in real life. Sewing embellishes, it brings people together, and her workshop is a place where people open up and share their secrets. I wanted to highlight the value of this work of dressmaking and transformation, which has all but vanished in the West. We shop, but we have lost this relationship with what we wear.

The sewing room also represents gender relationships in Cameroon. The men remain in the entrance, at the door, while the women establish themselves in the workshop, inhabiting the space. These opposing stances signal the contrast between a new generation of women who are increasingly assertive and men who don’t accept this reality – and are therefore in a vulnerable situation. Pierrette doesn’t sew for women only, she works for everyone, her workspace excludes nobody. By keeping at a distance, the men seek to protect themselves and avoid questioning their position in society.

Culled from France 24