Cameroon’s government has announced the arrest of six soldiers following a probe into a video released a few weeks ago that documented the abuse of civilians, the privately-owned Cameroon Info news site reports.

It marks a U-turn from their previous denials that any arrests had been made over the video which emerged last month.

The six soldiers are suspected of being the perpetrators of, or accomplices in the summary executions of women and children in the Far North Region, Cameroon Info reports.

In the clip which circulated widely on social media, men wearing military fatigues shoot two women, including one with a baby on her back, and a little girl.

They are heard accusing the victims of being connected to the Islamist militant group, Boko Haram.

Source: Daily Trust

Tanzanian police said Thursday it planned to arrest all the residents of a village in the country’s south after water pipes were destroyed by a mob.

The inhabitants of Ngolo village were accused of deliberately smashing pipes taking water to a neighboring settlement in Mbeya region.

Governor Albert Chalamila had on Wednesday, “ordered that all the inhabitants of this village be arrested regardless of their condition.”

In response, police on Thursday deployed several vehicles and officers to arrest the villagers, said regional commander Ulrich Matei.

“They committed economic sabotage. The government has disbursed money, installed water pipes and they destroyed them! We cannot accept that,” Matie said.

The police chief added that he had sent “enough vehicles, with enough fuel and police on board” to arrest the villagers.

Details about the incident remain sketchy, but the village, whose population is around 1,600, lies in an area where water resources are sketchy.

(Source: AFP)

A boat carrying more than 40 pupils has sunk while crossing the Nile River in Sudan, leaving at least 22 primary school children dead.

The state news agency SUNA reported that the small boat went down around 750 kilometers (470 miles) north of the capital Khartoum on Wednesday morning while it was crossing the river to a school in the village of Kabna.

A female hospital employee in the village also drowned.

“This morning, 22 schoolchildren and one woman died when their boat sank in Bouhayra in Nile State as they traveled to school from Kneissa,” the agency said.

SUNA added that the boat sank after one of its engines broke down “halfway across because of a strong current.”

A witness, who asked not to be named, said that the vessel had been crossing the river against the current, adding, “All the families (in the area) are in mourning.”

The small boat was reportedly overloaded, carrying sweet potatoes and grain in addition to the passengers.

According to the agency, the victims’ bodies have not yet been recovered.

Ibrahim Hassan, another witness, said at least nine children survived the ordeal.

Residents of the region rely on wooden boats to cross the Nile, which is an important transport route for people and goods in the country.

Monsoon rains in Sudan regularly last from June to November and cause the Nile, one of the world’s longest rivers, and its tributaries to overflow.

Source: Presstv

Southern Cameroonian fighters, popularly known as Amba boys, have sown panic across the entire English-speaking region today, Tuesday, August 14, 2018.

In Besongabang, civilians could be seen in a video running in different directions when gunshots supposedly fired by Amba boys rang out around a military camp in the town’s city center.

The pandemonium caused by the shoot-out caused the main highway leading to the border with Nigeria to be closed.

A few casualties have been reported, but the full picture of the unfortunate situation will only become clearer when our reporters on the ground will have to talk with military and police sources.

In Buea, Amba boys attacked army soldiers around Bomaka, a highly populated neighborhood in Buea, located some three kilometers from Mile 17.

Meanwhile, a case of serious violence was also reported in Babungu, in the Northwest region.

It was reported that Hon. Njingu Moussa who was traveling from Bamunka, Ndop, to Babessi with two trucks loaded with soldiers was attacked by Amba boys who, many say, were targeting the army soldiers.

Many people questioned by our sources on the ground say the trucks were attacked by pro-independence fighters.

It is alleged that the soldiers later retreated to the Babungo Three Corners where many civilians were waiting for the tension to subside.

According to Cameroon News Agency (CNA) correspondent reports, Hon Moussa and the convoy decided to blend with the civilian population so as to complicate things for the fighters who always claim their role is to protect the civilian population that is usually threatened by the military.

However, on their way back, the shooting continued around the Babungo Rice farm in Three Corners. Four soldiers have been reported dead as a result of the shoot-out at the border between Baba I and II.

Cameroon Concord News Group reporters are already on the ground and they will be providing more news about this developing story.

By Kingsley Betek

A senior press secretary to Ugandan president Yoweri Kaguta Museveni said on Monday evening that the president’s car came under attack by opposition supporters in the town of Arua, where a bye-election is to hold on Wednesday.

Phtos shared by Don Wanyama showed that the rear mirror of the president’s Toyota V8 had been smashed in the attack. He did not comment whether the president was hurt or not.

The information came barely an hour after a popular lawmaker, Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu also known as Bobi Wine, posted on Twitter that police had attempted to kill him.

“Police have shot my driver dead thinking they’ve shot at me. My hotel is now cordoned off by police and SFC,” he wrote on Twitter with a photo of his driver slumped in the front seat.

Local media portals are reporting that Bobi Wine has been taken into police custody along with a fellow lawmaker.

Bobi Wine, an opposition lawmaker, was reportedly supporting independent candidate Kassiano Wadri. President Museveni was also in Arua campaigning for the ruling National Resistance Movement’s Nusura Tiperu.

Source: Africa News

Kenyan authorities have detained the country’s chairmen of railway and the agency that manages public land, accusing them of alleged corruption over land allocation for the new $3-billion flagship Nairobi-Mombasa railway.

The two top officials were arrested on Saturday, the latest to be caught up in President Uhuru Kenyatta’s anti-corruption drive in the African country in recent months.

The new railway, which is linking the capital Nairobi to East Africa’s main port city, was funded by China and is now considered as one of the largest infrastructure projects of Kenyatta.

Mohammed Abdalla Swazuri, the head of National Land Commission, and managing director of the Kenya Railways Corporation, Atanas Kariuki Maina, were among 18 other officials, businesspeople and firms named in a statement listing arrests that was released by the prosecutor’s office on Saturday.

However, no Chinese companies were named in the prosecutor’s statement.

Opposition leaders and Kenyan economists have already lambasted the railway’s huge funding for increasing the country’s debt burden, which the IMF estimated at between 54 and 55 percent of economic output (GDP) in the 2017-18 fiscal year.

According to the country’s anti-corruption agency, the officials siphoned taxpayer money through phony compensation claims for land used for the railway. But the agency did not clarify who made the allegations.

President Kenyatta has vowed to deal with those “caught in the web of corruption.” In 2013, when he was elected for the first time, he pledged to stamp out corruption.

Back in May, several other corruption scandals were revealed. In one case, multi-million-dollar contracts were reportedly awarded to the friends and family members of employees at the electricity supplier Kenya Power.

In another case, fraudulent payments of 30 million dollars were uncovered at the National Cereals and Produce Board (NCPB).

Back in 2016, the then head of Kenya’s anti-graft agency said the county was losing a third of its state budget to corruption every year. The finance ministry disputed the claim, but Kenyatta acknowledged that corruption had reached levels that threatened national security.

Kenya, the sixth poorest country in Africa, fell to the 143rd rank among 180 countries in Transparency International’s annual corruption index for last year.

Source: Presstv

PRESS RELEASE.

Fellow SCNC Members, Dear Southern Cameroonians,

Following the convening of an SCNC International Convention in Geneva, Switzerland on the 20/04/2018,

Bearing in mind the re-enforcement ban on the SCNC and its activities by the colonial regime of La Republique du Cameroun on 17/01/2017,

Following the heavy crack down on SCNC members and subsequent abductions of the National Chairman Dr.Nfor Ngalla Nfor and the National Secretary Mr.Divine Yuyun,

And on the recommendations of SCNC Local County Heads and SCNC World leaders, the activities and functioning of the SCNC is hereby moved overseas to the management of an Interim Executive Team elected and voted by the different countries National Chairman’s representatives.

This is to ensure the continuous and smooth functioning of the SCNC.

SCNC NATIONAL INTERIM EXECUTIVE TEAM.

• Acting National Chairman: Comrade Engineer Agbor Prizo
• Acting Vice National Chairman:
• Acting National Secretary General; Comrade Yerima Dabney
• Acting National Vice Sec General: Comrade Valentine Tita
• Acting National Treasurer: Madam Ako Grace
• Acting National Fin Sec: Comrade Henry Nchendze
• Acting PRO/Communication Sec: Comrade Prosper Nji Tabong
• Acting Vice PRO/Comm Sec: Comrade Encho Ngemou Mathias
• Liaison Officer to European Parliament: Comrade Michael Ayong
• Advisers: Comrade Kometa Elvis and Comrade Ebai George

NATIONAL CORDINATORS IN HOMELAND.

• Madam……. Classified
• Mr………… Classified
• All the County Heads.

Done in Switzerland, This 01^st Day of August 2018.

                Prosper N.Tabong

                Chairperson for Switzerland.

                National Acting Comm. Secretary

Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara on Monday announced amnesties for around 800 people, including former first lady Simone Gbagbo who is currently behind bars, in the name of national reconciliation. Last week Ivory Coast’s Supreme Court overturned an earlier acquittal granted to Gbagbo for crimes against humanity.

The wife of former president Laurent Gbagbo, in power from 2000 to 2010, will “soon be freed,” Ouattara said during a televised address to the West African nation on the eve of the country’s independence day.

Simone Gbagbo has been serving a 20-year sentence handed to her in 2015 for “endangering state security”. Laurent Gbagbo has been in detention at the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague for seven years. Since 2016, he has been tried for alleged crimes against humanity during post-election unrest in 2010.

Among the others granted amnesties by Ouattara on Monday were former defence minister Lida Kouassi — a key ally of Laurent Gbagbo — who was sentenced this year to 15 years for conspiracy, and former construction minister Assoa Adou, jailed in 2017 for four years.

“On Monday I signed an amnesty order that will benefit about 800 citizens prosecuted or sentenced for offences related to the post-election crisis of 2010 or state security offences committed after May 21, 2011, (the date of Ouattara’s inauguration),” the president said in his address.

Around 500 of those named have already been released provisionally from detention, he added. They will have their criminal records erased.

The other 300 will be released “soon”, he added, without giving any dates.

The question of national reconciliation in Ivory Coast, or the lack of it, has been seen by observers as a black mark against Ouattara.

About 3,000 people died in the turmoil that swept Abidjan — once one of Africa’s most cosmopolitan cities — in the aftermath of the November 2010 presidential polls when Laurent Gbagbo refused to accept defeat to bitter rival Ouattara.

(AFP)

Directorate of Criminal Investigations director George Kinoti has ignored a court order and rearrested a Cameroonian national who was deported from the country last year but managed to find his way back.

Doctta Peter Longa, who was deported last year and declared persona non grata in Kenya was arrested two weeks ago in Nairobi and released on a Ksh.50,000 cash bail by a Nairobi court.

Mr. Kinoti, who says Longa is linked to a spate of criminal activities including; gun running, human trafficking and money laundering ordered for his re-arrest and deportation.

“We are not going to allow criminals to operate in Kenya, Longa has been involved in a series of criminal activities in various countries,” Kinoti said.

The spy boss says Longa was arrested two weeks ago after detectives intercepted him on Enterprise Road in Nairobi.

“We got information that the suspect had sneaked into Kenya through panya routes and immediately began tracking him down. On July 20, 2018, my undercover detectives intercepted Longa in Nairobi,” Kinoti added.

Longa was taken to court and charged with being in Kenya illegally and engaging in criminal activities. He denied the charges and was released on a cash bail of Ksh.50,000.

Last year, Longa was arrested in his Karen home where police seized fake US dollars worth over Ksh.1 billion. “How can court release such a dangerous character with Ksh.50,000 cash bail? This person was declared persona non grata in 2017 and deported to Duala, Cameroon. We will not allow him to commit crimes in Kenya,” added Kinoti.

The DCI boss insists Longa will remain in police custody as preparations to deport him are concluded.

Source: Citizentv

Rumours of a silent war ongoing in the anglophone part of Cameroon have been filtering through for months.

It was reported in October 2017 that the internet was shut off in that part of the country to quiet dissenters from spreading the news.

State-sanctioned kills have also been reported, with soldiers accused of shooting people.

The BBC Africa Eye has collated and analysed the videos from the killings. Their analysis is a saddening and heartbreaking one, revealing a civil war in the country, with too many killings.