Cameroon’s village defenders — local groups armed to fight off Boko Haram militants — are being accused of turning to crime. As the threat of terrorism and support for self-defense groups declines, many of the armed men villages depended on for security are looking for new ways to make a living.

Cameroon’s northern border with Nigeria has in recent years been preoccupied with the threat from Boko Haram. But, earlier this month police arrested 14 members of village defender groups accused of harassing, robbing, and abducting people for ransom.

Ahminu Youssoufa, with the Mora Criminal Research Brigadean armed police group, said as the threat from Boko Haram declined, some defenders formed gangs that prey on locals and business travelers crossing the Nigeria border.

He said authorities are still detaining five individuals who are now helping them with the investigations. They believe it is just a matter of time for the military to dismantle, what he called an entire network.

The self-defense groups were created in 2014 to patrol villages and remote border areas where the military has little or no presence.

They earned no pay but were given supplies of food, money, and equipment from donors and the authorities — that is, until Cameroon started winning the war against Boko Haram.

Gaibai Ousmanou, head of the Village Defender Committee for Mora, said when large-scale attacks by Boko Haram started fading out in 2017, assistance to the groups also dropped off.

But he insisted the groups are still needed for protection. He said although Boko Haram has not staged a full-scale attack with heavy weapons for more than a year, the presence of self-defense groups prevents followers of the Islamist group, who are still present in their communities, from attacking.

Local churches and mosques are taking up some of the slack in supporting the village defenders, said Ousmanou. But that support barely keeps them going, he said, and helps explain why some defenders use arms against those they were supposed to protect.

The governor of Cameroon’s far north region, Midjiyawa Bakari, denies a lack of official support. He said the government will continue to assist them by providing motorcycles, bicycles, communication equipment, money and food, to enable them to intercept all those who have decided not to respect the laws.

However, he said just as Boko Haram fighters and suicide bombers were stopped, those defecting to create or join groups of robbers will also be stopped.

As he headed out on patrol, village defender Njibri Bakao acknowledged his gorup now has to defend the area against some of its own.

Source: VOA

The Southern Cameroons (Ambazonia) Interim Government is inviting you for a Press Conference at the National Press Club, Monday August 20^th at 1PM. The Press Conference shall focus on the ongoing genocide in the country of Cameroon and the civil war in which the Southern Cameroons, Ambazonia wants to secede and become an independent country. It shall also address the alleged fraud and bribery involving the Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr. Anthony Guitterese and the government of Cameroon, to cover up human rights abuses by the Cameroon government.

Speaking at the press briefing shall be the major stakeholders and different frontline leaders for Ambazonia, including the Interim President, Dr. Samuel Sako Ekome. They will address the current armed struggle/civil war in Cameroon in which US military equipment meant for use against Boko Haram is being used by the government of Cameroon to kill civilians.

The leaders shall also use the opportunity to publish a Memorandum of Understand (MoU) that binds all the movements in a collaboration pack.

We will greatly appreciate your presence at the conference. Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at 603-682-2687. Contact person is Chris Anu. He can also be reached on email, anuchris@yahoo.com.

In what is set to become a annual tradition, Bisong Foundation will, on Thursday, August 16, 2018, donate school needs, foodstuff and healthcare needs to kids at the Good Samaritan Orphanage at Babete, near Mbouda in the Bamboutous Division in the West Region of Cameroon. The foundation will also pay school fees for the 2018/2019 academic year.

In a similar donation last year, the orphans sang for joy after receiving assorted gifts on August 18, 2017 from the Bisong Foundation, a UK-based charity.

The Bisong Foundation, founded in 2010 in Cambridge, United Kingdom by Michael Bisong and his wife Hortence Manto Bisong where they are both based, offered to pay school fees for all 18 school-going orphans in the 2017/2018 academic year. Seventeen of the orphans are in primary and nursery schools and one of them in secondary school.

The foundation also donated brand new uniforms for all the orphans, school needs ranging from schoolbags, exercise books, pens and pencils. Most of the kids attend the Babete Catholic School. They equally received foodstuff and other basic needs including rice, cooking oil, breakfast items and body hygiene needs.

The ceremony that took place at the orphanage centre at Babete was attended by members of the Bisong Foundation, the orphans all wearing their newly-made uniforms, officials of the orphanage and a representative of the Bamboutous Divisional Delegate for Social Affairs.

Appreciative of the gesture by Bisong Foundation, the orphans sang the French version of “If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands”. They sang many more songs expressing their joy.

“See how beautiful the kids are in their brand-new uniforms!” said the foundation’s Founder and President, Michael Bisong. “They are God’s children. We are realizing our dream! God has helped us, so we ought to share with the underprivileged. We won’t give them the world, we can only share the little we have.”

Explaining the foundation’s motivation for donating to the orphanage, Bisong said, “We know how important education is for, those who do not go to school will spend their lives in perpetual darkness.” He said though his foundation is concerned about the plight of all the needy, their priority was to the needs of orphans.

Speaking earlier, the foundation’s Executive President, Jean-Philippe Ntoukam who manages operations in Cameroon, recalled that Mr Bisong was inspired by his own childhood experiences to create the charity.

Taking the floor in her turn, the foundation’s co-founder, Mrs Bisong Hortence Manto said they were happy to see the children sing, dance and smile, which satisfies their desire as stated in the foundation’s slogan to “Give the underprivileged a reason to smile”. She said the foundation has already visited five other orphanages in Limbe and Yaounde since it was legalized in Cameroon in May 2016.

Visibly overwhelmed, the coordinator of the orphanage, Rev. Sister Therese Grace Tcheutchoua, simply sang a song of praise to Jesus and Michael Bisong: “Emmanuel, we are saying ‘thank you’, Mr Bisong, we are saying ‘thank you’.”

She said the orphanage was created in 2005 after a child abandoned by a mentally ill woman was brought to their care. The orphanage, now hosting 22 orphans, is run by the Benedictine Sisters of the St Benedict Monastery in Babete, an extension of the Mont Febe Monastery in Yaounde.

Also speaking on behalf of the orphanage, Mme Fomekong Tikun Jeanne Sylvie, director of the centre said some of the orphans have been found to have mental illness. This left Mr and Mrs Bisong particularly concerned as it somehow falls within their professional scope. Mr Bisong is a mental health social worker in the UK where he assesses and supports adults with mental health issues and Mrs Bisong is manager of their health support agency.

Besides donating to the orphanage, Bisong Foundation blended into week long sporting activities of the annual get-together of the Development Committee of Bamesso village, Mrs Bisong’s village of origin, located a few minutes’ drive from Mbouda. The foundation’s football team featuring Michael Bisong, a former Indomitable Lions player in the junior categories in the 1990s, played a friendly match with Bamesso Veterans.

Bisong, a native of Manyemen in Nguti Subdivision, Kupe-Muanenguba Division in the South West Region, presented medals and trophies to winners and outstanding players of the Bamesso football tournament in which Bamesso sons resident in Edea defeated those from Limbe in the final after post-match penalties. In handball, Bamesso girls based in the village beat those from Yaounde 15-6. The finals were presided by the Mbouda Sub divisional Delegate for Sports and Physical Education, Bibeme Damien Martial.

The closing ceremony of the Bamesso Cultural Week on August 19, 2017 was chaired by Public Works Minister Emmanuel Nganou Djoumessi, elite of the village and Honorary President of the local development association.

By Franklin Sone Bayen

Cameroonian authorities should speedily investigate an alleged arson attack on community radio station Sky FM in the volatile Northwest region and ensure those responsible are prosecuted, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Unknown persons on August 3 set fire to the station, destroying the building and equipment, according to the station owner Abdou Borno, an article on Sky FM’s official Facebook page, Cameroonian journalist Ndi Eugene Ndi, and two local website reports. The equipment included two transmitters, computers, four recorders, a video camera, a mixer, decoder, television set, and office furniture, according to Borno.

The radio station is based in the town of Ndu, about 124 km (77 miles) from Bamenda, the capital of the Northwest region–one of two regions where Anglophone separatists have been waging an armed struggle for an independent state called Ambazonia against the predominately French-speaking government of President Paul Biya, according to news reports. A recent Human Rights Watch report blamed both sides for grave abuses against civilians, including killings.

“All parties to the conflict in Cameroon, whether government forces or Ambazonians, should stop targeting journalists and media organizations and allow them to operate safely and without fear of reprisal,” said Angela Quintal, CPJ Africa Program Coordinator. “The media is not the enemy. Journalists are simply trying to do their jobs by ensuring that citizens are armed with useful information in what has become an increasingly bloody phase in Cameroon’s history.”

Borno told CPJ that he learned of the fire the morning of August 4 when the manager of the nearby Summit Hotel, Nformi Victor, called him to tell him that the radio station had burned down. According to Borno, Victor told him that a hotel receptionist heard a noise at about 11 p.m. the night before; she did not investigate further since she did not hear the noise again and because it was windy.

Sky FM’s station manager, Bernard Tata Gibip, found a cutlass, gasoline container, and a box of matches near the radio station after he too was alerted by Victor, Borno told CPJ.

The station broadcasts in English and “all other local languages including Limbum and Mbororo,” on topics including culture, health, and the economy, according to Borno, who is a local official of Biya’s ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement party. The station also broadcasts BBC programs and national broadcasts in French.

Borno told CPJ on August 7 that he believed his radio station was targeted because of its “Back to School” campaign, which began last year encouraging students to return to school. The new school year starts in September, and a school boycott has been in place since November 2016 when lawyers and teachers in both the Anglophone Northwest and Southwest regions began protesting the alleged marginalization of English by Biya’s central government in Yaounde, according to news reports. The grassroots protest was then taken over by separatist factions as the conflict escalated with Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch accusing them of violently enforcing the boycott, according to the independent humanitarian news website, IRIN.

The station has been off air since May 19 after its two transmitters were damaged in a lightening strike; they were planning to relaunch the week of August 8, according to Borno.

Borno told CPJ that because the new school year starts next month, the “separatist activists know very well our stand so they decided to burn the entire radio house with all equipment.”

In a detailed emailed statement to CPJ, a spokesperson for the separatists’ Self Defense Council of the Ambazonian Interim Government (ASC), A.J.N. Mbiydzenyuy, said it controlled about 98 percent of the “restoration forces”– who are the self-defense units of the separatist Ambazonia movement– in the Northwest and Southwest regions and that there was no evidence that they were responsible for the arson attack.

“The ASC leadership has never approved [an] arson attack, the restoration forces council in Nkambe is unaware of any involvement of their forces…and the field commanders of our forces in Ndu declined responsibility of the FM radio station arson attack,” he said.

CPJ could not verify independently the alleged motive or whether separatists were responsible for the alleged arson.

Ndi, the publisher and editor-in-chief of the weekly NewsWatch, told CPJ that both the government and separatists were targeting journalists. “Separatists are threatening us with messages that we are siding with government in our reports as we try to stay neutral or objective in the crisis. On the other hand, any report that seems to be propagating the agenda of the separatists is tantamount to the crime of ‘apologies de terrorisme’ punishable under the anti-terrorism law by the government,” he said.

Borno said he employed four staff members to report and produce programs. He said that the station, which he established in 2013, was not a profit-making enterprise, nor was it subsidized by the government.

Communications Minister Issa Tchiroma Bakary, who also serves as a government spokesperson, did not respond to CPJ’s request via Whatsapp for comment. The Northwest Governor Adolphe Lele Lafrique had not replied to CPJ’s request for comment at the time of publication.

In a Cameroon special report about the abuse of anti-terror laws against journalists published last year, CPJ spoke to journalists who said they were increasingly caught between the Cameroonian government and separatists.
Source:CPJ

Local media portals in Cameroon are reporting of floods in parts of the country. On Tuesday, the city of Limbe in the country’s South West was hit by floods.

Whiles in Douala, the country’s largest city and economic capital located in the Littoral region, heavy rains accompanied by landslides are said to have left scores stranded.

Videos and photos shared on social media showed streets submerged as flood waters have risen to knee-level of people who attempted wading through.

Some journalists are also reporting that in the case of Limbe, as the waters receded, people are counting their loses. There are no official account of loss of lives but local media are putting it at ten.

Floods continue to cause havoc across parts of Africa where high rain patterns have resulted in loss of lives and destruction to properties. The most recent was in the capital of Ivory Coast, Abidjan where government was forced to evacuate close to 200 families.

Source: Africa News

Cameroon is grappling with the threat of escalating violence in different crisis locations across the country even as the authorities prepare for run-up to the presidential elections set for Oct. 7.

About a fortnight ago, a video emerged showing men in the military fatigues of the Cameroonian army executing two women and two children. The video is believed to have been taken in the north of the country where the military is taking on Boko Haram. The clip of the extra-judicial killing of the women and children, presumably linked to the Islamic terror group, went viral on social media and sparked outrage.

Activists in the ongoing Anglophone crisis used the footage to describe what they claim are ongoing indiscriminate and unjustified killings in the country’s English-speaking regions, over 800 miles away. Government troops had previously been accused of targeted killings in those North West and South West Regions.

Global rights group, Amnesty International says the men in the video were Cameroonian soldiers carrying out the executions. The organization’s experts matched extensive analysis of the weapons, dialogue and uniforms that feature in the video, with digital verification techniques and testimonies to arrive at the conclusion that the perpetrators are soldiers of the Cameroon army.

Nevertheless, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, Cameroon’s minister of communication, strongly rebutted the video, denying the Cameroon army’s involvement. Tchiroma has challenged previous Amnesty reports on crimes and human rights violations committed by the army. Yet, he said “owing to the gravity and intolerability of the facts contained therein, the Head of State [Paul Biya] has ordered the opening of a thorough investigation to shed light on this case.”

Samira Daoud, deputy director of Amnesty International’s West Africa office, raised concerns over the genuineness of the government probe. “The Cameroonian authorities’ initial claim that this shocking video is fake simply doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. These hasty and dismissive denials cast serious doubt over whether any investigation will be genuine.”

Though Reuters reported that four Cameroonian soldiers had been arrested in relation to the execution, Tchiroma tweeted on Saturday noting that no military officer had been detained.

In addition to the Boko Haram threats, Cameroon’s government has been gaining negative global media coverage over the last year as the troubles in its English-speaking regions have escalated. What started out as a modest industrial strike action by English-speaking lawyers and teachers over real and perceived marginalization by the Francophone-dominated central government has turned into a full-fleg.

The long-drawn out crisis has so far caused the internal displacement of no fewer than 160,000 people, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. An additional 21,000 affected by the crisis have had to cross over to neighboring Nigeria as refugees. Even the Nigerian business community in some key towns in the restive area have returned home. Frequent gun battles between republican forces and armed separatists have led to hundred of deaths.

Like other concerned organizations and structures, Human Rights Watch is advocating an end to the killings. The rights group has recommended a mediated dialogue involving all the warring parties. But none has taken concrete actions which could breed such peace-restoration efforts.

Despite the volatile nature of the country’s two English-speaking regions, voters have been called to the poll on Oct. to elect a president. Current president Paul Biya, 85, has been in office since 1982 and has confirmed he will be running for his seventh term. Some 27 hopefuls have already manifested interest in challenging the incumbent. Biya’s grip on power has been shaken by the security threats of Boko Haram and more recently the Anglophone separatists but most watchers are not optimistic there will be change.

Even then, there are few indications the election will run smoothly in the restive Anglophone regions as some council branches of the elections management body, ELECAM, have remain closed.

Culled from Quartz

Capital of Cameroon restive South West region, Buea, was deserted by residents in observing an unofficial ghost town ritual that has been in place for over a year.

Streets of Buea were largely deserted as at the morning of July 23, 2018 and businesses refused to open as ordered by the Lord Mayor. In

Photos sent exclusively to Africanews showed that Buea was observing a ghost town. Residents had virtually abandoned the streets and all social and economic activities had come to a halt.

Late last week, Lord Mayor of the Buea Council Ekema Patrick Esunge, warned that the body will take punitive measures against economic operators especially who respect the most recent call for a ghost town.

In a press release, he said Monday (June 23) remained a normal working day. A word of caution to persons who planned to respect a call to stay away by suspected separatists.

His release read in part: “He further informs them (businesses) to stop respecting the so-called ghost town from unknown individuals.

“Defaulters of the above Municipal Order will have their businesses sealed till further notice considering that several communiques and press conferences have been held with them to desist from this phenomenon.”

Meanwhile, unconfirmed reports by people on social media disclosed that the Mayor was sealing off shops that did not operate. Authorities are said to be doubling locks of shops that refused to open.

Source: Africa News