Cameroon’s military has taken over two villages held hostage by separatists whom the government called terrorists. The separatists had been collecting taxes, rendering justice in their courts and imposing prison sentences on people who refused to collaborate with them.

The separatists have killed at least eight soldiers and policemen over the past month in their campaign to break from francophone Cameroon and form a separate anglophone state called Ambazonia. They also aim to loosen President Paul Biya’s long grip on power.

In the southwestern village of Bafia, one of those retaken, hundreds of people have returned, nearly two months after they fled. Resident Enow Basile, 31, said he and about 100 villagers were arrested by the armed groups and detained at a local government school, where a man calling himself General Amstrong, leader of the group, had installed his headquarters.

“When you come, they tie your eye, they beat you up,” he said. “If you don’t have from 100 thousand francs ($180) and above, they promise to take your life, so people were paying.” More than 100 people complied, he said.

“And they always attacked trucks that were transporting cocoa to Douala,” Basile added. “They attack them, each pay 50 thousand francs ($90) to pay a pass, but if you don’t pay, you will not pass. You don’t take cocoa to Douala.”

Muyenge, 10 kilometers from Bafia, was the other occupied village. Resident Ayuk Lucas said the invaders were sanctioning anyone who did not respect them.

“They even create a court. Everything. A whole government where they send to come and collect somebody and ask you to pay some money to them,” he said.

Last week, Cameroon’s military arrested 20 members of the armed group. But the U.N. Committee Against Torture expressed concern Wednesday, demanding an investigation into the deaths of at least 17 people killed in October 1 clashes between the security forces and those seeking a separate state. It said more than 500 people had been arrested, some of them from the hospital in the wake of the unrest, and it criticized Yaounde for not responding to several demands seeking information on those still being held.

Muyenge resident Ebune Francis said the armed separatists were expressing anger about what he described as the Cameroon government’s neglect of English-speaking regions. He said he did not support secessionists but did support demands made by teachers and lawyers when they began a strike more than a year ago that later degenerated.

“We had been supporting the government, supporting the government. Nothing is coming, so we all are annoyed,” Francis said. “We are abandoned by the government. We don’t have water, sometimes we don’t have electricity. You want us to be happy with the government? No.”

The government has assured the population of the English-speaking regions that it will assure their safety.

Schools have been closed in most of the English-speaking northwest and southwest since November last year, when the lawyers and teachers called for a strike to stop what they said was the overuse of the French language.

Source: VOA

Cameroonian author Patrice Nganang was arrested at the airport as he tried to fly to Zimbabwe a day after publishing an opinion piece sharply critical of Cameroon’s president, a source said Thursday. Nganang, who teaches literature at New York University, “was taken into custody yesterday (Wednesday) at Douala (airport),” a source close to the police disclosed. “He drew attention to himself in recent days with several acts of provocation,” the source said, also mentioning Nganang’s Facebook posts.

Agents were waiting for him at the airport in Douala, Cameroon’s economic capital, and he has since been taken to the capital Yaoundé for detention. The writer had been en route to Harare after wrapping up a stay in mainly French-speaking Cameroon, during which he visited the restive Anglophone regions that have been hit by an anti-secession government crackdown.

On Tuesday, Nganang published a French opinion piece on the Jeune Afrique news site that was critical of Cameroonian President Paul Biya’s handling of the Anglophone crisis. “It will probably take another political regime to make the state understand that the machine gun cannot stem a movement,” wrote Nganang. “Only change at the head of the state can settle the Anglophone conflict in Cameroon,” he said.

Calls for greater autonomy in Cameroon’s two English-speaking areas, the Northwest and Southwest Regions, have been rejected by Biya whose government has led a crackdown on the separatist drive. Anglophones make up about a fifth of the country’s 22 million people, and often say they suffer from economic inequality and discrimination, especially in education and the legal system.

AFP

A prominent member of the Central Committee of the ruling CPDM party has said that President Biya runs the risk of being at the International Criminal Court. Prof. Charlemagne Mesange Nyamding in an interview with a sister publication, Cameroon Info.Net also noted that the Francophone soldiers killed in Southern Cameroons were a consequence of a misguided policy that incited nervousness.

Mesange Nyamding who also moonlights as a senior lecturer at the International Relations Institute, IRIC condemned bluntly the Biya regime’s decision to send troops to quell the activities of Southern Cameroons protesters.

“We must avoid what I call a military escalation. We cannot solve a social problem with a military solution. If the army continues to fire on the populations, Paul Biya, the head of the state and commander-in-chief of the armed forces runs the risk of being at the International Criminal Court. We can do nothing but dialogue; this is the only way that the President of the Republic should follow. Look at how he handled the Bakassi case, for example. President Paul Biya is a man of dialogue.”

The University Don who was shortlisted for the Cameroon Concord News Man of the Year award  condemned the killing of men in uniform in Southern Cameroons, but invited the head of state to continue with inclusive dialogue to find solutions to the crisis.

Prof. Nyamding also pointed out that the President of the Republic must continue the dialogue and quickly implement decentralization.

By Sonne Peter with files from CIN

After months of meticulous investigations by Cameroon Concord News, we can confirm indisputably that La Republique du Cameroon infiltrators living in the diaspora are alerting embassies and authorities in La Republique about the activities of Ambazonians in Europe and North America. In a jaw dropping revelation, we can say without any fear of contradiction that contemptible repulsive moles are working amongst Ambazonians in the Diaspora.

Since the beginning of the year, prominent Ambazonians have been repatriated from Cameroun or abducted upon arrival at the Yaoundé and Douala international airports. In March this year, the recently appointed Ambazonian Secretary of State for Finance and Economy, Mr Brado Tabenyang was not allowed entry into the country whilst on a personal and business trip. That story, amongst many others were covered by our media group at the time. After many such non-coincidences, this media outlet launched an investigation to uncover the truth.

Our revelation was telling because it confirmed the worst fear of most Ambazonians. It uncovered that these blacklegs were born in British Southern Cameroon. It was previously alleged that they all originated from French Cameroun. This development is disquieting as Ambazonians in the diaspora talk about their political beliefs and quest for freedom without apprehension and the thought of in-community secret agents poses a problem to their fight for freedom.

We can confirm that one of these deplorable creatures lives in the South West of England, Great Britain. Our investigation uncovered that plagued with low self-esteemed and a lack of personal accomplishment, he has resorted to this dark art to gain favours from the crooked government in Yaoundé. During our investigation, we established that he is craving for an appointment back in Cameroun by the CPDM regime. The worrying part of this exposé is that he is an involved community member. During the cold war, the deadliest spies lived as close members of the populations they were infiltrating. Our investigation has uncovered that the strategy of these moles is to be very involved in the diaspora community and pretend to be part of the struggle whilst their intent is to spy. We are closely following the tracks of others who live in other European countries.

Our fact-finding operation exposed that these moles are driven by jealousy because the corrupt regime in La Republique and their embassies have not set aside any funds to pay them for their wretched services. Driven by envy, they call and in some cases visit embassies to cook up stories that their victims are prominent secessionists. Once this information is in the hands of La Republique authorities, the lives of these Ambazonians and that of their families back home are in danger.  They are more than a few stories of Ambazonians that have vanished upon arrival in Cameroun due to the works of these dark agents.

Venomous actions of this nature show the lengths at which some of our people are going to betray the struggle. We are currently in the process of clearing some legal barriers and when that’s achieved, the names of these characters will be communicated in the near future so Ambazonians could stay well clear of these scorpions.
By Chi Prudence Asong, CCN

This picture of the French Cameroun dictator, Paul Biya isolated and pretending to enjoy some kind of silence away from world leaders at the recent African Union-EU summit in the Cote d’Ivoire is very telling.

Biya looked so abandoned in the photo which generated murmured conversations during and after the summit.  But when it was over, what Cameroon Concord News Kingley Betek remembered most about that cathartic day was Paul Biya’s own haunting silence.
By Chi Prudence Asong

Two police officers were killed by suspected separatists in a restive English-speaking region of Cameroon, the authorities said Thursday, raising to 10 the total number of security officials who have died in attacks this month.

“Two police were killed overnight at a border post in Southwest Region,” said government spokesman Issa Tchiroma Bakary, blaming English-speaking separatists.

Another police officer and a soldier were wounded in the attack. Bakary said a group of police and soldiers were carrying out “routine checks and searches” during the night when they were ambushed by gunmen.

A regional police source said the attack took place in Otu, which is in the same region where four soldiers from the army’s motorized infantry battalion were killed early on Wednesday. The ambush brought to 10 the total of security forces killed in suspected separatist attacks since the start of the month. Five were police and five soldiers.

The bloodshed is the latest episode in an escalating crisis in the Southwest and Northwest regions, home to a large minority of English-speakers in the francophone-majority nation. Resentment among Anglophones over perceived discrimination has fed a spiral of political demands and also a government crackdown, leading to calls for secession.

Source:  AFP

Suspected separatists in a restive English-speaking region of Cameroon have killed four more soldiers as violence continues to plague government efforts for reaching a settlement with the secessionists.

Army and government sources said Wednesday that the four soldiers were “murdered” in Mamfe, a city in Cameroon’s Southwest Region, by those who promote “terrorism.”

“Four soldiers were killed around 2:00 am around Mamfe,” said an army source angrily, adding, “They murdered our soldiers. If that’s not terrorism, what is it?”

A government source also confirmed the deaths although there was no more information on how the soldiers were killed.

The deaths are the latest to hit the ranks of Cameroon’s security forces as they struggle to contain a growing insurgency in the Southwest and Northwest regions, where a large minority English-speaking people lives. Calls for secession have escalated in recent years as the community members lament about more discrimination and their leaders say the government has repeatedly ignored their political demands.

International monitors say up to 40 people have been killed since violence erupted in the two regions in late September. The government puts the death toll on a maximum of 12 while maintaining that eight members of security forces have been killed this month alone.

The central government in Yaounde has rejected calls for secession or a return to Cameroon’s previous federal system of governance. It has tried to reach out to key separatist leaders for political dialogue although nighttime curfews, restrictions on movement, raids and body searches remain in place in the anglophone regions.

The anglophone community comprise a fifth of the francophone-dominated Cameroon of 22 million people. Its presence is rooted in the colonial past of West Africa and in a decision by France and Britain after the World War I to divide Cameroon, a then German colony, under the mandates of the League of Nations.

Source: Presstv

There is a complete breakdown of law and order in the French Cameroun city of Douala as individuals are killed, raped and assaulted every day in Japoma, a locality in the third district. This drama has been unfolding for several weeks but the Francophone regime in Yaoundé is maintaining a kind of deliberate silence.

A girl, who was kidnapped on leaving a bank, said she was saved after bribing a member of the gang with the money she had withdrawn from her bank account. According to a testimony from a family member of the victim who is currently in hospital, she went to make a withdrawal last Friday and the motorcycle that she boarded to return home changed direction into the bush. Feeling at risk, the young lady called for help, but no one heard her calls.

Later, she was thrown into a yellow vehicle with smoked windows including a lady in her 40s, and a girl of about 14 years old and taken to an unknown destination. They arrived an abandoned building where she revealed that she met a young lady with many other girls and even boys. Some were already dead, and the smell of their bodies filled the dark room.

According to some residents interviewed by Radio Balafon, the lack of electricity in Japoma and drugs that circulate within the area is promoting these attacks.

By Rita Akana

Journalists covering the French Cameroun National Assembly were ordered to leave the premise during a stand-off between the Prime Minister and SDF Members of Parliament. The media gurus were present at the National Assembly during the plenary session today Wednesday, November 29, 2017 when Prime Minister Philemon Yang was assaulted by members of the SDF parliamentary group.  The so-called head of government was about to present the economic program when the MPs told him to shut up.

Immediately journalists and cameramen were ordered to stop coverage and French Cameroun security apparatus was deployed in the box reserved for the press. Some of the journalists had their phones switched off by security forces and as the voices rose between the Prime Minister and the SDF MPs, so also was the case between the media men and the men in uniform. A senior correspondent with the Cameroon Radio and Television was expelled from the building and banned on the spot from covering the National Assembly.

Meanwhile, the French Cameroun Prime Minister did not let go. He delivered his speech while the SDF deputies chanted anti regime songs loudly.  The Social Democratic Front party has thus continued its operation “Blockade” launched last week.

By Rita Akana

On Thursday, many of us celebrated Thanksgiving with our families. Serge Deumeni from Cameroon did not. 40-year-old Serge Deumeni was struck and killed in Adelphi, MD near New Hampshire and Metzerott Rd. Deumeni’s family is now pleading for a second driver to come forward as the family continues to search for answers in their loved one’s death.

Prince George’s County Police said Deumeni was hit by two cars trying to cross New Hampshire Ave and Metzerott Rd. at around 7:30 p.m. on Thanksgiving.

Deumeni’s twin brother told WUSA 9, he didn’t know what Serge was doing in the area, but he did say, they were expecting Deumeni later that night. The 40-year-old never showed. Deumeni’s brother said he got the phone call at around 2 a.m. the next day.

“He has an 18-year-old girl,” said Deumeni’s brother. “She still back in Cameroon, and she’s been crying, and she’s been telling me I’m lying. It’s not true, her father’s not dead.”

Deumeni came from Cameroon, a country in Central Africa, about a year-and-a-half ago. Deumeni’s twin described his brother saying, “He was a sweetheart, very funny guy. Hardworking guy.” A guy who took-on all kinds of tasks.

The immigrant activists group, CASA de Maryland, confirmed Deumeni was a part of their Day Laborer program. CASA’s Langley Park office is less than two miles from Thursday’s fatal collision. Police said Deumeni was found deceased in the roadway Thursday night.

He was struck by a car. That driver stopped. But while on the ground, police said he was hit again by a second car — a small sedan that didn’t stop.

Police are still investigating. It is unclear whether Deumeni was in the crosswalk at the time or when exactly he died. What we do know is: police are searching for that second driver and so is the victim’s family.

“Please, if somebody knows something, please, say something. Please. Say something,” said Deumeni’s brother.

The family is now preparing to fly Deumeni’s body back to Cameroon, where he will be buried. Prince George’s County Police said there is a chance that second driver did not know they hit a person. Police have not said yet whether the driver who did stop will face any charges.

Source: Wusa9