An Easter Sunday accident at Ebombé, located some 25 km from Edéa on the Douala-Yaoundé highway has claimed the lives of 4 people including the wife of Lieutenant-Colonel Dieudonne Ndonfack.. A small Toyota car collided with a large VIP coach from the United Express travel agency.

A spokesperson for the police department has said that the cause of the accident shall be made public soonest. The wife of Lieutenant-Colonel Dieudonne Ndonfack of the national Gendarmerie and three occupants of the Toyota car died instantly. Colonel Ndonfack was rushed to the regional hospital in Edéa and he is under intensive care.

By Fru James

Dr. Boniface Forbin has met his end in his home in Yaoundé.  The circumstances surrounding his death have not been made public by his family. The publisher-editor’s death may not be separated from The Herald Newspaper. Former newsmen and women including the Herald People have observed that at the inception of multiparty politics in Cameroon, relations between the Herald and the Biya administration took a nose-drive and the Herald Group took an unfriendly view of the regime (e. g, Biya’s fictitious anti-corruption campaign). Such became the unfolding of fishing in trouble waters…

Forbin resigned from the defunct Cameroon Airlines and started The Herald Newspaper. He understood that media freedom was better in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and North Korea than in Cameroon. He successfully taught Anglophone journalists the difficulty of being a reporter in Francophone dominated Cameroon.

Forbin and his kinsman Asong Ndifor invested time in training young correspondents on the challenge for Journalism in Cameroon. Forbin had the support of Napoleon Viban and men like Dr. Joachim Arrey, the late Kum Set Ewin, Peter Ngea Mbeng, Tabe Paul Blondo, Ekinneh Agbaw-Ebai, Gerald Ndikum and the Herald Newspaper told the world that the story of the press in Cameroon was that of persecution and perseverance and closure of newspapers, often without an enabling law.

Forbin declared his unflinching support for the Publisher of the Cameroon Post Group, Paddy Mbawa over the Epey Mandengue Affair. Paddy Mbawa had been flogged, head shaved with broken glass and photos published by some sister Anglophone newspapers for 30 pieces of silver. Forbin stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the wives of journalists who suffered persecution.  He was in a Douala hospital to see the wife of the late Pius Njawe who lost her baby after her husband was forced out of their home and taken to the New Bell prison.

He told this reporter when he joined the Herald from the Weekly Post that “When you really want to expose human rights abuses in Cameroon… it becomes more dangerous.” Rest in peace Doc

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

The people of Bangolan village situated in Babessi Sub division,Ngoketundjia in the North West region have stormed the village square demanding the departure of their Fon Chaffah Isaac XI.

Men, women including the youth say the Fon Chaffah is no longer permitted to enter and reside in the chiefdom. The Bangolans also observed that Fon Chaffah is no longer their traditional ruler.  Fridays protest comes one year since the people of Bangolan staged a fierce demonstration which led to many deaths and several persons injured.

On March 19, 2016, the Bangolan palace came under attack when angry villagers besieged the palace demanding the Fon to leave. The Fon’s son was allegedly shot before palace guards retaliated by shooting and wounding some villagers.

The alternate Senator who opted for reconciliation in February last year has ever since not known peace in his village. His subjects accused him of defiling the tradition by publicly denouncing traditional practices by attending a crusade with Apostle John CHI. Salim, a man selected by the villagers as their new chief died last year under mysterious circumstances.

Source: Cameroun Info.Net

Cameroon has been ranked first in the consumption of alcoholic beverage in Central and West Africa.  The listing was made public following research carried out by LVnextCentury, a firm based in Paris.  The ranking was obtained on the basis of the figures provided by the main brewing companies in the various countries of the continent.  The biggest consumer for the entire continent is South Africa.

According to figures released by SABC, the country’s largest beer company, overall beer sales in Cameroon in 2015 was estimated at about 6,600,000 hl (660 million liters), including imports. On average, a Cameroonian consumes 36 liters of alcoholic beverage per year.

The middle and the poor, who largely constitute the Cameroonian society, are most affected by the phenomenon of alcoholism. Young people in school are not spared by the drinking phenomenon. Three quarters of the Cameroonian population devote nearly half of their income to alcohol consumption in a country where the GDP per capita is US $ 1,328.64 (2013) and in which more than 48% of the population, lives below the UN poverty line.

By Chi Prudence Asong

Minister Martin Belinga Eboutou, the Director of the Civil Cabinet at the Presidency of the Republic has reportedly resumed service after a few weeks of unavailability due to poor health. The Biya acolyte re-emerged in public at the Yaounde-Nsimalen International Airport to welcome the Head of State home after the visit to Italy and a vacation in Swiss on Wednesday 12 April 2017.

Recently, official communiqués issued by the Civil Cabinet of the Presidency of the Republic did not carry his name and signature. Martin Belinga Eboutou has been present for almost ten years on all the foreign trips made by the Cameroonian dictator. However, he was conspicuously absent from the last official presidential trip to Italy and the Vatican from 20 to 23 March 2017.

A well-placed source hinted Cameroon Concord News that Belinga Eboutou was very ill when President Biya and wife left country and that all is indeed not well for the demagogue. The 77-year-old was evacuated to Europe in the middle of last year. He returned safely in July 2016 and ended a rumor that had said he had traveled to the land of his ancestors.

By Rita Akana

The Special Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations has revealed that the world body wants a rapid resolution of the socio-political crisis that has shaken the Anglophone regions of Cameroon for nearly six months. This is the message François Louncény Fall gave to officials of La Republique du Cameroun.

During his visit to Yaoundé on the 12^th of April 2017, François Louncény Fall, also Head of the United Nations Regional Office for Central Africa, met with the Secretary General at the Presidency, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh,  Justice Minister Laurent Esso, Minister of External Relations, Lejeune Mbella Mbella and Martin Mbarga Nguelé, Delegate General for National Security.

The UN Secretary General’s Special Representative said  the UN has welcomed the measures announced by the Minister for Justice but added that the Secretary General, Antonio Guterres is hoping for a rapid implementation of these promises.

The UN Special envoy further pointed out that an appeasement policy should be initiated with Southern Cameroonians and should involve the release of the leaders of the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium arrested in connection with the crisis. Louncény Fall was at the Kondengui Prison where he met Barrister Agbor Balla and the radio host, Mancho Bibixy, who are among the 27 people who face the death penalty.

François Louncény Fall condemned the decision to shut down the internet and the arrest of the leaders of the Consortium. The cutting off of the internet is a measure taken by the Francophone government on the 17^th of January and which has already cost the Cameroonian economy more than 2 billion FCFA.

By Rita Akana

South West CPDM elites have suffered another major setback as the only bridge linking the Kingdom of Ossing in Eyumojock Sub constituency in Manyu headed by General Tataw James  via Akak village to Nguti Sub Division has collapsed.  The Intersubdivisional highway bridge in Akak village loaded with regular timber trucks dropped more than 60 feet into the Akak river, sending at least an overloaded timber vehicle and its two Francophone passengers into the water.

“This is a catastrophe of historic proportions for both the Manyu and the South West CPDM elites,” Enoh Njock, an operations manager for the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium said about three hours after the collapse. The old and outdated German bridge has not been repaired for ages. The bridge, which was built after the 1884 Berlin Conference, collapsed in three sections. One section of the bridge lay flat in the river, with the part of overloaded timber truck parked on the rolling pavement.

The truck driver and his companion were seen floundering in the river, calling for help. Cameroon Concord News reporter had just crossed the bridge and was heading to Ossing when it collapsed behind him.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai with files from Eyong Johnson in Nguti

The renowned Barrister Alice Nkom has appealed to the Biya regime to release the detained leaders of the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium including all Southern Cameroonians being held at the Kondengui High security prison in Yaoundé and elsewhere in Francophone Cameroun.  The human rights lawyer told STV news channel that the accusations of terrorism against the arrested Anglophone leaders were cynical.

Nkom said the Anglophone crisis is causing the nation great pain and erecting a stone wall between families and relations in the French and English speaking regions of the country. She argued that nobody in the world will believe Barrister Agbor Felix Nkongho and Dr Fontem Neba are terrorists. For her, the arrests of Southern Cameroonians are not helping to foster the business climate that President Paul Biya spoke during his recent visit to Italy. She pointed out that no right thinking investor can take Cameroon seriously and swore that Cameroon as a nation will pay dearly for the mess going on in Southern Cameroons.

Alice Nkom also said the Minister of Justice and Keeper of the Seals, Laurent Esso acted unwisely and has failed woefully in his handling of the Southern Cameroons situation. For this experienced lawyer, the measures taken by the government to resolve the crisis in the Anglophone regions have been revolutionary and controversial.

“When you cut off communications to someone first you are violating a fundamental right. This is forbidden by the conventions you have signed. And secondly, it is an act of pure secession. And it is you Francophone who come to say that the others are secessionists?

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai