The United Nations High Commission for Refugees, (UNHCR) has began verification of 18,000 Cameroonian refugees in Calabar, Cross River capital.

The refugees who are camped in different locations in Cross River were asked to come with their fact sheets and other relevant documents to be verified as registered refugees.

According to UNHCR, the verification is to improve its data on the economic capacities within the population, identify persons with specific needs and extremely vulnerable persons, It also targets them for life-saving interventions, including food assistance, non-food items and livelihood support.

Speaking to journalists on Wednesday in Calabar, Udama Stephen, a Psychiatric Nurse, working with Red Cross Society, noted that the refugees were in Calabar to renew their identity cards which were issued by UNHCR as a source of identification.

Stephen said that the data the organization had showed that about 18,000 refugees from Cameroon would partake in the exercise and as they brought their cards, they would be treated free of charge.

“What we do here is also basically primary healthcare, we deal with common sicknesses like malaria, typhoid, ulcer, cold, body pains and so on but if it is beyond primary level we refer them to a more complex health facility.

“Some of them are sick because they lack access to healthcare, some are physically challenged and majority of them don’t have jobs, so the duty of UNHCR is to take care of their basic needs which includes their health need.

“Others include their nutrition, financial support and empowerment for the less privilege, basically for Cameroonian refugees in Cross River,” he added.

Similarly, an official of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) who preferred to be anonymous, said the officers were present in the verification centre to provide security.

He also noted that they were also ensuring that people who partake in the exercise were truly Cameroonians.

On his part, one of the refugees, 35 year old Tamfu Theodoni, from North-West Cameroon narrated his ordeal and why he decided to flee to Nigeria.

“I was a University Campus Driver but had to flee to Nigeria after my cousin who was also a driver was shot in the head by Cameroonian soldiers.

“I fled to Nigeria to find succour, I pray for peace and unity between the francophone and anglophone Cameroonians,” he narrated.

By Engelis Okesack Besong

Nigeria and Cameroon have beefed up security in the Gulf of Guinea and maritime borders as the 14 days ultimatum by the Biafra Nations League (BnL) to release the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi kanu, expired on May 20.

Recall that BnL had, on May 6, through its National Leader, Princewill Richards, given the two countries 14 days to release Kanu and withdraw troops from South East, as well as the Bakassi Peninsula.

Sources said there is heavy military presence as Nigeria and Cameroon have deployed heavy gunboats to the maritime borders in Bakassi Peninsula.

They noted that military presence on the major road to Calabar from Ikang has increased, while soldiers engage in stop and search operations.

The Guardian, however, observed that people were going about their normal businesses, as everywhere was calm and peaceful except for security men who were on red alert for any uprising.

An army personnel, who does not want to be mentioned, at one of the check points, said they were on a normal military exercise to forestall any violence, but declined to comment on the BnL ultimatum.

Operational Commander of BnL, Henry Edet, reacting to the reinforcement of troops, said: “They will end up intimidating indigenes, but they can’t stop anything that wants to happen.”

He noted that the BnL Chief of Staff in Ikang was alarmed that he received a call from Department of State Services (DSS) about the ultimatum, warning him against any violent action.

As part of efforts to check any violent situation, it was gathered that Richards was arrested and allegedly brutalised by police operatives in Ikot Ekpene, in Akwa Ibom State, as he was returning home after addressing the press in Calabar.

It was learnt they accused him of sending his boys to kill police operatives in Orlu, Imo State, and Essien Udim, in Akwa Ibom, as well as sending militants to vandalise pipelines in riverine areas, which he, reportedly, denied.

He has since been released on bail.

Source: The Guardian Nigeria

At least 3,000 people have been displaced in fresh fighting along the Nigerian-Cameroonian border, according to forces battling Boko Haram militants.

Refugees at Minawao, a camp on Cameroon’s northern border with Nigeria, say the number of people seeking humanitarian assistance in the camp increases by the day.

Isaac Luka, president of Nigerian refugees at Minawao, said the current influx caused by hunger and gun battles is making living conditions that were already bad in the camp even worse.

“There are Nigerians coming from the host community around the border,” he told VOA via a messaging app from Minawao on Wednesday. “They were given portions of land to start cultivating food, but this year the season was not good for the harvest and recurrent attacking at the border pushed them to the camp. They have their relations in the camp. They share the little they have. Some go selling firewood to earn something for their children.”

Luka fled Nigeria’s Borno state in June 2014 after Boko Haram terrorists killed more than 20 people in his village, including his family.

He said host communities around the camp are also overwhelmed by the number of civilians escaping hunger and battles between Cameroon government troops and Boko Haram fighters along the northern border with Chad and Nigeria.

Toudje Voumou, the highest government official in Mayo-Moskota district, said the Multinational Joint Task Force of the Lake Chad Basin Commission, or MNJTF, has increased its presence on the border. The force has troops from Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad.

Voumou said for about two weeks there have been intense battles between Cameroon government troops and Boko Haram militants on both sides of the Cameroon-Nigeria border. Voumou added that several military posts have been erected to face Boko Haram militants hiding and harassing civilians in villages on both sides of the border.

MNJTF announced in February that the month of March will be dedicated to wiping out remaining Boko Haram fighters in the border area.

The force said several attacks have been launched on Boko Haram strongholds, but did not specify how many jihadists have been killed or wounded.

The Cameroon government said civilians should assist troops fighting the jihadists by reporting strangers in their villages. The government also said it has remobilized militias to assist with the ongoing battles against Boko Haram by reporting strangers and armed men hiding in the bush to government troops.

Olivier Guillaume Beer, the UNHCR representative in Cameroon, spoke to Cameroon state broadcaster CRTV this week, saying humanitarian conditions for displaced persons is concerning.

“We have 2,500 people in the transit center, which has a capacity of 300. These people are supposed to be registered and then go to the Minawao refugee camp, which is already very saturated. Sixty-seven thousand people in the camp,” Beer said. “So, these are our challenges. We need more resources to be able to register and document them, to provide health care, increase the number of classrooms, and alleviate the suffering of this population.”

During an April 2022 visit to Cameroon, the U.N.’s refugee chief, Filippo Grandi, vowed to give more support to displaced persons and refugees fleeing violence and natural disasters. However, the U.N. said it received only 23% of the $100 million it needed to take care of the growing needs of refugees in the central African state.

Boko Haram attacks broke out in Nigeria in 2009 before spreading to neighboring countries, including Cameroon, Chad and Niger.

More than 36,000 people have been killed, mainly in Nigeria, and 3 million have fled their homes, according to the United Nations.

Source: VOA

Nigeria Immigration Service has arrested and detained three suspected gun smugglers at the Mfum Border Command, near Ikom in Cross River State.

Head of the Service at the border, Mr. Ndubuisi Eneregbu, who confirmed the arrest, said the fourth suspect was at large.

In a press statement in Calabar, Eneregbu said the three suspects were two Nigerians while the third is a Cameroonian migrant.

The third is said to have confessed to being a member of the Ambazonia separatist group, fighting in southwest Cameroon for independence.

The NIS boss further explained that the suspects were intercepted at the weekend on a motorcycle with arms and live ammunition, believed to be heading towards Cameroon.

“The suspects were found with a small bag containing incriminating items such as one barrater pistol, one locally made pistol, three live ammunition, charms and one Tecno BC3 Android phone.

“According to them, they were four and that the fourth person, currently at large, left them with the bag containing the incriminating items.

“Preliminary investigation revealed that one of the suspects, the Cameroonian, is a member of the Ambazonia separatist group in the Republic of Cameroon.

“The three suspects along with the incriminating items have been handed over to the Divisional Police Officer in Etung Division, Etung Local Government Area of the state for further investigation,” he added.

Eneregbu assured that since he resumed duties, there have been efforts to curtail illegal activities within border communities.

The Comptroller said, “The command initiated regular stakeholder meetings with traditional rulers of all border communities to enhance synergy and enshrine trust.

“We have a robust cordial relationship with the border communities. We have had a series of stakeholders’ meetings with the border communities and other security agencies.

“When I came on board this command, my team and I paid courtesy visits to all the traditional institutions within the communities under our command.

“We did that because we understand the need for synergy between security agencies and the communities.

“No security agency can tackle insecurity alone without the support of the community as a whole,” he stated.

He indicated that despite certain logistics challenges, the officers and men were prepared to apprehend anyone found perpetrating illegalities and sabotaging the economy of the country.

Culled from Daily Post Ng

The peaceful Nigerian fishing village of Manga sits not far from Cameroon’s border, but its residents know all about the separatist war raging inside their West African neighbour.

Cameroon’s five-year conflict is spilling over into Nigeria, where the armed forces are struggling to secure the border as they battle jihadists, bandit gangs and separatists of their own elsewhere.

Cameroonian security forces and separatist gunmen care little for the territorial integrity of their neighbours where they have carried out cross-border raids, attacks on villages and made illegal arrests.

Manga lived though the bloody experience at the end of last year.

On November 17 around 50 armed separatists crossed over from Cameroon, attacking the village and killing five people including Manga’s 70-year-old chief, residents say.

Dozens of bullet holes still mark the earthen walls of the chief’s house and its upper part is charred by fire.

“I had never heard gunshots like that,” said Abubakar Manga, the chief’s brother, who managed to escape on a canoe from where he watched the attack.

“We still don’t understand,” he told AFP.

Two days before, about 30 Cameroonians had found refuge in Manga, after the attack on their village in Cameroon.

“In my village, the separatists confronted the army, but did not attack us,” said one of these refugees.

“But suddenly they changed and started destroying our houses,” said the man who spoke on condition of anonymity for his security.

Terrible revenge

Cameroon’s war has killed more than 6,000 people and forced one million Cameroonians to flee their homes as they are caught between the army and the rebels.

The war broke out in October 2017 when militants declared an independent state in the Northwest region and Southwest region, home to most of the anglophone minority in a country that is 80 percent French-speaking.

Since then, more than 250 villages have been destroyed, in terrible revenge by either the separatists or soldiers against populations accused of supporting the opposing camp.

“We fled to Manga to take shelter,” the refugee said, explaining how they believed they would be safe in Nigeria and not suffer violence for a second time.

But the separatist fighters are not the only ones who have expanded their fight to the other side of the Nigerian border.

In October, around 60 Cameroonian soldiers invaded the villages of Mairogo and Tosso, harassing and intimidating their inhabitants, according to the UN and local authorities.

“They were looking for armed separatists who had fled to Nigeria,” local elected official Joseph Ammamzalla told AFP.

Cameroonian authorities suspect that separatists are hiding among the 70,000 Cameroonian refugees in Nigeria.

For Cameroon officials, eastern Nigeria is also one of the sources of arms supply for the separatists.

In January and February 2022, Cameroonian soldiers again invaded Mairogo, according to the local official.

“They severely beat several residents, and arrested and took with them four young people, and we have had no further news,” he said.

To keep the refugees away from the border, the Taraba State authorities and the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) are in discussions to create a refugee camp.

In neighbouring states of Benue and Cross River, four camps have been established.

“Here I am no longer afraid,” said Zacharia Okana, 59, a Cameroonian refugee who lives in one of the Cross River camps.

An opponent of the regime of President Paul Biya, in power since 1982, Okana fled Cameroon in 2017 for fear of arrest. He said he was suspected of financially supporting the separatists, which he denies.

But in September 2020, he says he was illegally arrested in Ikom, a Nigerian town near the border, and taken back to Cameroon, where he spent three months in prison.

‘Abuja laissez-faire’

Since 2018, Nigerian media have reported the incursion of several villages in Cross River by Cameroonian soldiers.

Contacted by AFP, the Cameroonian defence ministry said it was “not aware of these incidents” while Nigeria’s armed forces had no comment.

One Nigerian military official, however, said, on condition of anonymity, that the army continued to work to “secure the border”.

But this is not “the priority” for Abuja, said Ikemesit Effiong, an analyst with the Nigerian risk consultancy SMB Intelligence.

The army is already engaged “on several other fronts”, he said, in the northeast, where it has been fighting a jihadist insurgency for twelve years and the northwest where criminal gangs are terrorising local populations.

Yaounde and Abuja “have no desire to publicise these incidents”, Effiong said.

There is a laissez-faire from Abuja, he said, as the government has no interest in seeing “a successful separatist rebellion in its neighbour” when it is also facing separatist agitation of its own.

The Nigerian army has been trying for years to crush the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) separatist group, which is fighting to create a republic for the Igbo people in the southeast of the country.

“Because of their geographical proximity, the authorities are afraid to see the creation of a common front,” Effiong said.

That concern was reinforced in 2021 when IPOB and one of the separatist groups in Cameroon sought to enter into an alliance. But the accord did not materialise.

In 2018, Abuja did arrest several Cameroon separatist leaders seeking asylum in Nigeria and transferred them to Yaounde, where they were sentenced to life imprisonment.

The extradition was later deemed illegal by the Nigerian high court and denounced by the UN and civil society, but the men are still in prison in Cameroon.

Source: AFP

A Federal High Court in Kano has sentenced a Cameroonian, Wamba Jean-Gaston, 41, to five years in correctional centre, for trafficking three young women and four men from Cameroon enroute Nigeria to Europe.

The three female victims are: Belinga Ovanda, 19; Koussene Agnes, 21; and Meye Uwono, 27; while the male ones are Thomas Ange, 21; Ovanda Rodrigue, 21; Boris Kouass, 20; and Yannick Poudjom, 18.

Justice Abdullahi Muhammed-Liman convicted Jean-Gaston, after he had pleaded guilty to the two-count charge levelled against him.

Liman expressed concern over the implication of the convict’s conduct to general regional insecurity affecting many countries.

He described the convict’s act as a calamity and hazard that could befall not only the victims, but could contribute to banditry and kidnapping.

Earlier, Counsel to the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), Mr Abdullahi Babale, told the court that the convict was arrested in Kano on Dec. 10, 2021.

Babale said the Cameroonian was arrested with the seven victims on their way to Algeria.

He said the convict was illegally processing entry documents for the trafficked persons to travel to Algeria and Europe through Nigeria and Niger Republic, without having a resident permit or visa.

The counsel said the offence was contrary to, and punishable under Section 26 (1) of Trafficking in Persons (Prohibition) Enforcement Act, 2015.

Source: NAN

The Comptroller of Immigration Service (CIS), Cross River State Command of the Nigeria Immigration Service, Chris Baikie, has disclosed that the ongoing conflict between South-West Cameroon, called Ambazonia, and President Paul Biya’s soldiers is a serious concern to the service and other security agencies in the state.

In an interview, he stated that the matter is always discussed whenever the state security council meets.

He said Cross River State frequently bears the fallouts of the insurgency which is into its sixth year because it is next to the conflict zone.

“At every state security council meeting with the governor, Prof Ben Ayade, we do not fail to critically look at the insurgency as it impacts on our state and Nigerians.

“The conflict is a serious concern to us because of its proximity to our state, not only because of the influx of refugees but other attendant issues,” he said.

He used the opportunity to debunk reports which said that Nigerian traders, seafarers and other maritime persons were being blocked or turned back at the Cameroonian maritime boundary in the Bakassi Peninsula by Cameroonian security forces.

Two weeks ago, reports were rife that traders in Bakassi and Akpabuyo local government areas of the state, who ply the maritime route into Cameroon to buy or sell bags of rice, palm oil and other edibles, were being returned.

It was alleged that the Cameroonians did so because they do not want security issues from Nigeria as they host the Africa Cup of Nations.

“When I got the media enquiries, I immediately got across to our men in Bakassi to critically study the situation and to Interview Nigerian traders going to or returning from Cameroon if the media reports were true.

“The situation report from our man in charge of Bakassi axis is that there is no such development,” he said.

“Nigerian traders are not turned back from Cameroon.

“But Cameroonian security forces are patrolling their borders daily as a way to deter any threats to the ongoing African Nations Cup.”

Baikie lamented that they have only one serviceable boat and are therefore not able to patrol the long stretch of the maritime boundary as well.

Source: Daily Post