News

29, December 2017

Revealed: CONAC says custom officers are the most corrupt civil servants in Cameroon ⁰

The pro ruling CPDM party’s so-called National Anti-Corruption Commission (CONAC), – the body in charge of the fight against corruption in Cameroon has revealed that the nation suffered an estimated loss of 1246 billion FCFA in the last five years.

The CONAC report stated that a survey carried out at the general treasury in Buea, Southern Cameroons found fictitious payments of court fees amounting to 7,956 billion FCFA from January 2011 to June 2016.

In Bertoua, the chief city in the East region fraudulent payments were valued at CFAF 1.699 billion in the general treasury from January 2014 to July 2016.

Last year, CONAC said it registered 2,402 reports of corruption as against 3,268 in 2015 from all the 10 regions. The fake anti corruption body stated that areas were corruption is rife includes land disputes, public procurement and management of resources allocated to organizations.

CONAC also pointed out that Cameroonian custom officers are among the most corrupt civil servants in Cameroon. It cited in its findings the case of the customs official who owns 13 villas, a five-storey building, 10 registered land, five 30-ton trucks, and five Toyota cars, 28-seat coaster, two 18-seater coaches, a fleet of high-end personal vehicles …

Source: Cameroon Intelligence Report

28, December 2017

UNICEF says 2017 is devastating year for children in war zones ⁰

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has described 2017 as a devastating year for children trapped in conflict zones across the globe, saying the scale of attacks on children in war-ravaged regions reached “shocking” levels in the year.

In a new report published on Wednesday, the UN’s children agency said that throughout 2017, children in war-ravaged zones had come under attack in places where they naturally had to be safe, such as homes, schools, hospitals, and even playgrounds.

According to the UN body, children were employed as human shields, killed, maimed, kidnapped, raped, and even recruited against their will by armed outfits in conflict areas from Iraq, Syria, and Yemen to Nigeria, South Sudan, and Myanmar.

Furthermore, millions of children also bore the brunt of diseases spread as a result of medical shortages caused by fighting, the report said, adding that children also suffered from malnutrition and trauma when access to food, water, and sanitation, and health services was impeded by constant hostilities.

“As these attacks continue year after year, we cannot become numb. Such brutality cannot be the new normal,” said UNICEF Director Manuel Fontaine.

The report also said that some 27 million children in conflict regions had been forced out of school.

“UNICEF calls on all parties to conflict to abide by their obligations under international law to immediately end violations against children and the targeting of civilian infrastructure, including schools and hospitals,” the reports added, calling on countries with influence over involved parties to conflicts “to use that influence to protect children.”

Culled from Presstv

28, December 2017

Southern Cameroons Crisis: 2 mass graves with dozens of bodies found in Mamfe ⁰

Two mass graves containing dozens of bodies have been found in Mamfe, a local human rights activist hinted Cameroon Concord News today Thursday the 28^th of December 2017, adding they appeared to belong to people who had been killed by Cameroon government forces operating in Manyu Division ever since President declared war against the people of Southern Cameroons.

The mass graves were discovered behind the old council office in Mamfe, the chief town in the Manyu constituency. Our Manyu Bureau Chief reported that one of them contained 10 bodies belonging to young people from Eshobi, Egbekaw, Besongabang and Dadi including five other villages.

They had been forced out of the Mamfe prison immediately after the attack on the gendarmerie post in Egbekaw by Cameroon government troops, according to a local human rights activist. The number and identity of the bodies in the other mass grave was not yet known. A Mamfe Rural Council Official who spoke to us but sued for anonymity confirmed that two mass graves had been found, but declined to give more details.

Passersby found the mass graves after noticing a smell and insects there, the Council officer said. The victims belong to the Manyu ethnic group which the Yaounde regime accuses of supporting the Interim Government of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia.

Dozens of armed Southern Cameroons militants have remained active in Manyu confronting the Francophone dominated army.

By Judith Fon in Mamfe

28, December 2017

Libya deports 142 migrants back home to Guinea ⁰

Libya put 142 illegal migrants on a flight back to Guinea on Wednesday with the help of the UN migration agency, officials said, as the North African country steps up deportations to ease severe overcrowding in its detention centers.

The International Organization for Migration flew the Guinean migrants from two western cities – Zewara and Zawya – to the city of Misrata, from where they boarded a plane for Conakry.

(Source: Reuters)

28, December 2017

Cameroon army: 18 hostages rescued ⁰

18 Cameroonian hostages have been released by the elements of the 31st Mechanized Infantry Division of the Cameroon army.

They were detained between the localities of Gamba (North) and Mbé in the Adamaoua, two neighboring areas in the north of Cameroon where arm robbery and attacks on the motorway are rife.

During the operation that led to their release, four of the hostages were wounded and were evacuated to the Norwegian hospital in N’gaoundere. Among the hostages are traders, farmers and cattle dealers.

By Rita Akana

27, December 2017

Ugandan forces kill more than 100 rebels in Congo-Kinshasa ⁰

Uganda’s armed forces have killed more than 100 Uganda-based rebels during a high-scale offensive in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

The Ugandan army said in a statement Wednesday that several other rebels of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) were wounded in aerial attacks and artillery raids.

The military says the operation has been carried out from Ugandan territory.

The rebels were accused of carrying out the attack that left several UN peacekeepers dead earlier this month.

On December 7, armed assailants attacked a base of the United Nations peacekeepers in eastern DRC, killing at least 15 peacekeeperswho were mostly from Tanzania.

The base, which is located about 45 kilometers from the town of Beni, has been repeatedly attacked by rebels from the ADF. It is home to the peacekeeping mission’s rapid intervention force, which has a rare mandate to go on the offensive.

The UN described the attack in Congo as the worst in the recent UN history as well as a war crime.

The ADF originated in Uganda as a rebel force against the government and carried out deadly bombings in the 1990s. A military campaign forced them to relocate to eastern Congo.

The DRC had one of the most brutal colonial rules before undergoing decades of corrupt dictatorship and back-to-back civil wars that left the mineral-rich country poor and politically unstable.

In 2006, the UN mission helped carry out Congo’s first free and fair elections in 46 years, paving the way for President Joseph Kabila to be elected for a five-year term.

His second term in office ended in 2016. Under the DR Congo’s constitution, Kabila is banned from seeking a third term. However, he is authorized to stay in office until his successor is elected but he decided to remain in power. This prompted the UN to urge the Congolese authorities “to respect the fundamental freedoms enshrined in the Congolese Constitution.” The delay in holding an election has flared up violence in the country.

Source: Presstv

27, December 2017

More Southern Cameroonians flee Cameroon government crackdown ⁰

The worsening conflict between Cameroon’s Francophone dominated government and English-speaking Cameroonians now known as the Federal Republic of Ambazonia have displaced about 40 000 people. About 20 000 people are internally displaced while over 40 000 have fled to neighbouring Nigeria. Up to 65 percent of children in the affected area are displaced and face difficulties to attend school.

Tensions between the Francophone dominated security forces and Anglophone communities in the Southern Cameroons have intensified since November resulting in casualties among the civilian population and security forces.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has registered 7 204 arrivals in remote areas of Nigeria’s Cross River State. The refugee agency indicated that thousands more are awaiting registration.

Some 70 per cent of the registered asylum seekers, mostly women and children, come from Akwaya. It is among areas worst affected by deadly protests against alleged marginalization by the government dominated by French-speaking Cameroonians.

“As the unrest in Cameroon continues and more asylum seekers arrive, UNHCR is concerned that the local population’s capacity will soon be stretched to its limits,” said a UNHCR spokesperson. UNHCR and partners have developed a contingency plan for an estimated 40 000 new arrivals from Cameroon.

The minority English-speaking community in Cameroon is disgruntled by the reunification process that brought the English and the French-speaking parts of the country together in 1961. They complain about marginalisation and under-representation in the country’s Francophone-dominated administration of President Paul Biya. The Central African country is seen as fragile with the 2018 elections and the Boko Haram insurgency infiltrating from neighbouring Nigeria posing other problems.

CCN with files from CAJNews

27, December 2017

Yaounde frees US professor held for criticizing Biya regime ⁰

A New York literature professor held in the Central African nation of Cameroon since early this month for criticizing the government was released Wednesday, his lawyer said.

Dual U.S. and Cameroonian citizen Patrice Nganang waited to be expelled to an unknown destination, lawyer Emmanuel Simh said, adding that the professor has been told not to return.

The 37-year-old had written an article for Jeune Afrique that was critical of how Cameroon’s government has handled a sometimes violent secessionist movement in some English-speaking areas. The country’s English-speaking minority has complained about discrimination by French speakers. Human rights groups, which have accused Cameroon authorities of trying to silence opposition voices, had urged Nganang’s release.

The charges against him included issuing a death threat; insulting constitutional bodies, specifically the military; and inciting violence in a Facebook post, according to supporters including the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists. “We can only be very happy, when we have an unlawfully and arbitrarily detained client, to see him released,” Simh said.

Last week, a military appeals court in Cameroon acquitted and freed Ahmed Abba, a correspondent for Radio France International’s Hausa service, who had been sentenced to 10 years in prison for not denouncing acts of terrorism and laundering proceeds of terrorist acts. Cameroon had faced international pressure over his conviction.

Culled from the Seattle Times

27, December 2017

Russia to supply Turkey with four S-400 missile divisions worth $2.5 billion ⁰

Russia will sell Turkey four divisions of the S-400 surface-to-air missile system worth $2.5 billion under a deal agreed between the two sides earlier this month, says the head of Russian conglomerate Rostec.

Sergei Chemezov told the Kommersant daily on Wednesday that Turkey would pay 45 percent of the cost in advance while Russia would provide loans to cover the remaining 55 percent, adding that the Russian and Turkish finance ministries had already completed talks on the loans.

He added that Moscow would begin the first deliveries in March 2020.

Turkey is the first NATO member state to acquire the advanced S-400 missile system, the Russian official said.

The deal was discussed between Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan during the former’s visit to Ankara on December 11.

The deal comes as Turkey has been establishing closer relations with Russia after its ties with Western and European governments soured following a crackdown in the country over the July 2016 coup attempt.

NATO originally reacted skeptically to the decision, saying the system was not compatible with its equipment.

However, the Pentagon said recently that Turkey’s purchase of the S-400 system, the most significant deal Ankara has signed with a non-NATO military supplier, was generally “a good idea” as it was inter-operable with the military alliance’s other systems.

The S-400 is Russia’s latest surface-to-air missile defense system.

It has a range of 400 kilometers and can track up to 300 targets, including aircraft, drones and ballistic and cruise missiles, simultaneously.

Russia has also agreed a deal with Saudi Arabia to supply the S-400 to Riyadh.

The agreement was signed during Saudi Arabia’s King Salman’s visit to Moscow in October.

A number of other was also signed during the King Salman’s trip, the first by a Saudi monarch.

Source: Presstv

27, December 2017

Southern Cameroons War: BIR soldier gun down in Egbekaw ⁰

A soldier from the Rapid Intervention Battalion (Bir) – an elite unit of the Cameroonian army – was killed on Monday in Egbekaw following an attack attributed to Southern Cameroons Defense Force. The death of the soldier has been confirmed by the military authorities in Manyu Division. The attack has also been claimed by an Ambazonia militia group with ties to the SCNC.

Southern Cameroons armed attacks against Cameroon government forces are now spreading all over the Federal Republic of Ambazonia. Not far from the border with Nigeria, specifically in Toko, 3 other soldiers were wounded. After October 1, 2017, the date of the symbolic proclamation of independence, at least 89 Cameroonian soldiers have been killed in attacks claimed by Anglophone militants.

By Sama Ernest