The Vice President of the Ambazonia Interim Government, Dabney Yerima has brushed aside the much talk about French Cameroun military solution to the five year-long conflict in Southern Cameroons as an illusion. The exiled Southern Cameroons leader stated in an interview with Cameroon Intelligence Report late on Monday that the two independent Cameroons are locked in a strategic stalemate on the ground for the past five years.

Dabney Yerima told CIR’s correspondent in Holland that it is time for the new generation of La Republique du Cameroun political elites to come to the negotiating table for the two nations to discuss the terms of separation.

Yerima furthered that Southern Cameroonians were not expecting miracles or quick solutions and pointed out that the path forward will be necessarily incremental. But he noted that 2022 will witness the departure of the 88-year old French Cameroun dictator, Paul Biya and with a new leader in Yaoundé, the Ambazonia Interim Government and its jailed leaders will be able to work on concrete steps towards a satisfactory divorce package.

The Southern Cameroons revolutionary figure highlighted that the lingering atrocities currently being committed by the Francophone dominated Cameroon government military and self defense operations by Ambazonia Revolutionary Guards are making it increasingly clear that Biya and Yaoundé cannot determine the outcome of the Southern Cameroons war of liberation, and that a military solution remains an illusion.

Dabney Yerima stated that he remains actively engaged with other Southern Cameroons restoration groups in order to develop a unified front against the enemies of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia.

The Vice President of the Southern Cameroons Interim Government underscored that it is important for restoration groups to move away from empty social media propaganda on face book, Whatsapp and YouTube and commit to the liberation struggle.

By Isong Asu with files from Den Hague

Mandatory voting, lowering the security deposit and modifying the Electoral Council’s composition… We list out the main points of the reform project that the opposition was prevented by police from presenting on 24 November as planned.

The show of force had an unexpected effect. On 24 November, police and gendarmes were deployed in large numbers in front of the Hilton Hotel in Yaoundé, where the opposition was due to officially present its draft reform of the electoral code.

The organisers had no choice but to postpone the event at the last minute, so the guests had to leave. Even so, against all odds, the police’s muscular intervention put the initiative back in the spotlight. Launched by seven political parties last March, it seemed to have disappeared from the radar.

What does this 231-page document, which the opposition is now distributing to all public officials and diplomats in Yaoundé, contain? According to the technical secretariat that contributed to it, 15 political parties, 12 civil society organisations and about 50 citizens responded to the call for contributions that was launched.

The proposals, which mainly concern the electoral code’s provisions that require some modifications, were analysed, excluding those that could require the Constitution to be revised. “This is the minimum acceptable for the elections to take place smoothly,” say the members of the opposition.

The standard and the unexpected

Some of these proposals are fairly standard: introducing a single ballot paper; lengthening the duration of electoral campaigns (30 days instead of 15); lowering the security deposit required for legislative elections (from 3m CFA francs ($5,165) to 500,000 CFA francs per candidate) and municipal (from 50,000 CFA francs to 25,000 CFA francs); and prohibiting polling stations from being set up in barracks or chieftaincies.

THE RACE TO TRANSFORM

Others are more surprising, such as making voting compulsory. This would complement Article 2 of the electoral law, which currently stipulates that the election is by universal, equal and secret suffrage, and that it can be direct or indirect. The measure aims to reduce the abstention rates observed in recent elections. During the last local elections in February 2020, turnout was just over 40%.

The opposition has fear and doubts regarding the neutrality, representativeness and independence of the Electoral Council.

To remedy this, it has proposed that the 18-member body be composed – in future – of eight representatives from parties sitting in the Assembly; three representatives from parties only present in municipal councils; three figures from the three parties whose candidates emerged top during the last presidential election; two representatives from the administration that were chosen by the president of the Republic who have had no political affiliation for at least three years; and two members of the civil society.

The minutes from the 2018 presidential election proved to be a stumbling block while the case was being examined before the Constitutional Council. In general, the authenticity of the documents transmitted to the Commission Nationale de Recensement des Votes was often questioned.

The opposition therefore proposed establishment of a communal commission that will be responsible for supervising votes, ensuring the conformity of the minutes and be above the departmental commission. The objective is to reduce the risk of litigation at the national level. The same document adds that all the minutes should have the same legal value, but that today, only the Elecam’s PV is valid in case of dispute.

Another proposed change – which would amend Articles 133, 168 and 194 of the electoral code – is that post-election disputes be examined after the provisional results have been announced. Therefore, the body would only be able to proclaim an election’s final results once the Constitutional Council settles any possible post-election disputes.

Source: The Africa Report

Mandatory voting, lowering the security deposit and modifying the Electoral Council’s composition… We list out the main points of the reform project that the opposition was prevented by policefrom presenting on 24 November as planned.

The show of force had an unexpected effect. On 24 November, police and gendarmes were deployed in large numbers in front of the Hilton Hotel in Yaoundé, where the opposition was due to officially present its draft reform of the electoral code.

The organisers had no choice but to postpone the event at the last minute, so the guests had to leave. Even so, against all odds, the police’s muscular intervention put the initiative back in the spotlight. Launched by seven political parties last March, it seemed to have disappeared from the radar.

What does this 231-page document, which the opposition is now distributing to all public officials and diplomats in Yaoundé, contain? According to the technical secretariat that contributed to it, 15 political parties, 12 civil society organisations and about 50 citizens responded to the call for contributions that was launched.

The proposals, which mainly concern the electoral code’s provisions that require some modifications, were analysed, excluding those that could require the Constitution to be revised. “This is the minimum acceptable for the elections to take place smoothly,” say the members of the opposition.

The standard and the unexpected

Some of these proposals are fairly standard: introducing a single ballot paper; lengthening the duration of electoral campaigns (30 days instead of 15); lowering the security deposit required for legislative elections (from 3m CFA francs ($5,165) to 500,000 CFA francs per candidate) and municipal (from 50,000 CFA francs to 25,000 CFA francs); and prohibiting polling stations from being set up in barracks or chieftaincies.

THE RACE TO TRANSFORM

Others are more surprising, such as making voting compulsory. This would complement Article 2 of the electoral law, which currently stipulates that the election is by universal, equal and secret suffrage, and that it can be direct or indirect. The measure aims to reduce the abstention rates observed in recent elections. During the last local elections in February 2020, turnout was just over 40%.

The opposition has fear and doubts regarding the neutrality, representativeness and independence of the Electoral Council.

To remedy this, it has proposed that the 18-member body be composed – in future – of eight representatives from parties sitting in the Assembly; three representatives from parties only present in municipal councils; three figures from the three parties whose candidates emerged top during the last presidential election; two representatives from the administration that were chosen by the president of the Republic who have had no political affiliation for at least three years; and two members of the civil society.

The minutes from the 2018 presidential election proved to be a stumbling block while the case was being examined before the Constitutional Council. In general, the authenticity of the documents transmitted to the Commission Nationale de Recensement des Votes was often questioned.

The opposition therefore proposed establishment of a communal commission that will be responsible for supervising votes, ensuring the conformity of the minutes and be above the departmental commission. The objective is to reduce the risk of litigation at the national level. The same document adds that all the minutes should have the same legal value, but that today, only the Elecam’s PV is valid in case of dispute.

Another proposed change – which would amend Articles 133, 168 and 194 of the electoral code – is that post-election disputes be examined after the provisional results have been announced. Therefore, the body would only be able to proclaim an election’s final results once the Constitutional Council settles any possible post-election disputes.

Source: The Africa Report

On Nov. 12, riots broke out in the city of Bamenda, the capital of Cameroon’s Northwest region, in response to the killing of 8-year-old Brandy Tataw by a stray bullet after a police officer fired a live round at a car that had supposedly not obeyed orders at a checkpoint.

After the killing, residents took to the streets with tree branches, a traditional symbol for peace, and expressed their outrage. The protests soon turned violent, with buildings burned and the military firing into the crowd. The scenes in Bamenda nearly mirrored those in Buea, the capital of the Southwest region, a month prior, when 5-year-old Caro Louise Ndialle was killed by security forces under similar circumstances and furious bystanders beat to death the officer who fired the fatal shot.

Weeks later, on Nov. 24, unidentified gunmen attacked a school in Ekondo Titi in the Southwest region, killing three students and a teacher. The government blamed secessionists, who in turn blamed other groups within the splintered Anglophone movement and the Cameroonian government.

The Anglophone crisis in Cameroon has escalated in recent months at the hands of all parties to the conflict. The crisis began in 2016 as peaceful protests by lawyers and teachers demanding linguistic reforms but rapidly escalated into a war of secession that has killed thousands of people and displaced over a million. To many in Cameroon’s Anglophone regions, the recent killings are not new but instead a continuation of the heavy-handed techniques, corruption, and impunity demonstrated by the security forces.

In the aftermath of the killings, multiple factions of the divided separatist movement announced retaliatory measures, ranging from restarting a ban on all schooling, a controversial policy that they claim is to keep children safe but is seen by many on the ground to be a means of maintaining leverage and exerting control over the population, to calls to attack all members of the military.

These are far from the only recent escalations in the conflict. On Nov. 10, an explosive device was detonated inside a lecture hall at the University of Buea and injured 11 students. Just days before, a taxi driver was killed when his car exploded in the same city. The explosions followed widespread shock after passengers were forced out of a bus and tortured by separatist fighters, purportedly for not obeying orders to enact a “ghost town.”

The idea of a ghost town—similar to a general strike, albeit enforced—was originally a means for the civilian population to demonstrate their support for the striking lawyers and teachers, but it has come to be seen on the ground as an oppressive tool used by the Anglophone diaspora to demonstrate their control. While calls to create ghost towns have not been strictly followed in recent months, the explosions and attacks have caused a new sense of fear among the population.

These actions reflect a hardening of positions by all parties to the conflict, underscoring that it will continue unless the two sides shift their focus from zero-sum approaches, denials of the conflict’s severity, and infighting. However, actions by both parties indicate that the opposite is occurring.

Since the beginning of the conflict, the Cameroonian government has been in denial, hiding the burning of villages and attempting to blame the separatists for atrocities that it later took responsibility for. The government has attempted to unilaterally propose solutions that do not address the conflict’s root causes.

It held a national dialogue in 2019 that was boycotted by separatists, which led to the implementation of decades-old changes to the Cameroonian Constitution through regional elections held in December 2020. The opposition and many civil society groups boycotted these elections while the government continued to commit the very abuses that led to the conflict in the first place.

The government has continued this denial and taken its heavy-handed approach to the conflict even further. In October, Cameroon’s foreign minister summoned the diplomatic corps in Yaoundé, the capital, and said the government had undertaken “expensive and extensive structural and administrative reforms” to address the conflict, saying they demonstrated the government’s commitment to ending it.

In reality, the government allowed nascent peace talks with imprisoned separatist leaders to fall victim to political infighting and has continued to state that symbolic actions that do not include separatists are a sufficient means of addressing Anglophone grievances. Doing so continues to show its unwillingness to accept responsibility for allowing the crisis to escalate, its continued human rights abuses, and a refusal to engage in meaningful talks.

Recently, the government has taken its disproportionate and heavy-handed approach beyond its own borders, particularly into Nigeria. Nigeria hosts more than 60,000 refugees from the conflict but has also served as a source of materials including armaments and medical treatment for separatist fighters, who take advantage of the porous border between the two countries.

While Nigeria facilitated the arrest and extradition of separatist leaders to Cameroon in 2018, an act that was later declared illegal by local courts, Anglophone Cameroonians had largely been able to live in the country with minimal interference from authorities. This situation has changed rapidly in recent months.

Anglophone Cameroonians have been facing unprecedented levels of harassment and intimidation at the hands of Nigerian authorities, including extrajudicial deportation to Cameroon, often resulting in being imprisoned and tortured once being handed over. This often takes the form of joint operations against those accused of supporting separatists but regularly leads to civilians being harassed, picked up, tortured, and deported.

In other cases, the Cameroonian military has crossed into Nigeria in search of separatist fighters, leading to complaints from Nigerian villagers about harassment and intimidation by the foreign forces. When Cameroonian forces crossed into Nigeria earlier in the conflict, it led to a diplomatic standoff between Yaoundé and Abuja. Now, it seems to be done in coordination between the two. Some observers speculate this is the result of a visit by Cameroonian officials to Abuja in July, after which the Nigerian government stated it would ensure that its country was not a safe haven for separatists in Cameroon.

Some speculate that this is the result of a partnership, announced in April, between one of the major Cameroonian secessionist groups, the Ambazonia Governing Council, and the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), a secessionist group in Nigeria. The Cameroonian government has taken advantage of the secessionist issue in an effort to convince Nigerian officials that both governments face the same threat. Cameroonian leaders frequently mention shared security challenges along the countries’ southern border and even congratulated the Nigerian government on its arrest of IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu this year.

Cameroon’s Government Is Deceiving the West While Diverting Foreign Aid

Paul Biya’s regime is ignoring the battle against Boko Haram and the Islamic State and using foreign counterterrorism assistance to fund its brutal repression of citizens with legitimate grievances.

As the Nigerian government faces an increase in attacks by secessionist groups across its southwest, and responds by arresting more separatist leaders and threatening brutal retaliation, it is easy to depict the coordination as an extension of its domestic strategy to those perceived to support secession in neighboring Cameroon.

However, the fears underlying this approach are not well founded. It ignores the historically tense relationship between the Igbo people in southeastern Nigeria and the Anglophone populations of Cameroon, which has its roots in the colonial period. Moreover, the Ambazonia Governing Council is only one of several groups that comprise the bitterly divided secessionist movement in Cameroon, and cooperation between secessionists and Nigerian fighters has occurred throughout the conflict. Similarly, if any party to the recent accord were to benefit from the agreement, it would be the Ambazonian secessionists, who are far less established than the paramilitary wing of the IPOB.

Refugees living in Nigeria acknowledge that this argument could be used by the Cameroonian government, which has long been angered by the safe haven it saw Nigeria as providing to separatists. Regardless of its source, a climate of fear and distress now exists among refugees in Nigeria, with many believing the country they fled to is no longer safe.

Although the government bears the bulk of responsibility for the conflict and its continuation, actions by separatists in recent months have similarly caused the conflict to escalate.

Until recently, separatist fighters, composed of loosely formed groups with shifting allegiances to the bitterly divided diaspora, have predominantly relied on ambushes, kidnappings, and similar means. However, this year, separatist fighters have increased the use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) across Cameroon’s two Anglophone regions.

Between January and April, separatists planted at least 27 IEDs that detonated across the Northwest and Southwest regions, more than in all previous years of the conflict combined. Such attacks have continued, with 15 soldiers killed in two IED attacks in September alone. These attacks have not only led to heightened fear among the Cameroonian security forces in the two regions who already were suffering from low morale but have also had a negative impact on efforts to deliver humanitarian assistance.

In addition to the use of IEDs, separatist groups have become more daring in their attacks. In early October, Cameroonian Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute was rushed to safety when separatist fighters began shooting in his vicinity in the Northwest region. Similarly, targets previously seen as “off-limits,” such as traditional leaders, are now being regularly kidnapped, tortured, or even killed.

The separatists, while insisting that they are open to dialogue, have neglected to resolve the infighting within the movement that has prevented potentially promising opportunities for mediation from taking hold. The use of IEDs and an uptick in attacks have undoubtedly impacted the Cameroonian military, leading it to take more brazen actions such as forming civilian militias. However, the attacks have also increased the public’s fear of being targeted or caught up in an explosion, solidifying the sentiment that neither side is serving the interests of civilians in the war-torn regions.

While the outrage that was evident on the streets of Buea and Bamenda was directly sparked by the killing of two girls, it is emblematic of the resentment that the population of Cameroon’s Anglophone regions has felt as the conflict has escalated in recent months. This is the result of actions by both the government and separatist fighters, along with a lack of progress toward resolving the conflict.

Unless the two sides accept that concessions will have to be made and that the current zero-sum approach, fraught with infighting, is untenable, such escalations will continue. The tragic result will be more scenes mirroring those that occurred in Buea and Bamenda. Only a negotiated settlement that addresses the long-standing and genuine grievances of the Anglophone minority through fundamental changes to how Cameroon is governed will lead to a sustainable  resolution of the conflict—but each escalation in the conflict makes this more difficult.

Any resolution will require the secessionist movement to resolve its entrenched infighting and understand that the desires of the populations living in Cameroon’s Anglophone regions may not be entirely aligned with the demands of activists in the diaspora. Finally, the Cameroonian government must accept its role in sparking the conflict, ranging from the decades-long marginalization of the Anglophone minority to recent human rights violations. Only after these initial steps are taken could confidence-building measures and an eventual negotiated settlement be possible.

Culled from Foreign Policy

Five years into the war in Southern Cameroons, the Biya French Cameroun occupying regime’s attempts to criminalize the struggle of the Ambazonian people have failed.

“The killing of our people including women and children will not deter us from continuing to defend our homeland by all legitimate means through self defense,” Vice President Dabney Yerima told the Ambazonia war cabinet late on Sunday.

Dabney Yerima said resisting La Republique du Cameroun occupation by all available means, including armed resistance, is a right granted to people under occupation all over the world and protected by international law.

Yerima observed that the Paris that fought for the rights of French speaking Canadians has been bias in favour of the French Cameroun regime and its policies that are based on murder, terror, massacre, and destruction.

The Vice President of the Southern Cameroons Interim Government concluded that Ambazonian noble fighters, and the rest of the resistance factions will continue to fight the enemy until achieving liberation and victory.

The ongoing armed conflict in the territory of the Southern Cameroons has finally redefined itself. It has redefined itself from a war simply of self-defense against the predatory onslaught of France through its vassal state of French Cameroun, to a decolonization war. It is a decolonization war against France, French Cameroun and its hawkish Bulu-Beti minority tribe. That tribe dominates and controls the government, the legislature, the judiciary, and the military in French Cameroun. It believes the people of the Southern Cameroons and their territory must remain imprisoned under French Cameroun colonization, spoliation, and occupation.

By Chi Prudence Asong with additional reporting  

Most French speaking Cameroonians are now feeling uncertain on the bill of health and mental fitness of the 88-year-old President Biya.

A recent video of the dictator presently circulating on social media showed a very weak Biya and has prompted many politically docile French speaking Cameroonians to disagree with the statement that Biya is in good health.

“Biya is no more physically and mentally fit for office” a French Cameroun political commentator said last week.

The Beti Ewondo regime’s overall approval rating is now at its greatest low with civil administrators blaming the war in Southern Cameroons on Anglophone teachers.

A majority of French Cameroun ruling clans and tribes now disapprove of Biya and his CPDM party’s performance and many are saying that Biya should go and go now.

Biya and his men are also facing harsh criticism from every segment of the society including the Roman Catholic Church.

The Francophone dictator is also under pressure for corruption in the military, the senseless war in Southern Cameroons, the disturbing security situation in the East and the reemergence of Boko Haram in the Far North including the poor handling of Covid-19 funds.

By Chi Prudence Asong

The Swiss Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue and the Swiss government are trying to relaunch their stalled mediation efforts for the English-speaking regions of Cameroon, as fighting intensifies there.

The Swiss were part of the Southern Cameroons Retreat that recently held in Toronto, Canada to examine the possiblity of bringing to an end the Southern Cameroons crisis that is in its fifth year and has been spreading death and destruction among the people of Southern Cameroons.

The Toronto meeting organizers included the U.S. State Department, the Vatican, Canada, Ireland, Britain, Switzerland, Norway, the United Nations, and Greenclee which negotiated the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland.

Cameroon Concord News understands that the quality of those who attended the meeting inspired hope to Southern Cameroonians all over the globe including those in Ground Zero and Ground 1.

Since the Southern Cameroons crisis hit the global stage some five years ago, some 10,000 Cameroonians have been killed, with army soldiers accounting for close to 35% of the deaths.

Thousands of civilians and soldiers have been maimed and scarred for life in a conflict that could have been addressed through negotiations and genuine dialogue.

As of today, some one million Southern Cameroonians are either  internally displaced or are seeking refuge in a neighboring country due to a conflict many observers say was avoidable.

Thousands of army soldiers whose consciences could not allow them to kill innocent civilians have left the country to escape the harsh punishment the government inflicts on soldiers who do not want to implement the decisions of the top military brass.

By Isong Asu in London

Supporters of Africa’s second-longest serving leader, Cameroon’s 88-year-old President Paul Biya, are celebrating his 39 years in office November 6. Biya, who has been Cameroon’s president since 1982, is rarely seen in public these days. Meanwhile Biya’s opponents are saying renewed calls for the octogenarian to run for president in 2025 cannot be taken seriously.

Supporters of Cameroon’s ruling party, the Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement, CPDM, sang that Biya can still rule the central African state for another seven-year term, starting in 2025.

Biya was declared the winner of the country’s 2018 election garnering over 80% of the votes.

The song was sung in towns and villages across Cameroon during celebrations of Biya’s 39 years in office.

One event was held in Monatele, capital of Lekie, a department near Cameroon’s capital, Yaoundé. Henri Eyebe Ayissi, Cameroon’s state property, survey and land tenure minister, and Biya’s close ally led the CPDM party delegation to Lekie and delivered what he called a special message for Biya supporters.

Ayissi said the CPDM is appealing for a national consensus for Biya to seek a new term in 2025. He said the Lekie Division is making an appeal to Biya to accept the call to run for president in 2025 and continue the good works he is doing for Cameroon.

Ayissi said Biya has maintained unity despite Boko Haram terrorism on Cameroon’s northern border with Nigeria and the separatist crisis that has killed at least 3,000 people in the English-speaking western regions.

Ayissi said several million Cameroonian children have access to education because Biya has built schools and universities in many towns and villages of the central African state.

The call for Biya to run for president again when his current seven-year term ends in 2025 was echoed in several towns and villages, sparking criticism from Biya’s opponents.

Christopher Ndong, secretary general of the Cameroon Renaissance Movement — a party that claims its candidate, Maurice Kamto, won the 2018 election and that Biya stole his victory — Ndong says an invitation for Biya to be a candidate in 2025 means the CPDM wants the octogenarian to die in office.

“It is a slap in the face of Cameroonians and democracy in this country. Given his age, what will he do with power? Right now, he is not active. Honestly, this is a provocation of the first order. Look at the chaos all over the place. The country is in debts. In fact, it shows you that there is nobody at the head. That 2025 call should not be taken seriously because we know the state and health of the head of state cannot permit him to rule this country in 2025,” Ndong said.

Ngole Ngole Elvis, head of the CPDM party academy and Biya’s close aide, says calls for Biya to run are democratic. He says instead of complaining that Biya has been in power for long, the opposition should prepare to democratically vote for who they think should be their president in 2025.

“Wait for the next election and make sure that you prepare for it in such a way that with your freedom, you should have put in place the right campaign strategies, the right campaign messages, the right manifestos, the right candidates,” Elvis said.

Biya served as prime minister for seven years before becoming president. In 2008, he removed term limits from the constitution, allowing him to serve indefinitely.

He is now the second-longest serving leader in sub-Saharan Africa after his neighbor, Thedoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea, who has been in power since 1979.

Source: VOA

The turmoil engulfing the so-called Sako-IG has turned to near chaos as its spokesman Chris Anu is now fighting for his survival and relevance after being sidelined in a move teleguided by Irene Ngwa. Many within the Maryland based Southern Cameroons group are considering a mass exodus back to the main Southern Cameroons Interim Government headed by Vice President Dabney Yerima.

Key players in the power struggle at the ABC TV and the disgraced Dr Ikome Sako gang exchanged increasingly harsh words in dueling statements recently, culminating in a bizarre stalemate between Mr Chris Anu and Dr Sako.

The weeks-long Maryland IG battle has split Dr Ikome Sako from his acolyte, Chris Anu. And Mrs Irene Ngwa is now being referred to as a prostitute by senior members of her own group.  In the words of Mr. Chris Anu, Irene Ngwa’s legs are constantly open and all over the place and she is not prepared to give ABC TV a good bill of health.

Ikome Sako is yet to comment on the matter even though he remains the chair of the Maryland cabal that has contributed immensely to weaken the Southern Cameroons resistance.

It is all about money and keeping the ABC TV alive as an anti President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe tool where the likes of Fru John Nsoh go on air to make a mockery of the jailed Southern Cameroons leaders.  Behind Sako’s blue-chip image, there’s a pattern of breakups. But Chris Anu may not survive anymore within that camp.

Sako and his men learned of Mr. Chris Anu’s intentions through an audio message and the disgraced Southern Cameroons frontline leader was quoted as saying that Chris Anu is no longer committed to the Sako IG, its donors, and its stakeholders, he should resign.

Hours after ABC TV went off air for unpaid satellite bills; Mr. Chris Anu blamed it all on Irene Ngwa and Sako. However the two Southern Cameroonians reportedly in a luvie duvie relation have maintained a kind of silence of the lamb.

The conflict at the ABC erupted after the executive wing of the Sako IG blocked a drafting process that was supposed to raise money. It is hard to explain if Sako or Irene Ngwa were aware of the drafting plan as stated by Mr. Chris Anu in his audio message.

From every indication, Southern Cameroonians in the US and Canada are no longer interested in financing the Chris Anu propaganda which has been counterproductive to the Ambazonian struggle.  Chris Anu’s latest audio message and his actions demonstrate a disregard for good governance within the Maryland Ambazonian group and create a grave amount of risk for the Sako IG at an especially sensitive time.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

The month of October will forever be remembered in Cameroon not just because it is the month in which the trust territory of Southern Cameroons achieved its independence, but the month in which Cameroon as a nation was plunged into chaos that might never end.

But before the Cameroon Concord News Group delves into the analysis of the chaos playing out in the two English-speaking regions of the country, it would like to extend its congratulations to the people of former West Cameroon on the attainment of their independence which was captured by the Yaounde government and transformed into a nightmare that will not be ending anytime soon.

In remembrance of October 1, 1961, the recognized Interim Government’s Vice President, Dabney Yerima, wished the people of Southern Cameroons happy celebrations. He used the occasion to remind the population of the importance of the day, urging the people to protect their territory.

He also used the occasion to congratulate the fighters on the ground on their spectacular victories which have left the country’s military and government with bloodshot eyes.

Over the  last two months, Southern Cameroonian fighters have demonstrated that they are a force to reckon with and their back to back victories over the poorly trained Yaounde government’s military is gradually triggering a tectonic shift in the thinking of the country’s French-speaking majority.

Vice president Yerima also expressed his sympathy with the Southern Cameroonian population regarding the irresponsible and reckless lockdown declared by some members of the Southern Cameroonian Diaspora who simply want to remain relevant in a conflict that has exposed their greed and ulterior motives.

Since the commencement of this avoidable conflict, close to 4,000 army soldiers and special forces have been killed in Cameroon’s two English-speaking regions, with some 3,000 maimed and disabled due to the senseless fighting.

Also speaking to the people of Southern Cameroons on the occasion of their independence was Dr. Ikome Sako of the erstwhile interim government which has lost its popularity and the people’s confidence.

Dressed in a police uniform of the Yaounde crime syndicate, Dr. Ikome Sako, who looked more as a police officer and whose speech problems have been carefully documented, succeeded to thank the fighters on the ground for their brilliant success, urging them to keep the pressure on the beleaguered Yaounde government.

His Yaounde government police uniform has left many in doubt about his loyalty to the people of Southern Cameroons. Many Southern Cameroonians think he is in cahoots with the Yaounde government which has already killed more than 15,000 Southern Cameroonians in a war that lacks a raison d’etre.

Meanwhile, in East Cameroon, the population and government are in fear as Southern Cameroonians peacefully celebrate their much-cherished independence.

The Yaounde government has deployed soldiers in all major cities of the country in fear of what might happen. For over one week now, the country’s uniformed officers have not been having a good night’s sleep as it has been decreed that on October 1 or days preceding the independence day celebrations, Southern Cameroonian fighters might cross the Mungo to wreak havoc in cities in East Cameroon.

The fighters’ ability to manufacture bombs and IEDs has struck fear in the government’s mind. Six months ago, a delegation from China and the United States had trained the fighters to put together IEDs and this is a huge threat to the Yaounde government.

Rumor and fear are spreading in East Cameroon to the effect that large markets and shopping malls will soon come under attack as Southern Cameroons agents have been trained to deliver these deadly weapons to such soft targets in order to mount pressure on the government.

According to a fighter who elected anonymity, a rain of explosions will soon be falling on towns such as Douala, Dschang, Baffoussam and others.

“We will be changing the dynamics in the days ahead. We want to take the war and misery to East Cameroon where the people have been indifferent to the sorry plight of Southern Cameroonians. In Southern Cameroons, we have succeeded to sow fear in the police, soldiers and gendarmes and we want to replicate this in East Cameroon,” the fighter said.

The humiliating defeat of the military in many parts of Southern Cameroons has created mobid fear in the minds of the corrupt government officials who are clearly seeing the writing on the wall.

Speaking to the Cameroon Concord News Group’s Paris correspondent on September 30, 2021, at midnight Cameroon time, a senior gendarmarie officer said that for days he had not been sleeping in his house because he, like many officers of his corps, has been deployed in many parts of Douala, especially at the seaport which is heavily guarded because it is believed that Southern Cameroonian fighters might attack the seaport  considered as a den of corruption by many Cameroonians.

“We have not been sleeping for days as the government holds that Southern Cameroonian fighters have a plan to storm the seaport. There is total panic within the military and within government circles. Southern Cameroonian fighters have changed the game. Their use of IEDs to kill soldiers has changed the way Francophones see the conflict,” the senior officier who elected anonymity said.

“Southern Cameroonian fighters have succeeded to instill fear in the government. In the military, many of my colleagues are trembling. The deaths of many colleagues has demoralized the young soldiers and thousands are contemplating quitting the military for good,” he added.

“He highlighted that if the government did not hold out an olive branch sooner rather than later, it might lose everything in Southern Cameroons. The odds are stacked up against the government. The fighting has left the towns and cities of Southern Cameroons for the forest and the roads leading to the towns and the fighters who started out with machetes and hunting rifles are now clearly having an upper hand.”

To make their independence day celebrations more interesting, Southern Cameroonians fighters on September 30  killed some soldiers in kumbo in a humiliating manner, taking with them, the soldiers’ weapons and uniforms.

It should be recalled that  October is not only the month of independence for Southern Cameroons,  but a month wherein the conflict with the Yaounde government started. October 16, 2016, is a day that Southern Cameroonians will always remember as it changed their lives.

Years of marginalization by the government finally resulted in huge demonstrations across the country’s two English-speaking regions, resulting in the killing of many innocent civilians and citizens.

The events of October 2016 shattered Cameroon’s image as an oasis of peace in a desert of chaos. Many lives have been lost and ruined and confidence in the Yaounde government has evaporated.

The government has been humiliated and reduced. Its tough approach to the Southern Cameroons crisis has not only hurt the country’s image, it has resulted in a loss of life that is in many minds unpardonable.

The government like the separatists has remained frozen in its position and this is making it a lot more challenging to put an end to this conflict that has clearly hurt the country’s economy.

As Southern Cameroonians celebrate their independence today, they should always remember that the enemy is still strong, very manipulative and dangerous, though it has taken many punches to the liver.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

In The Art of War, Sun Tzu said, “know the enemy and know yourself in a hundred battles you will never be in peril.” Although there is a huge appetite among Ambazonians for a muscular approach on French Cameroun airwaves when talking about the atrocities committed in the Southern Cameroons, many have the impression that some who claim to be with them and speak for them in their quest for freedom are dishonest and are enemies within. Historic and current trajectories have inspired this Cameroon Concord News review of Barrister Agbor Ashu, the so-called Ambazonia spokesman in Ground Zero, as a person of interest in relation to Sun’s philosophy and dogma of war.

Over three months ago, Cameroon Concord News Group was dependably informed that prominent Southern Cameroons leaders invited Barrister Agbor Ashu to assume the leadership of the Southern Cameroons struggle in Ground Zero. However, he responded saying, “I am the National President of a legalized political party and will never get myself mixed up in your Ambazonian issues”.

Emmanuel Agbor Ashu (to use his three names) is implicitly a typical “bite and blow” and a serial killer that is deadlier than his onetime acolyte Ni John Fru Ndi the CPDM historical mistake who in utmost naivety, greed and disregard for inalienable rights of a people, openly rejected the Ambazonian ideology and legitimate right to self-determination.

Following the barrister’s refusal to take over leadership of Ground Zero affairs, Cameroon Concord News developed interest in the man of law including his genuine position on the Ambazonia struggle. Our investigation has uncovered a worrying trail of duplicity in the man seen by many as liberator.

Back in September 2018, when Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and his top aides who were abducted in Abuja, Nigeria in January 2018, surfaced in SED Yaoundé, the Interim Government of Ambazonia (IG) was eager to commission team of lawyers to defend them in any potential legal proceedings. When contacted to head the legal team of the NERA10, Barrister Emmanuel Ashu requested that the IG pay him FCFA 2.5 billion, buy him a new car, and furnish an office in Douala for him. Sako Ikome was stunned, Chris Anu was speechless, and Elvis Kumeta was astonishingly shocked by the Manyu Barrister’s low sense of judgment.

When the Interim Government informed him that his financial demands were bizarre and outlandishly unaffordable, the man of law replied, “then they can take them to the gallows”. Consequently, Barrister Emmanuel Ashu is one of the few high profile lawyers who elected not to defend the NERA10 in their court appearances in Yaoundé. Genuine revolutionaries and agents of justice and freedom do not abandon their own to the “gallows”. They often graciously embrace any opportunity to rescue those they claim are their comrades from the claws of a brutal oppressor. 

Correspondingly, when the SDF was the only political show in town in the early 90s, Barrister Emmanuel Ashu, Larry Eyong Echaw, and TT Tabenyang reportedly took Chairman John Fru Ndi to Manyu on a political tour. Fru Ndi could not spend an hour in Ewelle village because Barrister Ashu had nowhere to host the visiting SDF delegation.

People are genuinely suspicious of a man who has prostituted from the CPDM to SDF and to his comical Reform Political Party. He has now appointed himself spokesman for the Ambazonia resistance on French Cameroun television networks.  Barrister Emmanuel Ashu is now appearing on national television claiming to have a bright insight and deep understanding of the Ambazonia crisis when his true motive is being a surrogate for the disgraced Sako Ikome, who stole USD 2 million of Ambazonian money.

The Man of Law has pseudo academic intelligence, lacks composure, integrity and is emotionally too erratic. He has a relentless appetite for attention and is only a decent man where money is not involved. Those who happen to know him personally have increasingly defined him as a loose cannon devoid of trustworthiness. His recent defense of the failed two weeks lockdown of Ambazonia with a concealed agenda to increase the pain and sufferings of the people and subsequently spur them to revolt against the movement for the restoration of statehood by alluding to the UN General assembly proceedings in America also reveals Barrister Agbonde (to use his pet name) is out of touch with reality or not intellectually grounded with UN processes and public actions that exert positive influence on UN activities. A lockdown of a street in Maryland led by Ikome Sako would have been more impactful and would have saved Barrister Ashu from embarrassing himself with tantrums on TV just to defend a lie.

Our investigation uncovered that the Barrister has a propensity for asking the right questions and then precisely giving dishonest answers. To put it charitably, the gap between what he says and the truth is alarmingly wide, and this is a trait that has plagued him all his life. His last appearance on a French Cameroun TV claiming that the disgraced Sako Ikome, had control over Ambazonia self-defense forces was an inaccurate stereotype and the Barrister knows that. His numerous appearances on TV have given the barrister the false impression that he speaks for genuine Ambazonians.

Barrister Emmanuel Ashu “owns” a political party in French Cameroun called Reforme Party. The head office of this contraption of a political party is on his poorly conceived social media page. On the party’s Facebook page, Barrister Emmanuel Ashu published that “candidates who wish to be sponsored by the Reforme Party in the municipal and parliamentary elections 2020 in Cameroon, can contact the National President through the following numbers: 699989279, 675005043, 678511482,695969343”

Cameroon Concord News Group understands that over the last twenty years, Barrister Ashu has campaigned during every election in French Cameroun but never ended up on the ballot paper as he constantly sells out to the CPDM. He stood for elections in French Cameroun as recently as 2020 and the same man wants Southern Cameroonians to think that he is standing shoulder-to-shoulder with them.

For Barrister Ashu Agbonde, the Ambazonia struggle represents an opportunity to line his pockets, especially, as, in his view, there’s an irreconcilable mismatch between the money that the Ambazonia Diaspora has and what is being sent to people like him in Ground Zero. The barrister draws comfort from the fact that the disgraced Sako Ikome and other members of the Maryland cabal have taken radically different paths to reality and integrity. The Southern Cameroons uprising has also presented an opportunity for the Barrister to escape poverty even if it means chasing winds and shadows.

 In 2015 our Douala city reporter met Barrister Ashu dressed with an unpardonably tattered shoe, a pair of trousers with countless patches, a dreadful body odour, and looked desperately hungry.  The barrister is undoubtedly another product of the unending poverty culture in the Cameroons, which is a result of Paul Biya’s dreadful pattern of governance. Being a product of this poverty culture, Barrister Emmanuel Ashu belongs to an unenviable club of Manyu citizens in their 60s who have not contributed an iota of development to the villages.

As a man who courts popularity at every turn, the Ambazonia struggle offers him a platform to present his outdated law credentials. With Fru John Nsoh now full of sorrow, harboring multiple illnesses and extremely lacking in financial finesse in Maryland, USA, Barrister Emmanuel Ashu has now replaced him in the French Cameroun city of Douala as Southern Cameroons leading legal embarrassment.

The barrister possesses neither character nor direction, and in terms of personality, he is deemed inadequate by his peers. Barrister Emmanuel Ashu’s pretence of hammering the Yaoundé regime on French Cameroun airwaves has been exposed as a scam. He is skilled at joining any bandwagon with evil plans. His legacy is one of political and personal failure, intellectual recklessness, and dismal poverty.

Ambazonians should be wary of this man, given his history and penchant for political prostitution and deception. He is attracted to political games, dirty and cheap money.  To be sure, Barrister Emmanuel Ashu is a Southern Cameroons political disaster and a successful failure.

By Isong Asu in London and Dr Patrick Ayuk in Johannesburg