This unfortunate and unpalatable drama in Cameroon has been going on for too long and the government’s response to acts of violence by restoration forces is predictable. Once a uniformed officer gets killed by armed fighters, Cameroonian soldiers go on a rampage, killing innocent civilians, burning homes and damaging businesses in the area. This is the government’s strategy to counter attacks by Southern Cameroonian fighters whose tactics and strategies have morphed over the years. 

Southern Cameroonian fighters started with hunting rifles, sometimes using machetes to decapitate soldiers and civilians they suspect of betraying the course. Today, they have acquired assault rifles and bombs that have made them real weapons of mass destruction for the country’s military. The country’s army soldiers dread encountering these fighters, especially in the dense equatorial forest in the country’s Southwest region where professionally trained Southern Cameroon fighters have resorted to hit and run tactics. 

The last few months have shown the world the atrocities the fighters and soldiers are capable of committing. In August, Southern Cameroonian fighters literally slaughtered Ms. Comfort Tumassang, a government a spy, in broad daylight in Muyuka, a small town some five miles from the Southwest regional headquarters of Buea. Her killing and that of the young man she worked with sent three of her friends packing from Muyuka, as Southern Cameroonian fighters had made them targets and they were willing to make good on their promise.

As a response to the her killing, the government dispatched troops to Muyuka on the same day and a few minutes after their arrival in the town, they arrested three young men whom they have been brandishing on national TV as the criminals who committed murder in broad day light. But the population knows that the government and its troops are in the business of lying and that anybody who takes their word seriously will end up with the wrong information. The government is noted for lying through its teeth and its word should never be taken seriously. 

More than three weeks after arresting those young men, the same troops are still looking for Ms. Tumassang’s killers. They have been burning homes in Muyuka, Ikata and Muyenge, sometimes robbing the population and ruining small businesses. Today, Ikata and Muyuka have been reduced to rubble and the population has simply moved to other places considered as safe havens. 

Yesterday, it was the turn of Bamenda. Some Southern Cameroonian fighters ambushed a police car, killing two police officers at the city’s commercial avenue. This sent the country’s military into a rampage. One civilian was killed, and many businesses were destroyed. A pattern that has become normal and predictable by the population. 

The government’s demonic and ineffective strategy to roll back the fighters is only turning out to be counterproductive. The strategy has been in effect since 2017 and the government cannot display any meaningful positive results. On the contrary, the international community has been criticizing its heavy-handed approach to solving the Southern Cameroons crisis which has resulted in the deaths of more than 5,000 Cameroonians. As of today, more than two hundred Southern Cameroonian villages and  towns have been destroyed by government troops, creating hordes of refugees, with more than half a million Southern Cameroonians escaping to Nigeria and a similar number moving to East Cameroon where they are living rough and constantly being referred to as Internally Displaced Persons.   

For many, the hardship is unbearable and the hope of returning to their villages and towns is gradually fading away, especially as the government and the fighters are nowhere close to agreeing on even the slightest thing – talking. Both factions seem to be frozen in their positions. The fighters are determined to achieve their independence while the government, constituted of old and sick people, is still stuck in its old ways. It still holds that the tricks of the past will work again, but it is oblivious of the fact that times have changed, and the country’s English-speaking minority has significant support that may result in its toppling.

More than three million Southern Cameroonians live abroad, especially in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Nigeria and Australia and most of them are in support of an independent Southern Cameroons and are making significant financial contributions to the purchase and shipping of sophisticated weapons to the fighters, some of whom are mercenaries from neighboring Nigeria. 

Though the leaders of the insurgency are currently in jail in Yaounde, the fighting has not slowed down. Southern Cameroonian fighters have simply changed their modus operandi, and this is causing the arrogant Yaounde government to lose sleep and huge amounts of money. Resources that could have been used for development purposes are today being diverted to persecute a war that could have been avoided if the Yaounde government had opted to talk and negotiate. 

Its arrogance and love of brutality and violence which are its tools of choice of conflict resolution and management have today left the country in a difficult and complicated quandary. The country’s economy has taken a destabilizing blow to the liver with most state-owned corporations in the two English-speaking regions going under. PAMOL and CDC – the country’s second highest employer – have gone under and experts have already indicated that if those two corporations will ever be operational again, then the government must pour millions of dollars into their resurrection. Workers of those two corporations are today unemployed and the stress of losing a job and their inability to finance their children’s education are gradually sending many of them to an early grave. 

Many in the international community consider the government’s response to the calls for Southern Cameroons independence an act of stupidity. Many analysts argue that the government did not know that the times had changed and that new communication technologies had made it possible for Southern Cameroonians living out of the country to raise money and coordinate their actions with relative ease. Besides, with America, Canada and the United Kingdom standing firmly behind Southern Cameroonians, it will be impossible for the Yaounde government to win peace in the battlefield. 

If the military continues to kill civilians and destroy businesses in the two English-speaking regions of the country each time a soldier is killed by Southern Cameroonian fighters, it is clear that it has missed the point. The soldiers have not understood that each time they mount an incursion against the population, they are simply pushing the young men and women whose parents and relatives have been killed into the waiting arms of the fighters who are always ready to welcome them. 

If the government’s objective is to bring about peace in its two English-speaking regions, then it must know that it has missed its target. After four years since the conflict erupted, it must know that its strategy is totally wrong and counterproductive. More Cameroonians have been sent to an early grave and peace is still illusory. The country is in the grip of a civil war that will not be ending anytime soon. After four long years, the government should know that the battlefield will never deliver the results it wants. It must start thinking of new ways to deal with this ugly situation that has given the country a bad name and left the country’s economy on its knees. Talking will surely help. It is a pill that will be more effective than any “silver bullet” the government may buy. 

Though many lives have been lost, thousands displaced, and many businesses ruined, it is still possible to engineer a new political dispensation in Cameroon. War has never solved any problem.  It is always wise to talk. Talking with Southern Cameroonians is not difficult. Southern Cameroonian leaders are in jail and it will be a lot easier to bring them together for a peaceful resolution of the crisis that has left the government with a bloodshot eye. This will, however, require honesty, determination and sincerity on the part of a government that has thriven on tricks and dishonesty for more than three decades. The ball is in its court. It is up to it to choose the right conflict resolution tool. Violence, trickery and brutality will surely not deliver the right results. After four years, it is clear that a new approach is necessary. The world is watching! 

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai in Dusseldorf, Germany

Supporters of former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo and former rebel leader Guillaume Soro on Monday filed their candidacies for a tense presidential election in October.

The candidacies of the exiled leaders add to those of incumbent President Alassane Ouattara and former president Henri Konan Bedie — while the top Catholic leader warned the country was approaching a dangerous point.

Both Gbagbo and Soro had been barred by the electoral commission from running due to convictions in the country’s courts.

“We have just submitted the candidacy file of our political leader, president Laurent Gbagbo, the father of democracy in Ivory Coast,” said Georges-Armand Ouegnin, president of the pro-Gbagbo coalition called Together for Democracy and Sovereignty (EDS).

Gbagbo, 75, was sentenced in absentia to a 20-year term last November over the looting of the local branch of the Central Bank of West African States during the post-election crisis.

He could be jailed if he were to set foot in Ivory Coast.

Ouegnin said the decision to block Gbagbo from running was political, calling for the release of all political prisoners and the return of political exiles, including Gbagbo.

But Independent Electoral Commission chief Ibrahime Coulibaly-Kuibiert has said that anyone convicted of a crime cannot contest.

The courts have previously backed the body’s position, and judicial sources said they believed his candidacy was unlikely to be validated.

Soro camp cries foul

The country remains scarred by a conflict that erupted after the 2010 vote when Gbagbo refused to hand over power to the victor, current President Alassane Ouattara. Around 3,000 people lost their lives in several months of violence.

Gbagbo currently lives in the Belgian capital Brussels after being tried by the International Criminal Court. He was freed conditionally by the ICC after he was cleared in 2019 of crimes against humanity, a ruling prosecutors are appealing.

He has not made any public statement about whether he wishes to run again.

Meanwhile, relatives and supporters of Soro, a rebel leader who became prime minister, called for his candidacy to be validated.

Soro’s spokeswoman Aminata Kone-Zie accused the government of subterfuge “to make our president (Soro) ineligible under an alleged criminal conviction”.

Soro, 48, has been forced into exile in France in the face of a long list of legal problems at home.

He was sentenced in April to 20 years in prison for “concealment of embezzlement of public funds”.

A former ally of Ouattara, Soro was a leader in a 2002 revolt against Gbagbo that sliced the former French colony into the rebel-held north and the government-controlled south and triggered years of unrest.

‘Radicalisation of positions’

President Ouattara, 75, and former president Bedie, 86, submitted their candidacy papers last week.

Violence erupted after Ouattara’s announcement he was seeking a third term, claiming the lives of at least eight people in August.

Although the constitution limits presidents to two terms, Ouattara and his supporters argue that a 2016 constitutional tweak reset the clock.

On Monday, the head of the country’s Catholic Church, Cardinal Jean-Pierre Kutwa, warned the country is approaching a “dangerous turn.”

He said Ouattara’s candidacy “is not necesssary”, adding his duty as guarantor of the constitution is “to take the time to organise elections in an environment pacified by reconciliation.”

“As the presidential elections approach, we are witnessing a radicalisation of positions from one side or the other,” he warned.

“These have become even more pronounced since the declaration of the president’s candidacy.”

The cardinal called on all sides to move towards dialogue.

The October 31 election in the world’s top cocoa grower comes after years of political turbulence and civil war.

Source: AFP

One might suppose the coronavirus pandemic has given African leaders an opportunity to rethink their approach to governance. This particularly holds true for Cameroon, which appears to have suffered the brunt of the virus in Central Africa, registering close to half of all 1 025 fatalities in Central Africa as of Monday. By this same date, the country had 18 762 confirmed cases, surpassing its neighbours Chad, Congo, the Central African Republic and Gabon combined.

But with the coronavirus, the more things seem to have changed, the more they seem to have remained the same. Despite the free lessons offered by the pandemic, Cameroonian officials appear not to have learned to build on public trust to better prepare for future crises like the climate crisis, which is slowly grinding, but devastating in its effects.

For any response to a crisis of the magnitude and complexity of the coronavirus to succeed, it will largely depend on the contribution and collaboration of the masses. President Paul Biya, 87, presumably understands this, which is why, when he managed to address his compatriots on the coronavirus for the first time on May 19, he called on them to remain united, supportive and disciplined.

“I, therefore, call on Cameroonians to have trust in public authorities,” Biya said. But Biya himself has not earned the trust he is requiring of citizens; because of that, the country’s citizens have not made “a lot of effort” to fight Covid-19, as he implored them to.

As part of measures to contain the coronavirus in Cameroon, the government made the wearing of face masks in public mandatory; limited gatherings to 50 people; and closed all land, air and sea borders. But the president has, on several occasions, appeared in public without a mask. Other public authorities, such as MPs, have flouted the restriction on gatherings, and the country’s airspace was opened to Air France to run commercial passenger flights from France — a high-risk country at the time.

Such behaviour by public authorities during a pandemic nips public trust in the bud. It means people are less likely to trust the same public officials asking them to make sacrifices by giving up certain rights and privileges for the sake of the nation.

It is, therefore, not surprising to see Cameroonians ignoring the preventive measures put in place by public authorities. Many citizens have become carefree. They no longer put on face masks in public, nor observe the hygiene and physical distancing measures set out by the government. The outcome is that the contagion keeps rising and there are no indications when the curve will flatten.  Manaouda Malachie, the minister of public health, recently warned of a second wave of the coronavirus in the country if strong action is not taken.

In future, this lack of public trust is going to frustrate responses to potential crises, should the tide not be reversed. People who mistrust their leaders in ordinary times can’t trust them one bit in extraordinary times.

In addition, the government has not been proactive in shining a light on the management of resources contributed by the public to help fight the coronavirus, putting its transparency in handling the pandemic in question.

In July, some citizens took to social media to question the whereabouts of about 4 000 bags of rice that had been donated in March by Orca, a home goods retail store. It was only then that the minister of public health communicated information about the donation. Yet the minister only shifted the burden of clarification from himself to the 10 regional governors: he said the bags of rice had been dispatched to the regions for further distribution. How or whether the bags of rice got to the intended beneficiaries is still unclear.

The health minister also offered an explanation of how about  21-billion CFA francs ($38-million) of funds designated for the Covid-19 response had been spent only a few days after an opposition MP raised an alarm over suspicions of corruption. Jean-Michel Nintcheu of the Social Democratic Front had expressed concerns that the money — contributed by the public through a national solidarity fund — had been subject to corruption, citing overbilling and conflicts of interests within the public health ministry and among its officials.

Cameroon has a longstanding problem of corruption. It has emerged as the world’s most-corrupt country on two occasions, according to Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index. Systematic corruption continues to be a problem. It would have, therefore, been surprising if the coronavirus didn’t come up against the all-pervasive corruption in the country.

The public health minister created a commission to investigate corruption in relation to the Covid-19 response, even though several anti-graft structures already exist in the country. But this doesn’t translate to a serious intent to fight corruption when a lack of transparency in the management of public funds leaves a perception of corruption in the minds of the people.

Giving room to citizens to perceive corruption in the response to a pandemic is exactly how not to handle a crisis. It will certainly affect future handling of crises. It is apparent that there is no one to compel these public officials to be transparent at all stages in their management of the current crisis — and their own consciences don’t appear to be sufficient.

Culled from mg.co.za

Rival factions of the ruling CPDM crime syndicate are clashing over every government initiative as end of Biya’s reign looms.

A recent U-turn on management of the Ebo forest is only the latest incident in unending clan warfare that is tearing Cameroon’s government apart, reports Africa Intelligence

The Vice President of the Southern Cameroons Interim Government Dabney Yerima has censured the recent meeting between French Cameroun Minister of Territorial of Administration Paul Atanga Nji and some Southern Cameroons traditional rulers describing the meeting as a treacherous stab in the back of the Ambazonian nation.

Cat calls greeted the said meeting with thousands of Southern Cameroonians around the world stating that all the Fons and Chiefs who took part in the forum be dethroned.

“They have betrayed their people and are all considered traitors to the people of Southern Cameroons and the revolution.  It is a treacherous stab in the back of the Ambazonian people” Vice President Yerima said in conversation with Cameroon Concord News Group Germany Bureau Chief late on Friday.

Vice President Dabney Yerima pointed out that some illusions pushed the Southern Cameroons traditional leaders to seek the meeting with the Biya French Cameroun regime.

The first illusion the Ambazonian exiled leader said is that the Fons and the Chiefs think the Federal Republic of Ambazonia is in a state of defeat, and they are viewing Biya and French Cameroun as victorious. “The reality however is that the Ambazonian nation has not been defeated and the Southern Cameroons people will not stopped their struggle until French Cameroun occupying forces leave their homeland”  Yerima noted.

Vice President Dabney Yerima revealed that the second illusion is that because of the poverty culture, some Southern Cameroons traditional rulers believe their political legitimacy is achieved through support from the Biya Francophone regime, the French Cameroun army, the French Cameroun National Gendarmerie rather than their own people’s backing.

Comrade Yerima concluded that the third illusion that prompted some Southern Cameroons native authorities to attend the Paul Atanga Nji meeting is that they believe that Biya and French Cameroun are seeking peace and coexistence with the people of Southern Cameroons, but the French Cameroun regime is in fact an occupying regime founded on brutality and violence and its only conflict resolution tool is the gun.

By Isong Asu in London

A senior Southern Cameroons elite based in South Africa, Dr Patrick Ayuk has criticized the French Cameroun regime of President Paul Biya for sponsoring the arrest and forced extradition of the Ambazonian leader President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and his top aides from the Nigerian capital Abuja to Yaoundé saying it is in Paul Biya’s best interest to talk to the Southern Cameroons chief executive.

During a Cameroon Concord News Group event on Tuesday, Dr Patrick Ayuk opined on how the UN should intervene in the Ambazonia crisis and assist the two Cameroons move forward with several domestic and international issues, among them the terms of separation.

Dr Patrick Ayuk said the French Cameroun regime in Yaoundé could have tried to fix what it viewed as the Anglophone problem with  the Federal Republic of Nigeria as a mediator instead of wasting millions of US dollars in staging an action now described by international actors as state terrorism.

One consequence of the Biya-Buhari Abuja blunder was the internationalization of the Southern Cameroons crisis, Dr Patrick Ayuk noted.

The Southern Cameroons academic who holds a PhD in Management and leadership from the North West University highlighted the devastating effect of the 4 year old war that is showing no signs of ending blaming it on failed and irresponsible leadership in French Cameroun and pointed out that only a UN Security Council resolution will be able to bring to a very important conclusion the crisis in Southern Cameroons-Ambazonia.

The researcher at North West University and Founder and CEO of Global Leadership and Development Nexus also said the United Nations should thus return to the Milner-Simon Agreement as a means of restricting the casualties and preventing further conflict between the two Cameroons.

“I think it would be in Mr. Paul Biya’s best interest and his legacy to start talking to President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and to stop the senseless war that has radicalized thousands of Southern Cameroonians” Dr Patrick Ayuk added.

He, however, cast doubt on whether the Southern Cameroons Interim Government and its leadership would be receptive to that saying, “I think after Yaounde ignored the recommendations of the so-called Grand National Dialogue, President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and the Ambazonia Interim Government may have moved on and adopted a tough position.”

Vice President Dabney Yerima of the Southern Cameroons Interim Government has increasingly signaled that he wants the United Nations to send a fact finding mission to the Federal Republic of Ambazonia.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Ewumbue Monono Churchill has been appointed ambassador to Ethiopia by the 87-year-old French Cameroon dictator. The decree was published on Wednesday, August 12, 2020 by state radio and television.

The new boss of Cameroon’s diplomatic mission in Addis Ababa replaces Jacques Alfred Ndoume Eboule who died in August 2019 due to an undisclosed illness.

The 59-year-old long standing Cameroonian diplomat was before this appointment a Technical Adviser to the butcher of Yaoundé.

Churchill Ewumbue Monono previously served at the Cameroon Embassy in Russia and Ethiopia. He was the brain behind the Orthodox South West Elites Association that successfully put an end to the SDF dominance in South West politics.

Nicknamed by the late Chief E.T.Egbe as SWELA’s obasinjom warrior, the renowned Bakweri elite reportedly suffered political victimization from the Prime Minister Peter Mafany Musonge gang over claims that he attempted to sabotage the appointment of Musonge via an article that was published by the Cameroon Post Group.

By Rita Akana in Yaounde

Peace talks involving the government of Cameroon and Anglophone separatists are at a standstill due to a power struggle playing out between prime minister Joseph Dion Ngute and secretary general of the presidency Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh.

On 2 July, the jailed secessionist leader Sisiku Ayuk Tabe announced on social media that he had taken part in discussions with Cameroon’s government regarding a ceasefire agreement under the auspices of the United Nations.

Subsequently, on the orders of secretary general of the presidency Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, communications minister René Emmanuel Sadi said in a statement that this information was not “accurate”. Since then, the two parties have not been in further contact with one another.

Church provides neutral grounds

However, according to sources, a delegation made up of about 10 secessionist leaders led by Ayuk Tabe did in fact meet on 2 July with Léopold Maxime Eko Eko, head of the Direction Générale de la Recherche Extérieure, Cameroon’s counter-intelligence agency.

Given that the conditions set forth by the Ambazonians included that the meeting take place in a “neutral” setting, the government asked the Catholic Church to allow it to hold the talks at the Episcopal Centre of Mvolyé. Located in Cameroon’s capital, the church was ultimately selected as the site of the negotiations, which were attended by six other government representatives.

At the third such meeting arranged by the government, the duo formed by Dion Ngute and Eko Eko led the administration’s negotiation. A traditional dignitary in the South-West region, the prime minister has a network of local monarchy connections who provides him with a way to engage with separatist rebels.

Eko Eko, a police superintendent and speaker of French and English, was the negotiator who successfully secured the 2008 release of oil workers taken hostage aboard the French vessel Bourbon Sagitta by the Bakassi Freedom Fighters, a rebel group from the Bakassi Peninsula, which Nigeria and Cameroon had disputed.

Secret negotiations

Prior to that, the first meeting with Anglophone leaders had taken place in Ghana, where Eko Eko met with secessionist figures from the diaspora community such as Ebenezer Akwanga and Herbert Boh. The second meeting was held on 13 April in Mvolyé (Yaoundé) and brought together Ayuk Tabe and his allies.

At the end of these talks, some progress was made, as the separatists said they were prepared to abandon their most radical demand, i.e., the departure of Cameroon’s army from the North-West and South-West regions. However, their acceptance of the continued presence of these troops came with the condition that they remain in their barracks since, in their view, the police and gendarmerie forces should be the sole personnel permitted to be deployed on the ground.

Dion Nguté and Eko Eko excluded the rest of the administration from secret negotiations which nevertheless had the blessing of President Paul Biya. Even Ngoh Ngoh was not involved in the discussions, despite the fact that he had been the Swiss government’s primary contact since June 2019.

Yaoundé officially mandated the Swiss government to facilitate talks between the warring sides. Working with the Geneva-based Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD), the Swiss mediators invited several secessionist leaders to participate in a discreet preparatory meeting from 25 to 27 June in Saint-Luc, a small village in the canton of Valais. However, at the end of 2019, the HD-led mediation process ended in failure due to distrust from certain factions of the secessionist movement.

New round of Swiss mediation

After Ngoh Ngoh released a statement by way of Sadi denying that talks had taken place, the Swiss negotiators initiated a new mediation process. On 2 August, a delegation led by Günther Bächler arrived in Yaoundé. The 67-year-old diplomat and former Swiss ambassador to Georgia served as a mediator in conflicts in Darfur, Nepal and in the South Caucasus on behalf of the Swiss Foreign Ministry.

As soon as he arrived in Cameroon, Bächler got in touch with a number of people, not just separatists but also supporters of federalism and proponents of decentralisation. On 4 August, he met with Cardinal Christian Tumi. On 6 August in Buea, the capital of the South-West region, the delegation planned to meet with the lawyer Felix Agbor Balla as well as with other local Anglophone figures.

Culled from Africa Intelligence

Many Cameroonians have been leaving their country over the last three decades due to bad governance, but most of those who have left have been young unemployed graduates who are seeking better economic and social life for themselves and their families.

But over the last four years, some middle-aged Cameroonians, especially from Southern Cameroons, have left their country due to the civil war that has already killed over 5,000 Cameroonians.

Among those who have left are medical doctors, lawyers and engineers who believe that Cameroon does not hold out any hope for their children. These groups of professionals have been heading mainly to the United States and Canada where they believed it is possible to make dreams come true.

But there is another group that is also checking out of the country and this group is not large. Among them is one Barrister Fru John Nsoh who, in his late 70s, still holds that he can make things better for himself. But America could be a slippery ground, especially for those who do not have the right skills set. Things do not seem to be working for Barrister Fru John Nsoh and the strain is becoming very visible. 

He skipped into the U.S.A where he sought asylum before the coronavirus emerged, but the mismanagement of the pandemic by the Trunp Administration is affecting his asylum claim. As the virus lingers, his asylum claim is also suffering. The wait time is getting longer and there is no work for him. This is a major concern to him.

Prior to escaping to the United States, Barrister Fru John Nsoh had the nasty habit of taking the Yaoundé government to task for its role in the Southern Cameroons crisis. His criticism of the government made him a TV star in Cameroon, and this might have made him to think that he could repeat the same feat in the U.S.A. But America always has unpleasant surprises for those who migrate there, especially those who do not have a lot of financial resources.  

Indeed, he was among the lawyers who said their services to Southern Cameroonians who are being held in prisons across the country were “pro bono”. Southern Cameroonians have been sincerely grateful to these lawyers although they sometimes contribute to enable the lawyers to go and see their clients and defend them in court. Some of that money sometimes transited through Barrister Fru John Nsoh who unfortunately shared it to his fellow lawyers as if he was distributing candy to children. 

This outdated method of doing things did not really go down well with many of his colleagues and the Southern Cameroonian President, Julius Ayuk Tabe, had to look for innovative ways to ensure that the money was properly managed. This rubbed the learned lawyer up the wrong way. Like his friend Chris Anu, Barrister Fru John Nsoh is an honest man, especially when money is not involved, and that was why his colleagues had to complain.

He has been very bitter about that decision and ever since he came to the United States, he has accused President Julius Ayuk Tabe of all the crimes and sins in the world. He is even blaming his erectile dysfunction problems on him even when he is at the Yaounde Maximum Security Prison. There are rumors that he might sue Mr. Ayuk Tabe for all the stress he is going through in the U.S.A. 

In the United States, Barrister Nsoh cannot practice law. If has any dream of practicing law in the United States, then he must go back to law school and this will require him spending hundreds of thousands of dollars which he does not even have. He is currently facing tough financial challenges just to pay lawyer fees for his asylum case, and this explains why he is in cahoots with Mr. Boh Herbert who is using the crisis in Southern Cameroons to enrich himself.

Barrister Fru John Nsoh is cash-strapped and the pressure is showing on his face. The Barrister who looked younger and happier while in Cameroon has become grumpy and stressed out in the United States. He seems to be caught between a rock and hard place.

If he leaves the United States for Cameroon, then he might be joining President Julius Ayuk Tabe in Kondengui for all the insults he has heaped on the Yaounde government. If he stays in the United States, then his high blood pressure and diabetes will only get worse as his resources dry up. He is contemplating going home. Kondengui is appearing to be a more attractive and better option for him, as it is less expensive. 

If he insists on staying in the United States, then he might end up in a nursing home where he will be required to take care of people who are as old as he is. But that is not the biggest problem. Nursing homes are not popular destinations for many job-seekers in the United States. 

The coronavirus is on the prowl in those facilities. A weakened Barrister Fru John Nsoh will certainly not last long if he ventures into those coronavirus-infested nursing homes. The virus has no respect for old people and its special dislike for people with pre-existing conditions is known. Barrister Fru John Nsoh should rather err on the side of caution than to venture into a lion’s den without the appropriate protection.

The learned Barrister is in a fix. He cannot afford rents, and this is taking up his blood pressure. Without money and an insurance policy, the barrister is in the throes of a major health crisis. Having a health insurance policy in the U.S.A is costly, and it is the least of his concerns for now. He has other concerns that are keeping him up all night. A health insurance policy can wait. In his view, there is no rush and even if there was an urgent need for that, where will he get the money from?

The legal tender in the U.S.A is the green back and not the CFAF and the green back is hard to get in that country. That is a currency that keeps many young men running all day. Will the barrister be capable of running around just to raise money for housing and food? 

For now, he is still enjoying the largesse of some people, but the months ahead will be very testing to him. The financial pinch is already being felt as his host is already looking for creative ways to send him out of the house. The times are getting tougher out there for the barrister and without divine intervention; he might end up bouncing from one house to the other.

To avoid this, he must go back home. He is already losing sleep, and this is not a good sign. America is a not a place for people in their 70s to come and seek a better life. Fru John Nsoh must go back home where he will have the opportunity to enjoy his Achu and fufu corn.  There is time for everything and for now, his best bet is to accept a long jail term in Cameroon that will not come with the type of stress that America is pouring on him.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Group Chairman/Editor-In-Chief

Biya regime’s hard liners are using the Southern Cameroons crisis to deflect French speaking Cameroonian’s attention away from the conflict that has rocked La Republique du Cameroun.

For almost four years now, Cameroon government army soldiers deployed to Southern Cameroons are conducting a genocidal campaign that has claimed the lives of some more than seven thousand people.

“The war in Southern Cameroons is more of President Paul Biya’s attempt at distracting French speaking Cameroonians from the failures of the CPDM Beti Ewondo regime” Vice President Dabney Yerima told a cream of Southern Cameroons citizens late on Saturday.

Pointing to widespread confusion deep within French Cameroun and Southern Cameroons political circles both in Ground Zero and in La Republique du Cameroun, the Ambazonian Vice President said “The war in the Federal Republic of Ambazonia is a misdirected effort to take away from the problems the 87 year old Paul Biya has created in French Cameroun.”

Ever since President Biya came to power, the wealth and riches of the two Cameroons are in the hands of a few people who are either members of Mr. Biya’s ethnic group or members of the ruling CPDM crime syndicate which is holding the country’s treasury under its armpit.

Both French and Southern Cameroonians have been reduced to beggars by a bunch of people who have placed their interest above national interest.

By Chi Prudence Asong