Politics

4, March 2024

Putin seeks to ‘destabilize’ Germany with wiretap leak, defense minister says ⁰

Germany on Sunday accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of trying to sow disunity with the wiretap leak of a confidential German army discussion on the Ukraine war, at a time when Berlin is under pressure to supply the Taurus missile to Kyiv.

A 38-minute recording of the talks was posted online late Friday on Russian social media, with the participants discussing the possible use of German-made Taurus missiles and their potential impact.

The discussions also covered the use of long-range missiles provided to Kyiv by France and Britain.

“It is about using this recording to destabilise and unsettle us,” said German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, adding that he “hoped that Putin will not succeed”.

“It is part of an information war that Putin is carrying out,” he added.

Pistorius said he was not aware of any further leaks at the army.

He added that he would await the result of a military probe into the case to decide what consequences to draw.

Germany’s Scholz vows probe into ‘very serious’ leak of army talks on Ukraine war

Kyiv has long been clamouring for Germany to provide it with Taurus missiles, which can reach targets up to 500 kilometres (about 300 miles) away.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz has so far refused to send the missiles, fearing that it would lead to an escalation of the conflict with a nuclear-armed Russia.

The acquisition of German Taurus missiles would provide a massive boost for Ukraine as Kyiv struggles to fend off Russia’s invasion.

France and Britain have supplied Kyiv with SCALP or Storm Shadow missiles, both of which have a range of about 250 kilometres.

But Scholz has said that Germany could not justify matching British and French moves in sending long-range missiles to Ukraine and supporting the weapon system’s deployment.

“This is a very long-range weapon, and what the British and French are doing in terms of targeting and supporting targeting cannot be done in Germany,” Scholz said, without specifying exactly what he meant.

Britain denied that it had any direct involvement in operating the missiles.

“Ukraine’s use of Storm Shadow and its targeting processes are the business of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” a Ministry of Defence (MoD) spokesperson said in a statement to AFP.

Source: AFP

29, February 2024

Chad opposition leader killed in army attack on party headquarters ⁰

A leading opponent of Chad’s ruling junta Yaya Dillo Djerou has been killed in an army assault on his party headquarters, a government spokesman told AFP Thursday.

Dillo died on Wednesday “where he had retreated, at the headquarters of his party. He didn’t want to surrender and fired on law enforcement,” Abderaman Koulamallah, who is also communications minister, said.

The prosecutor general earlier spoke of “dead including Yaya Dillo” without detailing the circumstances.

Dillo, who led the opposition Socialist Party Without Borders (PSF), was accused of having led an attack against the offices of the internal security agency overnight on Tuesday to Wednesday.

It came after the arrest of a PSF member accused of an “assassination attempt against the president of the supreme court”.

Speaking to AFP on Wednesday, Dillo denied any involvement in the incident, denouncing the claim as a “lie” and politically motivated.

“I wasn’t present,” he said.

Dillo also condemned an attempted attack against the supreme court president as “staged”.

On Tuesday, Chad announced it would hold a presidential election on May 6, which both transitional president Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno and Dillo — who were cousins — planned to contest.

Source: AFP

28, February 2024

Yaoundé: opposition hopes for a renaissance ⁰

The opposition in Cameroon has had a worrying trajectory since it was legalised in 1990.

Things looked positive at first. Vibrant parties emerged, such as the Social Democratic Front (SDF), led by the charismatic Ni John Fru Ndi. It won more than half of the seats in the National Assembly.

While President Paul Biya secured re-election, he beat Ndi by only 4%, and everything changed. Understanding how close he was to defeat, Biya clamped down. Repression became more intense, and restrictive measures such as bans on meetings and demonstrations were introduced.

Worse, Biya’s efforts to divide and rule the opposition by sponsoring some groups and co-opting others has led to damaging fragmentation. Today there are more than 300 opposition parties; none can compete with Biya’s Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement.

But Biya is not the only problem. A lack of common vision, underpinned by ethnic divisions, has prevented the emergence of a more coherent challenge to the ruling party’s hegemony. The SDF has also struggled to replace Ndi, and has suffered from the conflict in the English-speaking regions of the country, which has made it difficult to campaign in its stronghold.

Taken together, these challenges explain why the opposition holds only 28 out of 180 seats in the National Assembly and has no senators at all. Even the decision of Maurice Kamto to form the Cameroon Renaissance Movement (MRC) in 2012 failed to deliver political change.

Despite considerable fanfare, Kamto was controversially given only 14% of the vote in the 2018 presidential election.

Even in the darkest moments, however, there is hope. Having boycotted legislative and municipal elections in 2020, the MRC will take part in the 2025 polls.

Opposition parties have also started to draw together to promote a mass voter registration drive and form a coalition around the Alliance for Change. Biya remains in control, but opposition supporters can now dream of a renaissance.

Culled from the Mail & Guardian

27, February 2024

Nato allies reject Emmanuel Macron idea of troops to Ukraine ⁰

Several Nato countries, including Germany and the UK, have ruled out deploying ground troops to Ukraine, after French President Emmanuel Macron said “nothing should be excluded”.

Mr Macron said there was “no consensus” on sending Western soldiers to Ukraine.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has warned of direct conflict if Nato troops deploy there.

Russian forces have recently made gains in Ukraine and Kyiv has urgently appealed for more weapons.

Mr Macron told a news conference on Monday evening: “We should not exclude that there might be a need for security that then justifies some elements of deployment.

“But I’ve told you very clearly what France maintains as its position, which is a strategic ambiguity that I stand by.”

The French leader was speaking in Paris, which is hosting a crisis meeting in support of Ukraine attended by heads of European states, as well as the US and Canada.

His comments prompted a response from other European and Nato member countries.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said there had been no change to the agreed position that no European country or Nato member state would send troops to Ukraine.

UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s spokesman said the country had no plans for a large-scale military deployment to Ukraine, beyond the small number of personnel already training Ukrainian forces.

The office of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said Italy’s “support does not include the presence of troops from European or Nato states on Ukrainian territory”.

Mr Peskov, on behalf of the Kremlin, called Mr Macron’s suggestion “a very important new element” adding it was absolutely not in the interests of Nato members.

“In that case, we would need to talk not about the probability, but about the inevitability [of direct conflict],” he said.

Earlier, Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg denied considering whether troops would be sent to Ukraine, although he insisted the alliance would continue to support Ukraine, which is not a Nato member.

That position has been echoed by a number of Nato member states including Spain, Poland and the Czech Republic.

Nato is a military alliance whose 31 members agree that, if a member state is attacked, they will help it defend itself. Sweden is set to become its latest member after receiving Hungary’s approval this week.

Kyiv is critically dependent on modern weapons supplies from its Western allies, particularly the US, to continue fighting Russia – a far bigger military force with an abundance of artillery ammunition.

But the approval of a much needed $95bn (£75bn) US aid package – including $61bn for Ukraine – faces an uphill battle in the US House of Representatives.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who took part in Monday’s meeting in Paris by video link, said that “everything we do together to defend against Russian aggression adds real security to our nations for decades to come”.

Source: BBC

26, February 2024

ECOWAS Lifts sanctions on Niger and calls for unity within the economic bloc ⁰

After months of wrangling following coups d’etat in Mali Guinea, Burkina Faso and Niger, the West African regional bloc has lifted most sanctions imposed on Niger over last year’s coup, in a new push for dialogue following a series of political crises that have rocked the region in recent months.

A no-fly zone and border closures were among the sanctions being lifted “with immediate effect”, the president of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Commission, Omar Alieu Touray, said on Saturday.

The lifting of the sanctions is “on purely humanitarian grounds” to ease the suffering caused as a result, Touray told reporters after the bloc’s summit in the Nigerian capital, Abuja.

The summit aimed to address existential threats facing the region as well as implore three military-led nations that have quit the bloc – Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso – to rescind their decision.

The three were suspended from ECOWAS following recent coups.

Since then, they have declared their intention to permanently withdraw from the bloc, but ECOWAS has called for the three states to return.

Speaking in his opening remarks at the start of the summit, ECOWAS chairman and Nigerian President Bola Tinubu said the bloc “must re-examine our current approach to the quest for constitutional order in four of our Member States”, referring to the three suspended countries, as well as Guinea, which is also military-led.

Tinubu urged Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso to “reconsider the decision” and said they should “not perceive our organisation as the enemy”.

ECOWAS also said it had lifted certain sanctions on Malian individuals and some on junta-led Guinea, which has not said it wants to leave the bloc but has also not committed to a timeline to return to democratic rule.

Touray said some targeted sanctions and political sanctions remained place for Niger, without giving details.

However, ECOWAS placed “some conditions” on the lifting of the sanctions, he added. “They want the immediate release of President Mohamed Bazoum and members of his family.”

Niger’s President Bazoum was deposed in a military coup last July, prompting ECOWAS to suspend trade and impose sanctions on the country. He is still imprisoned in the presidential palace in Niamey. On the eve of the summit, his lawyers urged ECOWAS to demand his release.

Earlier this week, ECOWAS co-founder and former Nigerian military leader General Yakubu Gowon also called for the bloc to lift “all sanctions that have been imposed on Burkina Faso, Guinea, Mali and Niger”.

“Even before today’s summit, there has been a change in tone, in language and also the approach of ECOWAS entirely to the sanctions and embargoes imposed on these three West African countries,” Idris said.

Easing sanctions is seen as a gesture of appeasement as ECOWAS tries to persuade the three states to remain in the nearly 50-year-old alliance and rethink a withdrawal. Their planned exit would undermine regional integration efforts and bring a messy disentanglement from the bloc’s trade and services flows, worth nearly $150bn a year.

ECOWAS on Saturday gave the three military-led countries “an opportunity to be members of the organisation once again”, Idris said, adding that they asked them to be part of “technical discussions of the ECOWAS bloc” without restoring them as full participating heads of state at summits or major conferences.

After Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger announced that they would permanently withdraw from the alliance and formed a grouping called the Alliance of Sahel States, “the ECOWAS institution itself was shaken”, Idris said.

“[ECOWAS] is an organisation that is gradually losing its steam, and there is the danger of it being fragmented … There is also the concern that unless ECOWAS brings these people back into the fold, there is the danger of coups spreading in West Africa,” he added.

Compiled by Alain A. Ebot

Source: Al Jazeera

22, February 2024

Kremlin lashes out after Joe Biden aims sweary barb at Vladimir Putin ⁰

The Kremlin has accused Joe Biden of attempting to appear like a “Hollywood cowboy” after the US president called Vladimir Putin “a crazy SOB”.

Mr Biden made the comments at a public fundraising event on Wednesday in California, warning about the threat of nuclear conflict.

In response, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called it a poor attempt to appear like a “Hollywood cowboy”.

He added that such vocabulary “debases America itself”.

In a brief speech in San Francisco, Mr Biden said: “We have a crazy SOB like that guy Putin, and others, and we always have to worry about nuclear conflict, but the existential threat to humanity is climate.”

It is not the first time the US president has used the offensive term. In a hot-mic slip in 2022, Mr Biden called a Fox News journalist a “son of a bitch”.

He has also called Mr Putin a “butcher” and a “war criminal” in the past.

The Kremlin spokesman said it was “unlikely to infringe on our president, President Putin. But it debases those who use such vocabulary”.

Mr Peskov said the remark was “probably some kind of attempt to look like a Hollywood cowboy. But honestly I don’t think it’s possible”.

“Has Mr Putin ever used one crude word to address you? This has never happened. Therefore, I think that such vocabulary debases America itself,” he added.

In California, Mr Biden also took aim at Donald Trump, who he is likely to face off against in November’s presidential election.

Mr Trump has appeared to compare himself to Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition activist who died in jail last week.

The Republican has not assigned blame to Mr Putin for Navalny’s death, while Mr Biden said there can be “no doubt” the Russian president was responsible.

“If I stood here 10 to 15 years ago and said all this, you’d all think I should be committed,” Mr Biden said.

Last week, Mr Putin raised some eyebrows when he said he would rather Mr Biden take the presidency over Mr Trump in November.

“He’s more experienced, he’s predictable, he’s an old-style politician,” Mr Putin told Russian TV.

Source: BBC

20, February 2024

Biya sacks his new Spy Chief Jean-Pierre Robins Ghoumo ⁰

91-year-old President Biya has sacked the Director General of External Research, Jean-Pierre Robins Ghoumo barely two months after he took over from Léopold Maxime Eko Eko.

The reason for sacking Ghoumo remains unclear but the external intelligence agency has struggled to steady itself following the arrest of former director Léopold Maxime Eko Eko.

Cameroon Intelligence Report gathered from reliable sources in Yaoundé that Ghoumo is widely believed to be loyal to Eko Eko and not Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh who is currently running state affairs in Yaoundé. A well-placed source hinted that Ghoumo’s dismissal points to possible failure to execute his assignments satisfactorily.

Jean-Pierre Robins Ghoumo was appointed director of Cameroon’s intelligence service in December, but was told by Biya’s top aides that he will never be granted access to the files of his predecessor, Léopold Maxime Eko Eko, currently in jail.

By Rita Akana in Yaoundé

10, February 2024

Protests in Senegal turn deadly as political crisis deepens over election delay ⁰

Senegal’s political crisis deepened as a second person died Saturday in increasingly violent protests against President Macky Sall’s decision to postpone upcoming presidential elections.

A 23-year-old man died Saturday after being shot during clashes in the capital Dakar, two of his relatives told AFP, while a 22-year-old student died Friday in the northern town of Saint-Louis in still uncertain circumstances.

“The international and regional community must bear witness to the excesses of this dying regime,” said presidential candidate Khalifa Sall (no relation).

Modou Gueye, a market vendor, took “a live round to the stomach” on Friday in the Colobane neighbourhood of the capital Dakar, said his brother Dame Gueye, 29, who was with him at the time.

His brother-in-law Mbagnick Ndiaye said he succumbed to his injuries Saturday morning.

Authorities have yet to confirm Gueye’s death, but videos posted to social media suggest there were others injured as well.

In Saint-Louis, Alpha Yoro Tounkara died on the campus of Gaston Berger University where he was studying geography, and a hundred of his classmates held an all-night vigil for him.

The Interior Ministry issued a statement denying that security forces had operated within the university campus.

Reputation in question

Anger has mounted since President Sall last week postponed until December a presidential election scheduled February 25. The postponement came hours before official campaigning was due to begin.

Protests were held across the country Friday and police made wide use of tear gas to keep crowds away from a main central square in Dakar, also closing main roads, rail lines and major markets.

Reporters Without Borders said at least five journalists were targeted by police in Dakar.

Senegal’s democratic record on the line as presidential vote delay sparks crisis

A new round of protests are planned for Tuesday.

Sall said he postponed the election because of a dispute between parliament and the Constitutional Council over potential candidates who were not allowed to stand, and has said he wants to begin a process of “appeasement and reconciliation.”

The postponement has been criticised by the United States and European Union. Senegal’s parliament backed the move after security forces stormed the chamber and removed some opposition deputies.

Parliament also voted to keep Sall in office until his successor takes office, which is unlikely to be before early 2025. His second term was due to end April 2.

The crisis has called into question the West African country’s reputation for democratic stability in a region beset by military coups.

Source: AFP

9, February 2024

Who is winning the war in Southern Cameroons? ⁰

It is more than 6 years since 91-year-old President Biya launched a full-scale attack on the English speaking people of Southern Cameroons — but who is really winning the war in Ambazonia?

Frankly speaking, the answer cannot be straightforward. To be accurate, it is also no longer dependent on Southern Cameroons Self Defense Forces and the Ambazonia Interim Government but much on the political situation in La Republique du Cameroun.

Judging from Yaounde’s military calculations, progress, so far, has been slower than expected, according to Cameroon Intelligence Report sources, although some Francophone military barons have insisted this is accidental and not deliberate.

While our chief political man, Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai says it is still too early to predict the result with any certainty, we of the Cameroon Concord News Group are of the opinion that there are some areas of the Southern Cameroons war in which Yaoundé or the Ambazonia Interim Government are currently leading.

Our London Bureau Chief Isong Asu breaks them down here:

One and indivisible Cameroon and the Federal Republic of Ambazonia

From every indication, neither President Paul Biya nor President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe has achieved the stated objectives they set out at the beginning of this campaign.

Immediately after Biya launched the invasion of English speaking Cameroon six years ago, he outlined the objectives and stated that “Cameroon was one and indivisible.”

Biya’s aims were to flush out separatists and to defend the territorial integrity of the Republic of Cameroon.

But the Biya Francophone officials have repeatedly shifted their goalposts, stating at the beginning that they were fighting Anglophone terrorists and changing it to separatists. And because of its ever-changing Southern Cameroons war aims, the Francophone dominated military has now commercialized the war and there are military bases all over Southern Cameroons including in villages that are not even accessible by road. From Yaoundé’s perspective, we think they’re moving closer to achieving their objectives which is that of militarizing the entire Southern Cameroons.

But the Ambazonia Interim Government is making resistance gains and has managed to put pressure on French Cameroun’s tough defensive lines in Buea and Bamenda. This week, Amba fighters raided Buea the chief city in the South West Region and punished Southern Cameroonians who defied ghost town operation orders.

“We still have a long way to go in this war in Southern Cameroons, but recent actions in Buea and Bamenda are something Yaoundé should be worried about,” Soter Agbaw-Ebai said.

Correspondingly, one of Southern Cameroons main objectives — stated in President Sisiku Ayuk Tabe’s independence speech — is to liberate the entire Southern Cameroons from the union with French Cameroun. But this is appearing to be unattainable following the many divisions deep within the Ambazonia Interim Government.

“So getting to Buea, I don’t actually think that’s ever going to be possible with the Ambazonia leader and his top aides still in Kondengui” Soter Agbaw-Ebai noted.

“No one in Europe takes those clowns in Maryland seriously so it is very hard to see how My Trip To Buea could be achieved in the near term. Only a change of regime in Yaoundé, which seems very unlikely at the moment can reactivate the journey to Buea” Soter Agbaw-Ebai furthered.

La Republique versus Southern Cameroons

If winning the war in Southern Cameroons was based on morale, Southern Cameroonians would emerge as the victor.

Morale among Amba fighters has been high even after the arrest of the Ambazonian leader Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and his top aides in Abuja, Nigeria. Stark resistances from Southern Cameroons Restoration Forces have forced President Biya to make some huge adjustments to his military deployments in English speaking Cameroon and cabinet ministers from Anglophone Cameroon including Paul Atanga Nji have been told not to comment publicly on the war.

“I think Cameroon government army soldiers are in a weaker position today because they appear to be panicking when deployed to the rural areas in Southern Cameroons,” Agbaw-Ebai said.

Biya and his Francophone political elites made their war aims very unclear from the very beginning, which has made it extremely difficult for them to win support for the war in both French and English speaking Cameroon.

A rising number of French speaking Cameroonians have started to express serious doubts about the progress that is being made in this senseless conflict in Southern Cameroons.

“Whether that means there will be some kind of threat to the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime, I think is a different question, but clearly there is quite widespread discontent with the way the war in Southern Cameroons has been run,” Soter Agbaw-Ebai pointed out. Morale has also been weakened by corruption among Cameroon’s military leaders.

Cameroon Government Military against Ambazonia Forces

It is difficult to say who is currently winning from a military standpoint because the two forces do not have complete control of the security situation in Southern Cameroons.

And even with the continued deployment of troops from French Cameroun to Southern Cameroons towns and villages, it is still unclear how effective these French speaking army soldiers plan to deal with the present invincible Amba fighters as well as how resilient Ambazonia fighters will be this 2024.

“For me, the two sides are relatively balanced and I believe the war will drag on for many years after Biya” Soter Agbaw-Ebai concluded.

By Isong Asu

London Bureau Chief

Cameroon Concord News Group

6, February 2024

Senegal on the brink after elections postponed ⁰

Senegal’s reputation as a bastion of democracy in an unstable region is on the line after protesters clashed with riot police outside parliament on Monday.

Inside, lawmakers passed a contentious bill to extend President Macky Sall’s tenure and delay elections after he called off a planned election with just three weeks to go.

There was a heated atmosphere in the chamber, and some opposition MPs had been removed before the vote by police clad in riot gear after they tried to block proceedings.

Khalifa Sall, a leading opponent and a former mayor of Dakar, who is not related to the president, called the delay a “constitutional coup” and urged people to protest against it. His political coalition has vowed to go to court.

Thierno Alassane Sall, another candidate, also no relation, called it “high treason” and urged his supporters to gather in front of the National Assembly to protest and “remind MPs to stand on the right side of history”.

The proposal needed the support of three-fifths (i.e. 99) of the 165 deputies to pass. The ruling Benno Bokk Yakaar coalition, of which President Sall’s Alliance for the Republic party is part, has a slight majority in parliament.

In the end 105 MPs voted for the proposal. A six-month postponement was originally proposed, but a last-minute amendment extended it to 10 months, or 15 December.

Mr Sall reiterated that he was not planning to run for office again. But his critics accuse him of either trying to cling on to power or unfairly influencing whoever succeeds him.

No sooner had he announced the unprecedented postponement than protesters marched across the capital, Dakar, to call for a reversal.

Source: BBC