Yaounde under pressure to investigate police inhuman treatment on Anglophones ⁰

As pressure keeps mounting on the Biya regime over police and army brutality on innocent British Southern Cameroon citizens, the two security departments have asserted recently that by resorting to force as a last resort, they were obeying the orders of their leaders. The predominantly Francophone dominated military and police force were caught on camera inflicting inhuman treatment on Anglophone students and lawyers.

The international communities have been fed with videos circulated on social networks featuring law enforcement elements brutalizing students and lawyers from the Anglophone section of the country. The United States government reacted by calling on the Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime to provide protection to its citizens. Yaoundé responded through Issa Tchiroma, Minister of Communication by making a mockery of the Anglophone people observing that public authorities are required to ensure the maintenance of order and security.

Faced with national and Western pressures due to the often bloody repression, the CPDM leadership has reportedly announced sanctions against some elements responsible for the wronged abuses. Last Friday at the national assembly, Defense Minister Joseph Beti Assomo said that investigations are under way and that the guilty parties will be punished. “There will be disciplinary and criminal penalties against those responsible. On the civil plane there was a violation of human rights and on the military level there was a violation of instructions, “declared a senior official at the ministry of defense.

Confronted with this intractable situation, the elements of the forces of order in question have hardened their tone. A spokesman for the police department was quoted as saying that “Each unit has a leader. The elements positioned on the ground acted according to what their head of unit asked them to do. So there is no need to say today that we will punish the elements.”

By Rita Akana