Cameroon: Anglophone activists call for month of “ghost towns” moments before arrests and Internet shutdown

[Elisabeth Janaina]

Cameroon: Anglophone activists call for month of “ghost towns” moments
before arrests and Internet shutdown
Posted on January 18, 2017 by Mbom Sixtus
The latest developments are the culmination of escalating tensions
over several months, which have seen widespread strikes, protests,
arrests and deaths.
Credit: Mbom Sixtus.

Activists in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions complain of
marginalisation. Credit: Mbom Sixtus.

On 17 January, Cameroonian activists on social media struck a tone of
both despondency and defiance as news broke of the arrests of two
prominent civil society leaders. Felix Agbor Nkongho and Fontem Neba
had been at the forefront of the campaign for greater autonomy for the
English-speaking regions of Cameroon, and their sudden arrests came as
a shock to many.

“We are finished. So this is how it was all going to end,” lamented
one campaigner. Another responded more hopefully, commenting that
“tears rolled down my cheeks when I got the news… [but] our leaders
will find a way”.

Soon this exchange was cut short, however, as the Internet went down
across Cameroon, and in particular the English-speaking areas.

This clampdown on communication has spread greater uncertainty over
what will come next in these restive regions, which have seen
escalating strikes, protests, arrests and fatal violence over the past
few months.

Many in Cameroon’s two English-speaking regions – the Northwest and
Southwest – claim that they have been discriminated against since
reunification in 1961. They say that the central government privileges
the majority French-speaking population and eight other regions.
Amongst other things, campaigners complain of being treated as
second-class citizens, of marginalisation in the education and
judicial system, of lack of representation in government, of a
perceived lack of returns from oil extracted from the region, and of
the erosion of Anglophone identity.

These grievances have been simmering since the 1990s, when the
Southern Cameron National Council (SCNC) was established with the aim
of “restoring” the independence of West Cameroon. But this
discontentment has resurfaced and intensified recently, though the
emphasis today has been on demanding a referendum on federalism rather
than secession.

Escalation of grievances

In May 2015, the Common Law Lawyers association sent a letter to
President Paul Biya, objecting to the appointment of French-educated
judges – who they say do not understand English common law which is
used in West Cameroon – to their courts. They requested the withdrawal
of these magistrates and demanded the restoration of federalism, which
had ended with the adoption of a new constitution in 1972.

In October 2016, in the face of the government’s non-response, the
lawyers finally decided to make their voices heard by striking and
organising marches to the courts. In November, police dispersed
demonstrations with tear gas, leading to multiple injuries.

On 21 November, this Anglophone campaign intensified as thousands of
teachers joined the lawyer’s sit-down strike, complaining against what
they see as the imposition of French in schools. On that same day,
activist Mancho Bibixy embarked on a solo protest centred on the poor
state of roads in Bamenda, the largest city in West Cameroon. He
marched along Commercial Avenue, carrying a coffin and saying he was
ready to die for his cause. Along his journey, he picked up support
from commercial bike riders and other citizens. Eventually, security
forces intervened, leading to bloody clashes and the death of one
protester.

In the following days and weeks, tensions mounted as the strikes
continued. The police engaged in mass arrests of protesters and there
were a number of deaths at the hands of police. On 29 November, when
students at the University of Buea embarked on their own related
protest, security forces beat students with batons, fired teargas, and
allegedly sexually assaulted some protesters.

Another flashpoint in the escalating crisis came shortly after on 8
December, as Paul Atanga Nji, a minister in Biya’s government, who had
previously angered activists by dismissing their grievances, organised
a ruling party meeting in Bamenda. Angry protesters stormed the
premises and attacked the gathering, requiring soldiers to rescue
officials. Four protesters were shot dead, many others were injured,
and dozens were arrested.

In response to mass arrests and state violence in the face of the
mostly peaceful protests over the past few months, international
bodies have increasingly raised concerns. The UN High Commissioner for
Human Rights called on the government to investigate the police’s use
of “excessive force”. Amnesty International demanded authorities
refrain from “unlawful force” and warned that “excessive force
threatens to further enflame an already tense situation”.

Meanwhile, the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights issued
a highly critical press release, stating: “The Special Rapporteur
condemns very strongly the alleged use of disproportionate force
against civilians, the violent and deathly suppression of peaceful
demonstrators”.

Ghost towns

In mid-January, there were momentarily signs that the long-running
impasse may be coming to an end. Members of the Cameroon Anglophone
Civil Society Consortium, a grouping of organisations behind the
protests, agreed to meet with the government despite earlier
reservations.

In a press briefing from the Consortium on 14 January, representatives
explained that: “In spite of the non release of those children
kidnapped and taken to Yaounde where they have been tortured
mercilessly, the Unions still accepted to talk to govenunent [sic] in
the hope that reason might prevail.” It claimed that, “The talks were
frank, heated and occasionally cordial.”

Yet it continued that after security forces “went on rampage…shooting
four unarmed young men and severely wounding them” while the talks
were ongoing, the Consortium had no choice but to pull out. Instead,
the campaigners declared a “ghost town” on 16 and 17 January and
called on supporters to stay at home in peaceful protest.

On both these days, many Cameroonians heeded the call with businesses
staying closed and many roads lying largely abandoned. However, some
protesters took their anger to the streets, with one group reportedly
blocking trucks from transporting petroleum and timber to Francophone
Cameroon. Further arrests and violence was witnessed.

This set the stage for 17 January, when the government appears to have
lost patience. In the afternoon, it announced the banning of the
Consortium along with the secessionist SCNC. Government spokesperson
Issa Tchiroma suggested the leaders of the Consortium were in fact
working for the SCNC and were hiding their real agendas behind other
demands.

Felix Agbor Nkongho and Fontem Neba, respectively the president and
secretary-general of the Consortium, were arrested and the government
terminated its invitation of dialogue. Soon after, access to the
Internet was severely limited.

In a hurried release following its banning yesterday, the Consortium
warned supporters: “it is uncertain how things turn out in the hours
ahead; things may go so fast and you may be seeing this release when
most of us could be under detention”.

The campaigners quickly designated two foreign-based activists – Mark
Bara in Belgium and Tapang Ivo Tanku in the US – to take over the
leadership of the movement, reassuring supporters that “they have been
sufficiently briefed on our non-violent approach to this struggle”.

In a final bid, the Consortium also called for more peaceful ghost
towns “from Monday to Wednesday every week…for a period of one month”
in order to “tell the world our plight and suffering”.

On 18 January, two former leaders of the Cameroon Bar Association,
Barristers Akere Muna and Bernard Muna, led a group of 30 lawyers to
Yaoundé to secure the release of the Consortium leaders who had been
transferred from the town of Buea overnight. Some of the lawyers took
photos with Felix Agbor and shared them on Facebook, reassuring
citizens that the strike leaders are in good condition. Tassang
Wilfred, who had been speculated to be the next likely leader of the
Consortium and targeted for arrest, was reported to have gained asylum
in an Embassy in Yaoundé.

The recent arrests of prominent activists, the banning of the
Consortium, and the shutdown of the Internet mark the culmination of
months of escalating tensions between the government and activists.
The government is no doubt hoping this crisis point will force the
campaigners to yield, but with so much uncertain and frustrations
intensifying, it remains to be seen how the movement will now respond.

Mbom Sixtus is a freelance journalist based in Yaoundé.
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4 thoughts on “Cameroon: Anglophone activists call for month of “ghost
towns” moments before arrests and Internet shutdown”

Janvier Tchouteu says:
January 19, 2017 at 5:27 am

From the Excerpt of “Triple Agent Double Cross”

The African Pearl

If you board a plane or ship plying any of the international
routes and ask to be taken to the heart of Africa, do not be surprised
to find yourself disembarking in Cameroon. It is a beautiful country
per se, situated opposite the middle portion of Brazil, on the eastern
side of the Atlantic Ocean. Bordered by six countries of which Nigeria
is the most prominent neighbor, Cameroon appears on maps like a
heavily pregnant mother carrying a baby on her back. .
This peculiar geopolitical entity was created by accident and
apportioned to Germany during the 1884 Berlin conference that carved
up Africa. Berlin treated German Kamerun as its treasured colony for
thirty-two years until Great Britain and France captured the land
during the First World War, partitioned it into British Cameroons and
French Cameroun, and then went on to lord it over the people for four
decades. However, they too were challenged by Cameroonian nationalists
who campaigned for the divided territory’s reunification and
self-rule. Today, English and French are the country’s official
languages, mirroring the dominance of the two Indo-European languages
in Africa.
They say the gods have a design even in the most outrageous acts
of mortals. If that is the case, then it also applies to Cameroon. The
country has defied so many odds in its history that the people now
pride themselves with the saying that “Impossible isn’t a Cameroonian
word.”
Renowned voices tend to call Cameroon “Africa in miniature”, not
only because of its fanciful shape and turbulent history, but also
because of the physical and human aspects of its geography. It is the
point in Africa where the East meets the West and where the North
meets the South. It is a country that features plains and mountains,
plateaus and valleys, rivers and seas, lakes and waterfalls and other
landmarks that mirror the rest of Africa. The south is dominated by
equatorial and tropical rainforests, the north is covered by Sahelian
vegetation, and the middle portion of the country is graced with high
savannah of mixed grassland and forest. In fact, all the different
flora and fauna in Africa can be found in this carelessly drawn
triangle called Cameroon.
The curious eye is apt to notice varying statures, facial types
and shades of complexion as it travels throughout Cameroon—a legacy of
the territory’s history as the crossroads of African migrations.
Anthropological linguists hold that all of Africa’s four major
language groups converge in Cameroon.
The southern portion of the country is the base from where Bantu
speakers spread to southern and eastern Africa. The furthest spread of
Afro-Asiatic peoples is in the north of this territory, featuring
groups like the Semitic-speaking Arabs, Berber-speaking Tuaregs,
Chadic-speaking Hausas and Batas, and Fula or Fulfulde-speaking
Fulanis or Peuls. Nilo-Saharan speakers dominate the north of the
country in their furthest spread to the west of the continent. Also
present in Cameroon are small ethnicities of the fourth major subgroup
(Niger-Congo A) that occupy the southwestern border regions with
Nigeria. Settled in the northwestern portion of the country that looks
like the pregnant part of mother Cameroon is the fifth and unique
indigenous group that you will find only in Cameroon. Called
semi-Bantu, Graffi or southern Bantoid, this group has characteristics
of all the four major language groups or sub-races in Africa. Legends
and lore hold that semi-Bantus are originally of Afro-Asiatic and
Nilo-Saharan descent and that they assimilated all the peoples they
encountered in the course of their migration. The Bamileké people are
the dominant ethnicity in this group.
It is true that Cameroon’s human and physical wealth has been the
source of its turbulent history, its pride and the ingredients that
give its people a unique flavor. The flavor has produced colorful
Cameroonian characters that the curious eye and mind is likely to
enjoy by hating or loving them, pitying or angrily denouncing them.
These characters provide insights into the human nature and the
African continent that is haunted by leaders with the evil
disposition.
While other African peoples have picked up arms and warred among
themselves to have their country split up, Cameroon is the only
geo-political entity in the continent whose inhabitants went to war to
reunite its people separated by the legacy of Anglo-French partition
of the former German colony of Kamerun. It is the only country where
those who fought for its reunification and independence are yet to
assume political power, as they continue to languish from the defeat
suffered in the hands of the French overlords and the puppets they
installed in power. It is the land where you will find Africa’s
biggest political deception and sleaziest mafia. It is the country in
Africa with the lowest number of heads of state in its history, yet it
is a country that is unlikely to engage in internecine war to get rid
of the suffocating system.
In the middle of the twentieth century, a child was born in
Cameroon who by the age of ten, proved he could become anything he
wanted to be. This child prodigy happened to be the son of a soldier
of the Free French Forces that fought across the African desert and
liberated France from German occupation during the Second World War.
The boy looked up to his revolutionary father as the greatest source
of inspiration in his life. But how he ended up serving those who
wrecked his world is the riddle the rest of the story is going to
unravel…

(Culled from Triple Agent, Double Cross)

Part II: Afterthought on 07/04/2015: Cameroon as a Hijacked Nation

In power since 1982 is Africa’s absentee dictator Paul Biya, who
was made the successor of his predecessor Ahmadou Ahidjo by an order
from former French President Francoise Mitterand; Ahidjo, who himself
was brought to power by the French to usurp the aspirations of
Cameroonians in their liberation struggle led by the UPC that the
French banned in 1955, a party with more than 80% of the land’s
intellectuals and even more national support. France had made sure
Ahidjo’s power was secured by decimating its support base in a 12-year
war against the party and by killing all the UPC leaders (Un Nyobe
1958, Felix Moumie in Geneva 1960, Ossende Ofana 1966, Ernest Ouandie
1971 etc.), leaving Cameroon a nation haunted by an “Unfinished
Liberation Struggle”. Today, Cameroonians are out not only to get rid
of the Dictator Biya’s autocracy, but also to get rid of the
French-imposed system that its custodians want to continue with
someone else after Paul Biya departs.

Part III: Cameroon under an oppressive system and haunted by Terrorism

Compounded by the retrogressive system and the lunacy of the Biya
regime is the specter of Boko Haram that started haunting northern
Cameroon a few years ago, a distorted form of Islam espoused by a
group that sees glory in the murder of the innocent (women, children
and other civilians), a spillover from Nigeria’s religious tension and
an amalgamation of geopolitics as foreign interests extend the
exploitation of resources in the Lake Chad basin. Only a Cameroon rid
of the retrogressive French-imposed system and headed by those who put
the interest of the land above their personal interests or the
interests of foreign entities who have no genuine concern for the
land, can the citizens of Cameroon be certain that the country and
government would be able to handle the insecurity posed by anti-people
and dehumanized groups like Boko-Haram. In fact, Boko-Haram in North
Cameroon and the system/Biya regime are in symbiosis as they make each
other relevant in a space where both are loathed by the vast majority
of Cameroonians.
Wilson Ambang says:
January 19, 2017 at 7:31 am

This is really unbelievable that other countries are spending
billions of dollars to keep or integrate their different cultures and
identity, protecting and building their national infrastruture,
competing for civilization and modernization, the cameroon government
is instead fighting against all these. When will the government stop
thinking about their stomach and instead start thinking about the
people and the country. what is democracy if it is not being practice.
when will the world put look or listen to what is happening to the
people of cameroon. this is not a problem for the anglophone but a
problem for the whole cameroon. the french part is totally blinded, so
it is impossible to even see what the other side is witnessing. there
is much to this and time is coming for us to do something to protect
the future of our children and the whole cameroon.
Nde D Nguti says:
January 19, 2017 at 7:34 am

The government of Cameroon should continue negotiations instead of
arresting strike leaders. These problems we postpone for our children
to solve. It is better we tackle them now and leave a better future
for our children for all Cameroon. We have done much to leave them
with a lot of foreign debt. Let us no leave them again with issues of
identify and marginalization.
Michael Njong says:
January 20, 2017 at 1:30 pm

The arrest, detention, torture and execution of Southern
Cameroonians by the government of La Republique du Cameroun constitute
an effort towards the wrong direction. Citizens of Southern Cameroons
are not their slaves. Southern Cameroonians are a people, with their
territory and population. What is lacking is only the government,
which I suggest should be put in place as soon as possible and
independence declared. What La Republique and its Biya regime are
doing are just the last kicks of a dying horse.