By Sandra Lum
Many international rights NGOs that have been monitoring the insecurity situation in Cameroon, especially in the Northwest and Southwest regions, have continued to advise against the return of Anglophone Cameroonians to the two conflict-ravaged regions.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Assistance, OCHA Cameroon, in its some of its reports noted with concern that the “humanitarian situation in the NW and SW regions continues to be marked by armed violence and insecurity in affected areas”.
The above insecurity and life-threatening situation in the two regions has been going on since 2017 when a disagreement on how to resolve grievances submitted to the Government by teachers and lawyers of these two English -speaking regions, also known as former Southern Cameroons, soon degenerated into an armed conflict.
The conflict, which has been raging for the past seven or so years today, has resulted to the deaths of over 6,000 persons as reported by many of these humanitarian NGOs.
Over 500,000 others are reported to have fled the two regions to find refuge in other countries, either in Europe, the US or others. While some countries, such as Switzerland, Canada, among others, have tried to mediate for a peaceful end to the crisis, both the Government of Cameroon as well as the separatist fighters who are battling for the independence of these two regions – have failed to accept a peaceful resolution.
Thus, the war has continued to grind on with serious and very recurrent cases of violence, targeted killings, kidnappings among others vices being reported.
In OCHA’s report, it stated as follows: “… restrictions on movements, illegal checkpoints, kidnappings for ransom, targeted killings, burning of houses and difficult access to basic services, especially in remote areas, continue to impact the civilian populations”.
Why are many fleeing?
The above situation, which depicts a complete absence of safety in the two English Speaking regions as described by OCHA Cameroon report, explains why many people have continuously been fleeing from these two regions for their safety.
Human rights activists, Journalists are not spared!
Even human rights activists and media reporters, who have been working on the ground in these two regions, gathering information on the war’s happenings, as well as in the Far North Region where the Boko Haram insurgency group is still operating, have equally had to flee these regions.
A humanitarian organisation such as Doctors Without Borders, MSF, were banned by the Government and asked to leave the two Regions on the pretext, the Government said, they were collaborating with the Separatists armed fighters.
Thus, both the Government forces and the armed separatists fighters, as reported by Amnesty International, in its 2024 Report on Cameroon, have made human rights activists their victims.
“Forty one activists and opposition leaders remained arbitrarily detained after being sentenced by military courts for taking part in a march on 22 September 2022 organised by the Cameroon Renaissance Movement political party.”
A Cameroonian activist, Yves Kibouy Bershu, known popularly as Ramon Cotta was arrested…in Gabon and transferred to Cameroon on July 19th, 2024,” the Amnesty reported stated.
Ramon Cotta was later transferred to Yaounde and jailed “without any known legal or diplomatic procedure”.
He is said to have been charged, among other issues for an “apology for the crime of secession, contempt of constituted bodies and lack of an identity card”.
Anglophone activists abroad fear for their lives!
From our investigation, one Ms Mercy Lemnwi Suhbesi, who worked as a human rights activist and field reporter for a local media organistation in the Southwest Region – the Cameroon Association of Media Professionals, CAMP, headed by one Solomon Agborem, a prominent Cameroonian Journalist, is one of such activists who, apparently fled Cameroon.
CAMP says they haven’t heard from her since she stopped work sometime in mid 2023.
Te CAMP authorities informed us that Lemnwi was one of some four other CAMP staffers: Daniel Membou, Mortar Njoumesi, Nana Coline and Vanawal Daniel had they suspect must have fled the country given the heightened insecurity situation that they had become subjected two in the Northwest and Southwest.
They are said to have under serious threats from both the Government and Separatist forces sometimes in 2023. Lemnwi and her other former CAMP colleagues had worked within the Southwest and Northwest Regions as field reporters for CAMP and also for Stand Up Cameroon – a group that has been fighting for the protection of women in the course of the armed conflict in the two regions.
Their duty was to collect field information and report to their organisations about they conduct of war in the two regions especially as human rights issues were concerned. But they started facing threats and decided to flee.
State security forces, just as they have been doing to every other activists they suspect, even arbitrarily, of working in the two regions, our investigations confirmed, had come hunting for Lemnwi on many occasions.
Lemnwi is suspected to have left Cameroon sometime in March, 2023, when CAMP observed she was no longer reporting for work.
But, the continuous killings, incessant arrests by both State forces and the fighters makes one to suspect Lemnwi must have been forced to flee so as to stay save.
Thousands of Cameroonians As Refugees Abroad
There are thousands of Cameroonians living in many countries abroad and who are unable to return owing to the incessant violence that continuous to ravage the two Regions.
And since the disappearance of Lemnwi, this reporter gathered that state security forces, have, on several occasions, since 2023, being visiting their home in Bamenda in search for her.
Family members told this reporter that, the security forces often beat and brutalise them each time they visit their Bamenda home on grounds that they must produce Lemnwi whom they have been searching for.
“In August, 2024, elements of the Cameroon police force went in search of Lemnwi right at her Douala residence. She left our family residence in Bamenda to Douala,” a family member in their Bamenda family residence told this reporter. They, too, say they can’t quite tell where she fled the country to.
Lemnwi happened to have lived in Douala at the time she worked as a staff of the Douala-based Stand Up for Cameroon activist group led by Ms Kah Walla, a well known Cameroonian female politician and Activist.
Her Group has been fighting for the rights and protection of women in the crisis-hit Northwest and Southwest regions.
The act of brutalising innocent family members, killing and maiming others has been a recurrent tactic used by the state security or police forces in Cameroon since the onset of the Anglophone crisis. They reportedly use such tactics as a mean to subdue their targets or force them to release information they can hang on to either arrest or kill.
There is this famous case of the 14th of February, 2020, in Ngarbuh, a village in the Northwest region, where government forces stormed the village at night and massacred 21 civilians with their guns while the innocent children and victims slept. The state forces claimed the villagers had been harbouring separatists fighters.
Until date, these families are still waiting for justice on their murdered children, relations as the Government drags on in silence.
The state security forces have thus, brutalised and killed civilians on countless occasions and gone unpunished since the start of the crisis; a situation that has forced many to flee the country and equally caused many, out there, to be afraid to return.
The military courts that the Government has charged to handle cases related to the crisis has largely favoured the state security forces and the police in almost all the crisis related cases.
International rights groups and others have generally condemned the unjustified actions of both the state security forces and that of the non-state armed fighters. But all these condemnations seem to be falling on deaf ears as the killings, kidnappings and other acts of terror continue unabated.
Thus, the prolonged conflict from 2016 until date has made it very unsafe for the return of thousands of refugees and many persons who fled from the two regions to other countries or parts of the world.
Fairplanet.org reports that, “As security threats drive more people to cross the US border in search of protection…thousands of Cameroonians asylum seekers in the US” whose temporary protection status, TPS, had to be renewed were left in a situation of uncertainty as they are “unable to return to a country still gripped by violence.”
Thus, the situation on the ground in the two English Speaking regions of Cameroon, coupled with the crisis in the Far North Region remains very unsafe.
The risks of arrest, detention or being kidnapped among other ills are still very imminent, especially for any persons who have been critical of the brutish actions of both the Government forces and the Separatists or non-state armed forces.
