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The Anglophone crisis is more than 18 months old today, but it has yet to stop switching moods to even uglier ones, despite every effort that has been undertaken by the government of Cameroon to lay it to rest.
It started with industrial actions by lawyers and teachers and gradually morphed into a political crisis with calls for a return to a federal system of government and then for outright secession.
This continuous degeneration of the crisis has only continued to put the ordinary population in pain with people now forced to respect multiple ghost towns and night curfews.
Schools in many villages are still shut down meanwhile; so many villages have been burnt down with thousands of villagers displaced and thousand others currently seeking refuge in Nigeria.
Armed militia groups have also emerged with many of them fighting for what they now call “freedom”.
A commuter who left Kumba for Bamenda told TCR that, armed militia groups popularly called Ambazonia fighters have taken control of some points of the road particularly around Kendem just after Widikum town, and are controlling cars, checking ID cards and educating the population on the need to indentify with the fight.
“When they check on your ID card and realize that you are a security officer, they pull you down but I don’t know what they will do to you after that” the source added.
Similarly, in Mbonge subdivision in the Southwest region, fighting seems to be at its peak as armed militia groups there are said to have taken total control of the road and are carrying out similar checks on vehicles.
“There are days cars are not allowed to move to Mbonge” the source added.
Over the weekend, there was serious fighting in the locality of Konye and tens of security forces were feared dead but no casualties have been reported on the side of the armed militia groups, TCR learnt from sources.
In Lebialem, separatist fighters have allegedly taken control of the town of Menji and have even summoned courage to show up in the town in broad daylight to the amazement of the population. They are also reported to have carried out several attacks that have caused serious injuries on the side of the population.
We also gathered that they equally have lost several of their members even though they do not admit that as sources indicate.
The DO, the regional delegate, and other officials that had been abducted by separatist fighters are still missing and only the whereabouts of the regional delegate are known.
Worst still, there are indications that the Anglophone population in the Diaspora is mobilizing huge finances to provide the armed militia groups of separatists with sophisticated weapons to carryon with their cause.
This has inspired fear in most Cameroonians that love the peace of this nation that, the future is very tentative as separatist fighters seem relentless in their cause.
Like never before, Cameroonians are yearning for a quick and lasting solution to this crisis that has shaken the very foundation of the peace and unity of their country before it spreads its tentacles to the rest of Cameroon, God Forbid.
Gov’t wants Dialogue only with Advocates of a one and indivisible Cameroon
In the face of this untold hullaballoo that has been created by the Anglophone crisis, the Minister of territorial administration, Paul Atanga Nji, has toured the two English speaking regions of Cameroon with the hope of causing the crisis to halt.
While in the Northwest and Southwest regions, the minister affirmed that he was bearer of a message of peace to the people therein.
With his usual charisma and confidence, the minister handed over peace plants to traditional rulers and local populations, appealing on them to promote peace by helping security forces to crackdown on the armed separatist groups.
In Batibo, Paul Atanga Nji advised the population to call on their children fighting and hiding in bushes to come out and surrender themselves so as to be forgiven by government and that if not, they were going to be chased by forces of law and order and dealt with accordingly.
In the Southwest region where he spoke extensively about dialogue, the minister unraveled the lone condition under which the government will dialogue for a solution to the crisis. He maintained that the lone condition is that, dialogue takes place only with advocates of a one and indivisible Cameroon.
According to critics, his declarations effectively meant that the country is not going to engage armed separatists whose activities continue to threaten members of the security forces and disrupt life in the Northwest and Southwest regions of the country – the Anglophone regions.
“We can still solve the problem without burning, looting, raping, destroying. The government is ready to dialogue with those who seek the oneness of Cameroon,” the Minister said in a visit to Buea, capital of the Southwest region.
His declarations though described as “lofty” by some Cameroonians, has received a strong backlash from many who think that the only form of dialogue that can break the current impasse is inclusive dialogue, that is, one that brings every aggrieved party on the table.
Meanwhile, the National Commission of Human right and Freedoms on March 8 2018, issued a press release reiterating its position which is that, “dialogue is the only way out of the crisis”. The NCHR appreciated the efforts put in by the government to ease the tensions in the two regions but regretted the fact that the government is not willing to collaborate with the commission to allow it reach the Anglophone leaders that were arrested in Nigeria.
While the calls for the initiation of a dialogue to solve the crisis galore, the spokesperson of one of the separatist movements, Chris Anu, of the Interim Government of the hypothetical state of Ambazonia, stated categorically that, they (separatists) were not going to dialogue with the government of Cameroon if secession was not brought on the table. According to Chris Anu, Southern Cameroons, a former British territory is “illegally occupied and annexed,” and that the international community should call on the government of Cameroon to pull out of the territory before dialogue could take place. He also intimated that the problem “cannot be solved by decentralization” and that all the measures the government had taken were cosmetic. According to Chris, the interim government had repeatedly called for dialogue but that the dialogue must be only under the auspices of the international community and that independence must be on the table. He went further to opine that, the government has resisted the calls for dialogue and had instead wedged war on Ambazonia and that the Ambazonians were left with no choice than to defend themselves.
According to the positions of the opposing parties in the crisis, it is rather limpid that a solution to the crisis could still be far-flung if care is not taken especially with armed groups springing up almost on a daily basis.
The conflict in positions is where lies the greatest challenge to getting a panacea to the crisis as o one is willing to submit to their opponent.
And, the innocent population has for long been abandoned to the mercy of fate with the arby-bargy dragging on.
However, the international community has in several occasions, prescribed dialogue which it has said can only be initiated by the government of Cameroon, and that it should be inclusive.
Meanwhile, some critics are of the opinion that at this point in time, a solution can only be provided by the African Union. They think that the African Union should send a team to the troubled Northwest and Southwest regions to initiate the process of reconciliation between the population and the government while forcing the government to implement the political demands provided by the constitution especially concerning regional autonomy.
Political analysts also think that, a block in the channel of funding of the armed separatist groups as well as their channel of rearmament and the incrimination of some of their leaders abroad will help to kill the rising tensions.
This viewpoint has however been debunked by some who think that if arresting leaders of the Anglophone cause could play the magic, then it would have long so with the arrest of Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and his close aides.
The unanswered question now is, since government has a different point of view from that of the separatists, how then can genuine dialogue be initiated? One might be tempted to conclude that with the situation at hand, the crisis might still be at its introductory phase.
LVV/FHM
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