Ambazonian Struggle for Liberation: A Cauldron of Human Rights Abuses.
by Pavlov Vellenvevinyo
The World’s most neglected displacement crisis.
According to the Norwegian Refugee Council Report of June 2019, the “Cameroon Anglophone Crisis” is one, if not the world’s most neglected displacement crisis of the 21st century. The English speaking minority of former British South Cameroons and the French speaking dominating majority government of former French Cameroon are engaged in a war that has been very devastating since it began in the late 2016, after dictator Paul Biya declared war on British Southern Cameroons citizens. What started as an uprising of teachers and lawyers of English expression against educational and legal practices that discriminate against English speaking minority groups, degenerated into an all-out armed conflict that has claimed thousands of lives and displaced millions of citizens all over central and west Africa, destroying livelihoods and property.
Complaining to the United Nations Human Rights Commission, the Secretary General of the Norwegian Refugee Council – Jan Egeland – had this to say: “_This culture of paralysis by the international community has to end. Everyday, the conflict is allowed to continue; bitterness is building and the region edges closer towards a full blown war… the conflict has so far uprooted half a million people in the Northwest and Southwest of Cameroon. Hundreds of villages have been set ablaze. Hospitals have been attacked. Health workers fear being abducted or killed. Over 780.000 children have seen their schools closed and thousands of people currently hiding in the bushes, have received no relief program. ” This statement of the Norwegian Refugee Council summarizes the prevailing crisis situation in Cameroon, witnessed by civilians who suffer gross human rights violations by belligerent factions in the ongoing war.
Another report dated August 20 2020 from the CHRDA, documenting gross human rights violations committed by government security and defence forces on civilians, registered extra judicial executions, arbitrary arrests, and unlawful detentions, looting and extortion, poor prison conditions, and inhumane and degrading treatment of detainees. Many villagers have seen their homes and villages burned down by military forces, forcing civilians to flee their homes and seek refuge in other towns as internally displaced peoples.
This report from CHRDA is in effect a follow up report to another one earlier issued through a press release on August 13 2020, calling on Ambazonian armed groups to stop perpetrating human rights abuses against civilians. The release statement included details of violations spanning a full spectrum of war crimes among which are hostage-taking, kidnapping for ransom, murder, recruiting child soldiers, intimidating and harassing of innocent civilians. The report showcased the most recent beheading of a man in mile 90 in Bamenda Northwest Region, and of a woman in Muyuka in the South West Region! The Ambazonian war of liberation indeed stands out as a bastion of human rights atrocities ans abuses.
