Media Release;
Consortium Outlines Conditions for Dialogue
The President of the Republic of Cameroon, Paul Biya addresses the youths today. The Consortium has received a tip-off that he may acknowledge mistakes in the handling of our struggle. We are told the acknowledgment would not be sincere, but meant to fool us once more; a thing we should have become used to by now.
Secondly, we have read from the French Language Daily- “Le Messager” that the President has designated the Archbishop of Douala, His Grace Samuel Kleda as mediator in this struggle. We respect the man of God, who has demonstrated always that he is honest and has a personable character. But we must point out that in as much as we are ready for dialogue at any time, we abhor diversion.
Let it be known that all those leaders the people of Southern Cameroons put their trust in to negotiate on their behalf are either in jail or on the run. They must be found and brought to pilot any negotiations that shall engage the responsibility of the people; no government appointee shall speak for us, the people of the two regions have very resoundingly rejected those regime stooges.
Furthermore, the Consortium re-iterates that any discussions with government that shall not be based on one agenda only; the practical modalities for the putting in place of a two-state federation, and in the presence of representatives of the United Nations, and the UK shall be a waste of time.
While we maintain our struggle as a non violent movement for the liberation of our people, we want to strongly condemn the continuous provocation by forces of law and order against peaceful and unarmed citizens. We particularly deplore the actions of gendarmes who raped students in a boarding school in Kumba last Wednesday night; reason we keep asking parents to keep their children at home.
The excessive use of force, arbitrary arrests, kidnappings and torture on our people is pushing many to begin wondering whether federalism is even an option anymore!
God is with us!
On behalf of the Consortium,
Tassang Wilfred, Tapang Ivo, Mark Bara
6 comments
I have followed the divine struggle of the People of the Southern Cameroons for a while now. My first word of courage goes to the leaders of the Consortium. The fact that in all their outings, they have given God Almighty the pride of place, in this struggle warms my heart.
It does warm my heart because without God’s intervention, there is nothing any human can do. I will refer us to the book of 2King 6:16-18. There are so many like Fame Ndongo, who suddenly believe that he is superhuman; can do and undo…there are all these bundle of blood thirsty marauding military robots who are busy raping women all over the Southern Cameroons territory, killing and maiming innocent people.
Its all tasting so sweet and romantic. But one thing i can assure them is that the time has come. It will be written and recorded, and it will be judged, for there is no single drop of freedom that went unaccounted for.
First of all there is a need to ceate an environment of peace. If I look only on todays action of LRC in Western Cameroon I don’t see to start dialogue now. Biya want to negotiate with us but at the same time he arrests anglophone journalist in Buea, anglophone teachers in Jakiri and dozens of young people in Ndop. Mr. Biya you and your government you are not serious and not sincere. Withdraw your troops out of our territory, release all arrested including our leaders and stop the illegal blockade of the internet. After we can start to talk. When it comes to negotiations with us don’t think to put in a person which is in favour for you. You shall dialogue with the consortium. We need independent observers as well. Thus invite UN and AU as well. Don’t come up with commissions or decentralisation. That is wastage of time. We have seen in the last 20 years what you mean by decentralisation. Thank you all West Cameroonians for successful ghosttowns.
The speech of Mr. Paul Biya makes me speechless. He hasn’t understood anything. Putting our leaders into the corner of terrorism. It seems that there are two Cameroons today. In Ndop youth and population are hunted by wicked regime soldiers in Yaounde handpicked youth is clapping hands after a useless speech of an very old man. I don’t think that with him we can have a equal dialogue. He is totally out of reality. Out of topic. We will resist you until last man standing.
This consortium guys are also failing the people of west cameroon. I understand all of us have voice to play in this struggle. Bareta southern cameroon cannot go into federation with somebody who treats you as nothing. We will dialogue for the release of our brothers FIRST, then set the record straight for any dialogue. Dr Wirba, Dr Ayah, Mancho BBC, Lawyer Fontem, all of them have suffered a lot. We including you and all consortium need to know we need our country and Fatherland back. We cannot be in federation where we will still get up and imagine that we have a Federal Government with this same murderers and some of this old fools still intimidating us using some of our useless brothers in the police and BIR who have refuse to say we cant be killing our own blood when they have a genuine course and you don’t want to listen. Thr picture is they will continue to repress us in as long as we still have any connection with them. INDEPENDENCE is what the diaspora stands for and we will get it. All this Facebook messages will not help us, the struggle is ours and we must act before foreign help will come in. So be wise.
Dear Victor, trust them they are wise. Agbor Balla and the others well understood the system. For Biya Federalism is a no go. That’s why they pinch him on that. It is the root cause of our struggle. They know that Biya will not act in that part of the drama anymore. We are going to see many funny things in the upcoming weeks. God is with us. The force of peaceful protest is stronger than any gun of LRC.
This matter is either a domestic dispute or not. It cannot be both domestic and international at the same time. There are certain things we must be able to address before entering into any negotiations with The Republic of Cameroon. Firstly we should be able to determine how likely is it that as a domestic dispute we will attract the intervention of the international community easily? That is, would it be easy for us to attract an international negotiator if we insist on that? The same question would apply if we view it as an international dispute too. But in this case the way I see it, since the problem originated from the wrong application of UNGA Resolution 1608 of 1961 and it definitely concerned two equal states with recognized international boundaries, it was and definitely still is, an international dispute even if the occupying aggressor might choose to see it another way. This way if we insist that an international mediator be brought in we have a right to do so and may even get our wish.. In fact I think there are some hopes that such a possibility is taking shape in the horizon. But as I had written earlier we can still choose to carry on the negotiations with a mutually accepted negotiator from within Cameroon. It all depends on the two parties.
So my problem now is this. If we have to treat it as an international dispute, on what basis does it carry that definition – that on what basis can it be considered as an international dispute? I think it carries that definition on the basis that the UN voted on Resolution 1608 which clearly defined it as such. Which seems to me that the dispute cannot be negotiated without refering to UNGA Res. 1608. Now, does Resolution 1608 offer the third option that calls for complete independence? NO. So how do we go about discussing the dispute based on Res. 1608 and then we insist on direct independence which is not found on the resolution? I understand that time and our experience with The Republic of Cameroun provides enough reason for this third option to be more attractive and even more reasonable. It therefore means such a change must be made on that resolution or a completely new resolution be decided on by the UN. But who makes that decision? Who is competent to make that change? Us The Southern Cameroonians? The Republic of Cameroun? or the UN? None sounds that easy to accomplish. But in my opinion, the UN will be the most competent since it has the ultimate right to do so without asking the opinion of the other two parties, i.e. us and the The Republic of Cameroun. But now here is another problem. If the UN can enforce the decision of independence, why should any negotiation be initiated again between us and The Republic of Cameroun? It should just declare that the Southern Cameroons from such and such a date is independent and is on its own – and then recommends that it follows up all necessary procedures to be accepted as a full member of the United Nations. But can the UN do it like that without revisiting the historical facts that brought us to this situation – from which it will then make a ruling? Most important, can that be done without going back into the security council for another vote? If that would be the case, what about the possibility that France can veto any vote that would favour independence in preference to a much watered down decision and then we will be doomed forever? It is a risk we should not take. I don’t think it suffices to claim that France would not do it. We truly have a very justified and compelling argument in our favour but if our situation only depended on right and wrong we would have been out of it a long time ago. Unfortunately it is not. Our situation is compounded by French greed. We have suffered under Republic of Cameroun Annexation for over fifty years. We had narrowly escaped France’s participation in deciding our case when it was in the security council before Resolution 1608 was arrived at at the UNGA. – because at the time they had no influence over us when our future to be a newly independent state was being determined there. But when our case was decided France happened to become part of the negotiation of 1608 in the way we all know how – and then advised and aided Ahmadou Ahidjo to annex us. We have been in bondage ever since under a complicated, fraudulent arrangement from which we have not been able to get out of. However, at the moment based on the fact that it is an international matter, we have successfully made a compelling case to the point of getting into negotiations with The Republic of Cameroon on the argument of revisiting issue of how Res. 1608 of 1961 was implemented. We should understand that the resolution did not insist on international negotiator, but recommended the presence of international observers. So that is not a problem. Let us understand however that the abortive negotiations of 1961 was the handwork of France which succeeded because of our position of weakness. But we are no longer a weak poor territory with just about 800.000 “expendable” population – as one British Parliamentarian described us. If based on our negotiating power in 1961 Resolution 1608 could not be relied on to favour us, that is not the case today. We have a dynamic, well educated huge population full of experts on every conceivable subject under the sun. Renegotiating our dispute with The Republic of Cameroun based on resolution 1608 but with the intelligence and power we now possess, there is no danger in not getting everything we want.
But let us look at the matter based on the option of a one item agenda of direct independence. Everybody would like direct independence. I do too. But let’s see again what gives the matter its international dimension. It is simply our former trusteeship status which was changed through Resolution 1608 of 1961 to grant us independence. I am sure the UN has the power to grant us independence but how sure are we that the decision will not have to pass through the Security Council and then to the UNGA? If the UN guarantees that, then I am alright with it. But if it has to pass through the Security Council, France can veto it forcing it to be watered down to a kind of agreement I don’t even want to think about. We might even end worse off than we were before – and that would be forever. So why do we want to take the risk of creating a possibility where our case can be referred to the Security Council? Except the UN decides without its standard procedure, (i.e. without going through the security Council to the UNGA) I would advise that we avoid any possibility of letting our case pass through the Security Council regardless of whatever guarantees any third party can assure us.
But there is another negotiation processs we can adopt to get direct independence. That will be for us to disregard UNGA Res.1608 and negotiate just like that with The Republic of Cameroon. This when we accept, or forced to accept that it is a domestic dispute.With this option I think independence will be completely off the table.
So looking at the matter from my analysis above, as much as strongly demanding for direct independence is attractive and patriotic, it can only be considered if we choose to disregard Res. 1608.
I am sure the UN will be very willing to pass another resolution on our dispute but what if France chooses to veto it? Let nobody delude themselves that France cannot or would not. It’s better to avoid it completely rather than to try it out. What if France decides to veto it?
But if we accept to negotiate to implement this Res. 1608, it does not limit us from demanding direct independence. Even if we fail to get it we can still come out with an agreement that will give us such broad autonomy with the option of opting out of the federation whenever we see that it is not longer in our interest. Many federations have broken up peacefully like that. Senegambia is one clear example. It all depends on our negotiations from the beginning.
Let us try to believe in the possibility that France will destroy us at the Security Council. let’s not take that lightly. So before we decide on anything we must be assured that we will not allow France have a say in this dispute. At the moment France cannot directly intervene in it because we have every proof that we are not yet a part of The Republic of Cameroon even though Res.1608 states that we should enter into a union agreement with them. But do we want this third option to be added to the Resolution now? Or we should demand that a new resolution be taken from scratch? France can mess up things for us if we allow our case to be decided all over again by the UN. We better exhaust UNGA Resolution 1608. It does not limit us to Federation with East Cameroon. It does not prohibit us from demanding complete independence either. Let us not limit our demands to independence because as I see it, it will need a new UN resolution and France will be waiting at the Security Council for us. Federalism will eventually lead us to independence within a very short period of time. But let’s do all not to create a situation where we can meet France at the Security Council
JN