Southern Cameroons Interim Government

Understanding the Southern Cameroons Question - Fact Sheet

1. The Southern Cameroons was part of the United Nations Trust Territory of the  Cameroons under United Kingdom’s Administration. The Trusteeship Agreement between the United Nations and the United Kindgom was signed on 13 December 1946.

2. The name, Southern Cameroons, comes from the fact that the British Administering Authority had divided the Trust Territory into a Southern and Northern part, even while the territory was still a League of Nations mandated territory. British Southern Cameroons was created by the British Order in Council of June 26, 1923. By this act of the colonial authority, the British Southern Cameroons became a distinct territory from British Northern Cameroons within the international system, and a unit of self-determination.

3. The Southern Cameroons therefore does not refer to the Southern part of the Republic of Cameroon, but the Southern part of the British Cameroons.

4. French Cameroon was a United Nations Trust Territory under France.

5. French Cameroons and British Cameroons were separate UN Trust Territories with separate agreements, and each governed separately by Article 76(b) of the United Nations Charter. Apart from the fact that they were former parts of an ephemeral German Kamerun that lasted just 30 years and which was formally dismembered by the Versailles Treaty of 1919, there was no other link between them, either in language, administration, culture, politically or otherwise. Each was being prepared for its own self-determination as per Article 76(b) of the UN Charter.

6. British Cameroons was ruled from Nigeria until 1954, when members of the Southern Cameroons in the Nigerian Eastern House of Assembly walked out and returned to Buea, capital of Southern Cameroons, where they formed a thriving parliamentary democracy which lasted until 1961. From 1954 then, the Southern Cameroons was self-governing, with its government, Prime Minister, parliament, judiciary and House of Chiefs. It conducted its first free and fair election in which power changed hands peacefully in 1959.

 7. On 1 January 1960, in application of Article 76(b) of the UN Charter, French Cameroons gained independence from France and became known as La République du Cameroun, or in English, the Republic of Cameroon.

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African Union Border Programme Statement

The International Community, and the People of the Southern Cameroons in particular, are informed that the Southern Cameroons Restoration Government (in exile) has served Notice to the African Union Border Programme, its Director, Partners, Academics, Facilitators and all stakeholders.

The Notice calls the AU Border Programme’s attention to the fact that there is an international boundary between the former UN trust territory of French Cameroon that attained independence on 1 January, 1960 as la République du Cameroun, and the former UN trust territory of Southern Cameroons, presently under colonial occupation by la République du Cameroun.

The Notice in question was served on 12 February 2009 (reference African Union Registry: No. 533 of 12 February 2009), and copies sent to the United Nations, the Peace and Security Council of the AU, the Conflict Management Department of the AU, as well as to Embassies of African countries accredited to the AU in Addis Ababa.

AU Border Programme-Southern Cameroons Mission to Addis Ababa Report

INTRODUCTORY

The Southern Cameroons Mission to Addis Ababa was given a two-fold assignment.

- To counter with the last ounce of vigour the Agenda item proposed by LRC to be put on the AU Summit programme on the Bakassi dispute as a model for peaceful settlement of conflicts in Africa.

- To place the BP on Notice concerning the fact that there is an international boundary separating the territory of the Southern Cameroons from that of La Republique du Cameroun.

The RG already put out an official statement on the Agenda Item. The present report will therefore confine itself to the 2nd assignment namely, Southern Cameroon’s NOTICE TO THE AU BORDER PROGRAMME.

The original plan for the Mission was to send a delegation of 3 people. Finally it was the fall-back position (of 2 persons) which prevailed. The 2-man delegation comprised Mola Njo Litumbe from Buea and Ba Nkom A.F Ndangam from Bamenda.

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Southern Cameroons Gov't Announcement

Fellow Compatriots,

The African Union (AU) just concluded its 12th Ordinary Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on 4 February 2009. Although most of our people were unaware of what was going on behind the scenes, this was no ordinary Summit for the people of the Southern Cameroons.

La République du Cameroun, in yet another futile political manoeuvre against the inexorable restoration of the sovereign statehood of the Southern Cameroons, had proposed a calculated agenda item on what it falsely called the “Peaceful settlement of the Bakassi conflict” to be discussed by the organs of the Union. In the proposal, la République du Cameroun invited African leaders to do a number of things, which if done, would have seriously undermined the work of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (an organ of the AU) before which is a complaint from the people of the Southern Cameroons on the violation of their eastern frontier by la République du Cameroun.

La République du Cameroun’s proposals were also framed in such a way as to make it appear as though the African Union was endorsing that country’s annexation and continuing armed colonial occupation of the Southern Cameroons.

What la République du Cameroun was asking the AU to do in effect was for the AU to undercut the work of its own organ.

Thanks to the vigilance of the Southern Cameroons Restoration Government (RG), the Southern Cameroons People’s Organization (SCAPO) and the Southern Cameroons National Council (SCNC), and thanks to the guidance of Divine Providence, and the wisdom of African leaders, this misconceived and duplicitous agenda item never managed to get into the final agenda for the Summit.

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African Union Rejects La Republique du Cameroun's Bakassi Charade

Southern Cameroons National Council (SCNC) Press Statement

The futile efforts of expansionist la Republique du Cameroun to use a neo-imperial mask and conceal the truth on the ground boomeranged in the face of the Yaounde dictatorship in Addis Ababa as the African Union Summit opened yesterday February 1, 2009.

Its sponsored Agenda Item, "Peaceful Conflict Resolution in Africa: Model of the Bakassi Crisis." (EX CL/495 (XIV) Add6) was rejected and deleted from the Agenda for the AU Summit. Without doubt, this came to the junta as a shocking defeat. We salute the courage and vision of the New Age of the AU.

As stated in the SCNC Press Release of August 16, 2006, Yaounde in dancing lame before the main dance, is using its so called "victory" over Nigeria on the Bakassi conflict to divert both national and international attention from the real problem on the ground, namely, her annexation and colonial occupation of British Southern Cameroons. The Bakassi conflict created and magnified by Yaounde was a mere diversion to garner support against its so-called external enemy, namely, Nigeria.

Amnesty International Exposes the Camerounese Junta

Amnesty International today released a report on the alarming human rights situation in Cameroon , accusing the government of gross violations spanning more than ten years - including killings and torture.

Full report: http://www.amnesty.org.uk/uploads/documents/doc_19130.pdf

Many of the violations detailed in today’s report include heavy-handed tactics to clamp down on any political opposition of the Cameroonian government.

Amnesty International’ s Africa Deputy Programme Director, Tawanda Hondora, said:

‘Political opposition is not tolerated in Cameroon.

Unfair trials, intimidation and harassment, including death threats, are routinely used by the authorities to quash criticism from politicians, human rights defenders and journalists.’

Amnesty International said that Cameroonian security forces habitually use excessive and unnecessary force - and the perpetrators regularly go unpunished.

In late February 2008, security forces killed as many as 100 people during demonstrations against the escalating cost of living. Amnesty International has seen photographs and received testimonies suggesting that some of the victims were shot at point blank range, with no effort made to arrest them instead.

Journalists covering these protests were assaulted by members of the security forces. The victims included a cameraman from Canal 2 International television, who was beaten and arrested and had his camera destroyed. He was only freed after soldiers forced him to pay them.

Tawanda Hondora continued:

‘The silencing of the media is particularly worrying. If a journalist is deemed too critical of the government they are silenced — and radio and TV stations are shut down.’

Journalist Michel Mombio was arrested in September 2008 and spent 10 days in custody. He was then transferred to the central prison in the capital, Yaoundé, and charged with fraud and blackmail. He was still in custody without trial in January 2009.

The report also details dreadful prison conditions, which are characterised by inadequate food and medical care as well as overcrowding. All too often minors are held together with adults and there is inadequate separation of males from females, which has led to sexual and other forms of violence and exploitation.

Prisons are reportedly infested with rats and cockroaches and some inmates have resorted to sleeping in the toilets for lack of another place to rest.

HoG State of the Struggle Address

 January 8, 2009

My fellow Citizens of the Southern Cameroons:

As we speak to you the colonizer is tightening his asphyxiating grip around our neck. He wants to choke the life out of our collective existence as a people. Today, therefore, more than ever before the time has come for more action than words. Nevertheless, as a responsible government we propose to give an account of our one-year stewardship and our perspective on the enormous challenge of national liberation in the course of this year.

In all great endeavors the breakthrough that produces success always inevitably comes from the least expected source. This is true in the field of scientific achievements, political milestones, and military conquests. It is true with the unexpected circumstances that forced European colonizers to relinquish their hold on Africa in the 1960s. It is true with the unexpected circumstances that led to the election of Barack Obama as President of the USA.

It is under similar unexpected circumstances that the Restoration Government came into being. It came from the least expected source. And it drew uninformed and inflamed attacks from some quarters, in some cases by those unable to move from the personal to the principled. The task of conducting the affairs of the Government in the wider context of the national liberation struggle was thrust upon us. Despite the unusual circumstances under which the Government was created, we hit the ground running. We dared to hope that by today we would be speaking to you in completely different circumstance. The realization of that dream has regrettably been deferred to the day after.

Professor Carlson Anyangwe’s Interview with La Nouvelle Expression, November 12, 2008

Professor Carlson Anyangwe gave an interview last month to La Nouvelle Expression (LNE) that was published online on Wednesday November 12.

Below is the full English language text of the responses given to the LNE reporter, Mr. Omer Mbadi Otabela.

1-     In what terms can the anglophone identity problem in Cameroun be defined?

The question you have just asked appears to suggest that there is a community of people known as ‘anglophones’ who happen to find themselves in the French world of Cameroun Republic and who are suffering from an identity crisis. Cameroun Republic is of course the former French Cameroun which achieved national independence on 1 January 1960. I am not aware that there is within the frontiers of that country a community of people known as ‘anglophones’ and who now have an identity crisis. There are many citizens of Cameroun Republic who are proficient in English as a second language. You may speak of them as ‘anglophones’ but I very much doubt that they have an identity problem in their country.

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Communique: Release Our Kidnapped Nationals in Tiko

Several British Southern Cameroonian citizens, members of the Southern Cameroons National Council (SCNC), were arrested in the Tiko on October 6th, 2008 by the colonial occupation forces of the French Cameroun Republic. Their crime? Meeting as free men and women in a private residence.

The British Southern Cameroons government considers this arrest and detention as a criminal kidnapping, and one more in a historical pattern of state-sponsored acts of terror by the occupying French Cameroun Republic in a desperate need to hold on to their increasingly tenuous presence in the Southern Cameroons territory.

We have received reports that these detainees have been beaten and tortured by the criminal and brutal French-trained gendarmes of the Camerounese occupation forces. Those arrested (ages are in brackets) are:

October, 1 2008 Address By Professor Carlson Anyangwe