#FreeThePress-Anglophone Crisis: Cameroonian Journalists, Amos Fofung and Atia Azohnwi Arrested

Cameroon Concord's  Buea correspondent picked up by Cameroon security forces as Biya's regime Continues to harass reporters covering the current anglophone crisis.Amos Fofung is a correspondent for Cameroon Concord, The Gaurdian Newspaper and US based publication Blasting News.com.He was arrested upon his arrival from Douala yesterday ,09.Februaray 2017, and detained at the 3rd Police district police station in Buea,South West region of Cameroon.

Amos was detained alongside Atia Azohnwi, who works for The Sun Newspaper in Cameroon.Both men are accused of being in possession of tracks(flyers)that were calling for a boycott of the National Youth Day in Cameroon / February 11, 2017, in protest with the current Anglophone crisis.

Biya and his gang seem especially worried that word gets out into the world about the situation in the Anglophone regions and particularly about tomorrow's 11 Febraury event that has been doomed by the anglophone consortium to fail.Journalists  in Cameroon, have been threatened with sanctions if they report on the conflict.Cameroon Concord reporters all over Cameroon are all afraid to correspond objectively concerning the crisis. Peter Essoka, the head of the media regulator CNC (Conseil National de la Communication) had issued a warning that media outlets  could see their licenses revoked if they report favourably on separatist or federalist demands by the Southern Cameroonians.Text messages have been sent by the Ministry of Post and Telecommunications threatening and intimidating reporters with arrests.

Journalists in Cameroon are often subjected to arrests designed to intimidate. Ahmed Abba, Radio France Internationale's Hausa-language correspondent in northern Cameroon, is being held incommunicado in Yaoundé since August 2015 in a manner qualified as “extra-judicial” by RFI. Abba was later charged with terrorist collusion and failing to report terrorist acts to the authorities,

François Fogno Fotso, the editor of the weekly Génération Libre, has been facing charges of disobeying the police and “rebellion” ever since he photographed the heavy-handed arrests of pro-democracy activists in September. His trial has so far been postponed three times.

Cameroon is ranked 133rd out of 180 countries in the 2015 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index.