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Dieudonne Tantoh Nforba alias Farmer Tantoh has returned to his Binju village in the North West of Cameroon from a scholarship awarded him in the United States of America by Tahoe-Baikal Institute. He carries back technics of water supply systems, watershed management and manual well drilling & equipping. He thinks he will be supported and certainly be an asset to his community but surprisingly, the hands of his people are tight due to influence of local politics.
By Ndi Derek Giyoh, February 2017

Kwepsa Mbong of Binshua, a neighbouring village to Nkambe wakes up at 3:00 AM to go and fetch water from Maagha, a watercourse located three kilometres away. Along her path, she crosses two bamboo bridges of what used to be streams. They are all dry.
“Maagha is our only hope and if one doesn’t go this early, one will not get clean water” she says. “Things were not like this. Recently our waters have been drying up and we don’t know why” she adds.
A few kilometres away, Tata Tango, the sub chief of Binju, also a neighbouring village to Nkambe, expresses his joy on how Farmer Tantoh has changed the lives of the Binju people with his new water technology. “Our women no longer trek far distances to fetch water” says the chief. Farmer has also provided water in our primary school. We are now free from water borne diseases and our livelihood has improved tremendously” he adds.
“Farmer also tells us to plant trees. He says they will protect our waters and increase our harvests. We have planted more than 10000 acacia trees and we are waiting to see his magic” says the sub chief in humour.

“Our greatest problem now is that we can no longer predict the seasons. We use to plant our cash crops with the early rains in March but now this does not seem to work anymore. Rain may fall once in early march and only fall again in early May. This is not good for the crops and most of the time we end up with poor harvests” says the sub chief.
The cries of Kwepsa Mbong of Binshua and Tata Tango of Binju go beyond the boundaries of Binshua & Binju villages to the four corners of the world. It’s a cry for cooperation from all nations to fight climate change and make the world a better place for the children unborn. Their cries are similar to those of world leaders.
"Because we know that so many of the threats we face today - global terrorism, climate change, and unprecedented movements of people - do not respect national borders. So we must turn towards those multinational institutions like the UN and NATO that encourage international cooperation and partnership" says the British Prime Minister, Theresa May.

From Grass to Grace
“I fell in love with the Environment in 1996 when I was in secondary school. I was not a very bright student and spent most of my time working in my garden and planting trees, flowers & lawns in churches, homes and other public places for free. This earned me the name FARMER” Farmer Tantoh says amusingly. “I created the first environmental club in GBHS Nkambe where I schooled and the lone Botanic garden in Donga Mantung Division. I continued with my activities until one day I met one Gregor Moray Smith, a VSO Volunteer in 2001. This meeting changed my life. He connected me to his friends in the US and UK” Farmer recalls. “It was one of his friends that recommended me for the summer environmental programme organised by Tahoe-Baikal Institute in 2007” he says smiling.

“Since I came back, I have been carrying out minor projects through Safe Your Future Association (SYFA), an NGO I created in 2005. Fortunately while in the US I was able to create SYFA-USA which is now helping to mobilize funds for my projects here” he says. “We have protected a total of seven watersheds throughout the Northwest in an effort to combat water scarcity and also constructed a water supply system in Bafut similar to the one we did in Binju” Famer Adds.
His works have not gone unnoticed as he has received the African International Achievers Award, the Green apple Award, World Echoes Award and he is an ASHOKA fellow.

The enemy inside
On the other side of Farmer Tantoh’s small community is do or die politics. It is a community dominated by the two main political parties in Cameroon, CPDM (ruling party) and the SDF (main opposition party). Everybody has become a politician.
“He has refused to cooperate with us” says Ta-shey Paah, a diehard CPDM supporter referring to Farmer Tantoh. “How can we support such a person?” he adds.
Ta-Shey is deeply disappointed at Farmer for refusing CPDM members to pretend as though they were the ones funding his projects. He sends a message which suggests that the government may not support Farmer’s projects if he does not identify with CPDM.
“The SDF has also approached me for the same arrangement” Famer says. “Political rivalry has greatly hindered my work here and I think my people need to draw a line between political rivalry and development. My cry is that one day my people should realize this and fully support me so that together we can better protect our environment and continue this fight against climate change” he adds.

Details: Ndi Derek Giyoh; 02.Mar.2017; Hits: 2344

Roads in Cameroon:Non respect of speed limitation signs in and out of the cities, giant chicken nests in the middle of the road, trucks polluting with no break lights, pedestrian crossings and pavements that have been invaded by parked vehicles or spontaneous markets. All this alarming circumstances are ongoing under the nose and beard of the Corrupt Cameroonian authorities. This is the sad situation that happens on roads in Cameroon on a daily basis.

To this ,we must as well take into considerations the incompetence of drivers, who sometimes drive without a driving license and with overloaded passengers in their bush taxis. Most often, you see 8 occupants choked up in a small vehicle that is officially designed for maximum 5 passengers.

In Cameroon, there is also an abuse of the car horn, often near hospitals,residential areas and so forth.The horn is meant to be used in signalling other road users , but in Cameroon, it is a sign of greetings. The highway code's usage in Cameroon is also questionable.Drivers and even uniform men, will never stop at a zebra crossing to give priority to the pedestrian, drivers will overtake you from left and right. All this takes place under the watchful eyes of security agents who are actually committed to traffic, but they lay more focus on the extortion of money from drivers.
The consequences in such a country where the abnormal has become normal, are sometimes very dramatic. Many accidents have occurred that has taken the lives of thousands of Cameroonians due to such negligence. Roads in Cameroon are ranked among the deadliest in the world, not just because of their narrowness or condition, but much more because of the the behaviour of road users.

Details: Rita Akana; 15.Feb.2017; Hits: 2050

5 suspected highway robbers were neutralized this weekend in Ngoura, a border town with the Central African Republic, in the Lom-and-Djerem region In eastern Cameroon,by an elite unit of the national gendarmerie.

Five others were taken into custody, following a field operation take compelled the Cameroonian security agents to move across the border with the Central African Republic, A group of about 20 men suspected to be Central African nationals, had broken up into small groups of 4 or 5, and had crossed over into Cameroonian territory to carry on armed robbery in the area.

Those arrested where in possession of hand-made weapons and ammunitions.The suspected highway robbers, were taken to the headquarters of the gendarmerie in the Eastern regional capital of Bertoua, where they await prosecution.

Details: Rita Akana; 06.Feb.2017; Hits: 2142

The head of a gang of robbers notorious for stealing vehicles, have just been arrested in Douala by Cameroon security agents(Gendarmes). The two suspected criminals were arrested while attempting to sell cars they had stolen.

After their arrest, the gang leader and his accomplice were detained at the Gendarmerie head office of Ndogbong, a district in the Bassa neighbourhood of Douala.

According reports revealed by the police, robbers had acquired fraudulent registration papers for the stolen vehicles with the help of corrupt agents at Cameroon's ministry of Transportation in the Central and Eastern Regions of the country.
The car snatchers had sold over 20 stolen cars before their arrest.

Details: Rita Akana; 02.Feb.2017; Hits: 3106

According to the website Passportindex.org, who creates a world ranking on passports depending on the ease they provide when travelling, Cameroon is among the countries whose passports offer the least possibilities of travelling without a visa or by getting a visa upon arrival. With only 43 open destinations, the Cameroonian passport is among the last 15 in Africa in terms of travelling facilitation.

The country is far behind Seychelles, first in this Passportindex.org ranking. Indeed, we learned, it is possible with a Seychelles passport to freely travel to 126 countries (including 96 without visa and 30 with a visa upon arrival), while the Mauritian passport opens 118 destinations to its holder; against 90 for the South African passport.

In the CEMAC zone, the Cameroonian passport (with a ranking equal to Equatorial Guinea and Congolese documents) is even outranked by Chad (44 destinations), Gabon (44 destinations) and the Central African Republic (44 destinations).

Details: Rita Akana; 25.Jan.2017; Hits: 3444

This is the Cameroon of today, the Cameroon that is one and indivisible. Take a look under the seat of the scooter of this young gendarme officer and you will understand the reasons behind his frantic dancing and smiling. Bundles of silver skilfully arranged notes of Fcfa laying intact. This is the harvest they"collection" are accustomed in Cameroon.

Gendarmerie officers in Cameroon are making hugh hugh money for themselves as they punish nearly every road user for offences such as over-speeding, over-used tyres, non-respect of road signs, lack of spare tyres, lack of First Aid Box, un-lit/illegible vehicle number plates, lack of speed indicators, poor breaks and impromptu breaking and non-transparent glass. An English speaking Cameroonian officer who felt confident to face our tape recorders noted that he and his men were ready to even collect more money from our CAMCORD Intel agents for not wearing seat belts.

Details: Rita Akana; 13.Jan.2017; Hits: 4029

The remains of a four day old baby boy weighing approximately 3.5kg has been discovered at the Bamenda up-Station.

Saidou a 12 year herdsmen made the discovery . Saidou explained that in the course of walking his cattle, he discovered a brown carton at the hill side. Curious to open, he saw a black plastic paper and in it was a dead baby.

He immediately alerted security forces of the army camp who, in the company of municipal authorities got to the Scene.

The remains were buried immediately. In the meantime investigations have been opened to identify the mother of the dead baby.

CRTV