Inside Cameroon

Drive-by shootings in two towns in southern Germany have left two people dead, sparking a huge sense of panic in the area. Police said in a statement on Friday that a man shot and killed an 82-year-old woman about noon local time in Tiefenthal, near Ansbach, in the state of Bavaria. The suspect then fatally shot a man riding a bicycle in the nearby town of Rammersdorf, the police statement said, adding that both of the victims were apparently targeted randomly and died at the scene.

The shooter then fired at a pedestrian and the driver of another vehicle, although police said they were not harmed. A later report by the n-tv television quoted police spokeswoman Simone Wiesenberg as saying that the suspect has been apprehended. A massive hunt had been launched in the entire Bavaria region for shooter, who is reported to be just 18 years old. No further details have been reported about the suspect. However, a local newspaper, in another account of the story, said workers at a gas station in Bad Windsheim, about 35 kilometers (20 miles) from the scene of the shootings, managed to subdue the man as he arrived in the area and threatened them with his gun. The reports said the workers tied the suspect up with cable ties and called the police.

Police cordoned off the service station, checking the suspect’s vehicle for any potential explosives. Authorities tried to calm down the people in the region who were quite shocked with the incident. The mayor of Leutershausen, Siegfried Hess, said he was “stunned” by the incident. “In a place with 5,500 inhabitants where we have always had a quiet life, we only know this kind of situation from television,” he told DPA. Police spokesman Bert Rauenbush told TV news channel N24, “At the moment we have no evidence of accomplices, but of course we will keep our eyes open.” The motives behind the shooting are also unclear as of yet, as is whether it was a terrorist attack.

Details

Ngwa Bertrand

10.Jul.2015

Hits: 1785

Burundi is on the brink of renewed violence over President Pierre Nkurunziza's controversial bid to stand for a third consecutive five-year term, the United Nations rights chief warns ahead of the country’s forthcoming parliamentary and presidential elections. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Ra’ad Zeid al-Hussein, told the Security Council on Thursday that the situation will slide into “devastating violence” again, if the pattern of politically motivated violence continues in the Central African nation. "Burundians appear to be braced for an explosion of the murderous violence that has so frequently engulfed the country," he said, warning that "the risk to human life, and to regional stability and development, is high" in the landlocked African state.

The official also noted that over the past two months, his office has documented dozens of killings, most of them shootings of human rights defenders and protesters by security forces as well as the militia known as Imbonerakure, the youth wing of the ruling party known by its French acronym, CNDD-FDD. He further cited reports of demonstrators being imprisoned and subjected to ill-treatment and torture in Burundi.  Over 145,000 people have fled to neighboring countries due to "precise and targeted campaigns of intimidation and terror," the UN official added. Gervais Abayeho, a spokesman for President Nkurunziza, announced last month that the presidential poll will be held on July 15, while legislative votes will be on June 29.

Details

Ngwa Bertrand

10.Jul.2015

Hits: 1510

President Muhammadu Buhari will visit Cameroon after Ramadan, Cameroon Concord intelligence officers in Yaounde have revealed. The Buhari visit shall take place immediately after that of French president, Francois Hollande. After his electoral victory, the former Nigerian dictator now in civilian clothing, began a tour to thank his country's allies in the fight for the eradication of the Nigerian Islamic sect, Boko Haram. 

The menu of the visit by the Nigerian leader to Cameroon will include the fight against Boko Haram, the economic relations between the two countries, and the materialization of the Cameroon-Nigeria border, after Bakassi conflict, which ended with a victory for Cameroon at the international court. Cameroon and Nigeria share a 1,700 km of borders (land and sea), and have historical relations, sometimes stormy and tense. Approximately 5 million Nigerians are living in Cameroon.

Details

Ngwa Bertrand

29.Jun.2015

Hits: 1724

The cost of global war in the year 2014 reached $14.3 trillion, or 13.4 percent of the global gross domestic product, a report by the Institute for Economics and Peace says. Last year, the cost of global conflict equaled the combined economies of Britain, Germany, France, Brazil, Canada, and Spain, according to a recent report by the Australia-based group. The statistics mark a 15.3-percent spike in the cost of conflicts since 2008 when the financial impact was recorded as $12.4 trillion, the report notes. “Large increases in costs are due to the increases in deaths from internal conflict, increases for IDP (internally displaced person) and refugee support, and GDP losses from conflict, with the latter accounting for 38 percent of the increase since 2008,” the report stated.

Since 2008, the cost of supporting IDPs and refugees has increased by 267 percent and the number of people forced to relocate by war has reached its highest since the Second World War, the report noted.  It also described the Middle East and North Africa as the most violent regions in the world and Europe as the most peaceful, adding that Saudi Arabia's ongoing aggression against Yemen has dragged down the overall outlook for the Middle East.  According to the report, Syria, which has been gripped by deadly unrest since March 2011, was world’s least peaceful country, followed by Iraq, Afghanistan, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic.

Details

Ngwa Bertrand

18.Jun.2015

Hits: 1642

According to local media, Pierre Moukoko Mbonjo, Cameroon Minister of External Relations (Minrex), was victim of a heart attack late last week at his home. Our informant at the Moukoko entourage who confirmed the story to us also hinted that the Minrex, suffered the cardiac arrest due to a "burnout" resulting from a high workload.

Cameroon Concord gathered that Pierre Moukoko Mbonjo had withdrawn the right of signature from some of his collaborators and made himself the sole cock that crows at the Ministry of External Relations. Inside sources maintained the minister has been evacuated to Europe.

Details

Ngwa Bertrand

13.May.2015

Hits: 2827

Tanzania's foreign minister says East African leaders will hold a meeting next week over the ongoing political unrest in Burundi. Bernard Membe said on Wednesday that the "extraordinary summit" of the five-nation regional East Africa Community (EAC) would take place in Tanzania's economic capital of Dar es Salaam on May 13. The remarks came as East African foreign ministers arrived in Burundi on Wednesday following days of violent protests over President Pierre Nkurunziza’s controversial bid for a third term in office. Meanwhile, Burundi's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Daniel Kabuto said ministers from Rwanda, Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda, were in the Burundian capital, Bujumbura, “to listen to all parties in the conflict, and to try to propose ways out of crisis.”  Meanwhile, UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Antonio Guterres said he was "extremely worried" about the crisis in Burundi that has resulted in over 35,000 refugees fleeing from the African state.

In a statement released last week, the EAC urged talks to ease tensions and to ensure "the realization of a peaceful, free and fair electoral process" and called on Burundi to "ensure that the electoral process does not lead to humanitarian crisis." The political unrest erupted in the African country late April after the National Council for the Defense of Democracy – Forces for the Defense of Democracy, which is the ruling party in Burundi and known by its French acronym, CNDD-FDD, designated the incumbent president as its candidate for the next presidential election due on June 26. Opposition forces say Nkurunziza’s bid for a third consecutive term in office is against the country’s constitution, as well as a peace deal that ended a civil war in the country some nine years ago. Nkurunziza, a former rebel leader from the majority Hutu tribe, has been in power for two terms since 2005. In October 1993, Melchior Ndadaye, the first democratically-elected president of Burundi who came from the Hutu ethnic group, was assassinated after only 100 days in office. The assassination triggered deadly ethnic violence between the Hutu majority and minority Tutsis. Hundreds of thousands of people were killed in the African nation's 13-year civil war that ended in 2006.

Details

Ngwa Bertrand

07.May.2015

Hits: 1773