BY CYNTHIA BIH
As the Anglophone crisis, which long metamorphosed into an armed conflict in the North West and South West Regions, rages on, workers of state-owned Cameroon Development Corporation, CBC, have been bearing the brunt.
CDC workers have continued to be targets of Amabazonia separatist fighters, who are clamouring for the independence of the Anglophone regions into a country they have named Ambazonia.
The corporation itself has suffered huge financial losses as most of its estates have shut town due to the attacks on its workers.
Separatist fighters have banned CDC workers from going to work on the corporation’s plantations. They claim the CDC is located in their Ambazonia territory and thus belongs to them. CDC workers who violate the ban of Ambazonia separatist fighters have frequently come under attack.
The separatist groups that have vowed to make the English-speaking regions of Cameroon ungovernable, consider the state-run CDC a legitimate target.
Some of the workers of the corporation have been maimed, the fingers of some chopped off and others killed by the separatist fighters. Others have been kidnapped by the fighters and only released allegedly after ransoms of undisclosed amounts were paid.
It should be recalled that in November 2018, six CDC workers on a rubber plantation near Tiko, Fako Division of the South West Region were attacked by separatist fighters. The workers were wounded and the fingers of some chopped off with machetes.
In August 2020, armed men believed to be separatist fighters had attacked the CDC estate in Penda Mboko in Moungo Division. They reportedly shot Agbor Mbi, a 16-year-old child of a CDC worker, who was writing the General Certificate of Education (GCE) Examinations. He died on his way to the hospital in Mbanga.
The house of the Factory Manager, Ali-Malex Achalle, was set ablaze. His private vehicle and the Corporation’s supervision vehicle were equally burnt down. The Factory Manager and three watchmen; Nkemasong Nicasius, Achou Roland, and Tawlan Peter, aged 48, 49 and 60 years respectively were kidnapped.
Meanwhile, on Friday February 10, 2023, five CDC workers were killed and 44 others injured. The incident took place on the stretch of road off the Tiko-Douala Road to the Mondoni Oil Mill, when armed men stormed a bus carrying banana plantation workers who were returning from work.
Four men and one woman were killed instantly, while 44 other workers were injured. The Ambazonia Governing Council, one of the several separatist movements, later claimed responsibility for the attack.
Many workers caught in the web
As the corporation continues to pay the price, many CDC workers have been caught in the web. A case in point is that of Forzong Benedicta Manyi, who worked with the CDC in Tiko. She suffered in the hands of separatist fighters on January 15, 2022 when she and other workers were attacked while on assignment in one of the farms of the CDC.
Forzong and her colleagues were kidnapped and taken to the fighters’ camp, where they are said to have been tortured for over eight days when they were rescued by the military.
Because some separatist fighters were killed in the military raid that freed Forzong and her colleagues, the fighters are said to have vowed to deal with her and her colleagues. They thus became targets of the fighters. Forzong is said to have thus abandoned the CDC camp and gone to live with family relations out of the camp.
However, Forzong’s ordeal was far from over. Unfortunately for her, the military is also said to have accused her of sympathising and collaborating with the separatist fighters. The military thus initiated a manhunt for her. In November 2024, Forzong is said to have vamoosed and her whereabouts is not known.
Not long after she vanished, we gathered, Forzong’s daughter, who was schooling in Buea, was attacked and burnt with fuel. It is suspected that the macabre act was carried out by separatist fighters.
If the separatist fighters lay hands on Forzong, she will definitely be killed, like many others who have been victims of atrocities perpetrated by fighters.
Meanwhile, if she is arrested by the military because of the accusation that has been leveled against her, Forzong Benedicta Manyi will be tried in a military tribunal, under the 2014 anti-terrorism law, whose maximum punishment is the death sentence. That is if she is not killed outright, like many others who have suffered extra-judicial killings within the context of the armed conflict in the North West and South West regions.
Flashback on origin of crisis
It is also worth recalling that the Anglophone crisis, something that pundits say had been brewing for several years, boiled over recently, when Common Law Lawyers in the North West and South West regions went on strike. They were demanding for the return of the federal system of government, redeployment of Civil Law Magistrates back to Civil Law Courts in French Cameroon, among other grievances. Not long after, teachers in the North West and South West regions also went on strike, demanding for the redress of several issues concerning the English system of education.
Things, however, got worst when Anglophones in both regions, who had been fed up with the unfavourable political and economic situation of the country, the use of French as the dominant and official language, and the marginalisation of the Anglophones, joined the strike.
The crisis has left thousands, both civilians and security and defence forces dead, some 400,000 displaced with some living in bushes while over 30,000 have fled to neighbouring Nigeria where they are living as refugees.
Many houses, and even whole villages, have been burnt down in the crisis-hit regions.
The separatist leader of the self-declared Republic of Ambazonia, Sisiku Ayuk Tabe, and eight other close associates of his, who were arrested in Nigeria and extradited to Cameroon, are currently at the Kondengui maximum security prison in Yaounde, where they are serving life sentences.
Many other activists such as Mancho Bibixy, Penn Terrence, Tsi Conrad, among others, are serving jail terms at the Kondengui prison.
While the Anglophone crisis continues to escalate, international organisations and other western powers have called on the government to address the root cause through genuine and inclusive dialogue.