BY SANDRA LUM
Antem Julius Bakia aka Antem was abducted on December 6 ,2022 around Kokaka village along the Kumba-Mamfe road on his way to his grandmother burial funerals
It is unclear what the real motive was and who was behind this act. Some holds that he was targeted by separatists because of his ties with the Cameroon military, meanwhile others claimed that he was targeted by the Cameroon military because of suspicion that his resignation from the militarywasbase on the ties with Anglophone separatists groups and also the influence from his brother Antem Williams a prominent member of the Southern Cameroon National Council,SCNC, and was wanted for his participation in the 2016 Anglophone uprising in Kumba Cameroon after he led the two uprising in Kumba, South West Region of Cameroon.
Antem left behind two girls and aboy who are currently living with his displaced mother (widow) and a sister with little means to take care of the kids. Speaking to his sister Antem Beltha Achere over the phone she said “we are frightened and terrified by the situation, Me and my mum have decided to fled to an undisclosed destination because we are worried about who may want to hurt us or what may happened next”. When ask about any information about her brother who fled the country and wanted by the Cameroon government, she refused to comment.
It should be recalled that the Anglophone protest that started in 2016 with Lawyers, Teachers, civil society and some Anglophone activists in the Anglophone regions of North West and South West regions as a peaceful demonstration due attempts to annihilate the Common Law practice and bi-jural Cameroon, has now spread to a full blown armed-conflict between the separatist fighters and the Cameroon defense forces, As a result of this war some say more than a thousand people have deaths recorded, some missing, houses razed to the ground, villages burnt down with impunity and with more than a million internal and external displaced persons of Anglophone Cameroon. The IDP’s and EDP’s keeps increasing as the government is sparing no effort at tracking down and eliminating those she considers agents of Southern Cameroon movement and separatist internally and externally who opposed the government of Cameroon as terrorism charges hang on them.
The war still rages on and many more killings by the military are still been documented by Rights organizations.We are asking more international organization and community to come and mediate the situation in Cameroon.