CTE Workers Block Bamenda-Ndu Highway With Beehives

By Chris Mbunwe & Nformi Sonde Kinsai

Striking workers of the Cameroon Tea Estate, CTE, Ndu,Tuesday, November 28, blocked the highway at Ndu from Bamenda with heavy beehives to prevent the importation of some 1000 workers to Ndu to replace the striking workers.

It is alleged that 1000 workers who were to be ferried into Ndu CTE plantation were to be protected by some 200 gendarmes as they set to work to pluck tea leaves.
According to a source who did not want to be named, 200 workers left Djoutisa heading for Ndu.

Speaking to The Post in Ndu, the striking workers have promised the DO for Ndu, Yorisobom Mkong, hard times because of a banning order and utterances.

They insist to continue intensifying the strike until all their outstanding allowances are paid. The workers say they had to add beehives to the eucalyptus trees they felled so as to halt any moves by the Forces of Law and Order who would want to remove them or the workers to be ferried from Djoutisa and elsewhere into Ndu.

As of Wednesday November 29, there was no access to Ndu from Bamenda, Nso, Sabongari, Nwa, Banyo and so on.The consequences have been hikes in prices and setback to the economy linking the towns of Abonshie, Nkambe, Nwa and Sabongari.

A delegation of striking CTE workers was sent to Nseh Fon's palace in Bui to request permission so that the stretch of the road is blocked as well. The Fon is said to have refused and advised that the stretch of road blocked at Ndu be maintained.

However, the workers vowed that the other Nseh stretch of the road leading to Ngarum village in Ndu where smaller vehicles have decided to ply will be blocked in like manner soon.

The road blockade followed November 28 protest march by striking workers with their wives, husbands, children and other dependents. The workers saw injustice in the way issues are handled. According to the workers, in Tole, FCFA 460 million was paid to about 320 workers and only FCFA 181 million for 853 CTE Ndu workers.

They described this as gross discrimination. Some names on the list appeared more than thrice with varied amounts depicting fraud and cheating.A delegation of four workers had been in Yaounde and submitted complaints to the French, American, German,
British, Canadian and Japanese embassies, as well as the Prime Ministry and Labour Ministry.

Relations between the striking workers, the Divisional Delegate of Labour and the Donga Mantung.Administration deteriorated and the gap continuous to widen everyday.

It would be recalled that some 16 CTE Ndu workers' representatives, who have been acting as spokespersons for their colleagues, have resigned. Talking to The Post on Tuesday November 28, the

Secretary of State in the Ministry of Justice, Emmanuel Ngafeeson, expressed indignation that the CTE workers have refused to collect partial payment."The solution for them is to collect this money and ask for more because the money is from Cameroon Government not Danpullo.

I am embarrassed that hey have mounted roadblocks again. Instead of subjecting their children and relatives to untold suffering, I am begging they should collect what is available and we will see how the rest can be paid," said Ngafesson.

Comments

[rexon]

You Tea estates was stolen by Mr Biya and his gang of bandits and handed over to Baba Danpullo in their sham privatisation. Now, he does not want to pay you. You have every right to fight these criminals masquerading as businessmen. It is your right. While you are suffering like these, they are enjoying themselves in europe everyday. Their children are studying in the most prestigious institutions in the developed world, but you can't even afford a daily bread. We need genuine businessmen not criminals who will steal state resources in sham privatisation exercise. If these government want peace, they should employ expert accoutants and financial analysts who can revalue these soo called privatised companies objectively. We are tired of all these lies by these colonialist. They want to colonise us mentally and physically.

Ndu Tea workers, do fight for your rights.

[Akoson]

Tole and Ndu workers...join the strike action. Lobby taxi drivers and fight the agents of darkness. Send them away from your territories. You have the cover of the international community. They're invaders and killers.

Send them away! And stop complaining everyday. You've got powers to fight these prematures stooges and whoever. Stop complaining like a kid. Look at South Africa and many other countries that have experienced a great change? Do you think they were chickens like you? We are prepared to help you in whatever way you like.

The SON.

[Kumbaboy]

Mr Emmanuel Ngafeeson is talking sense. The workers should collect the 181m FCFA as advance payment and set a deadline for the balance to be paid up.

It is crucial that workers continue to pluck tea because that is the source of future payments. Please STOP this strike! Collect the partial payment. That is the sensible thing to do.

[Che Sunday]

Mr. Ngafesson,
How often do you receive your salary in portions? Why can't these people be paid what they have earned. It is you and the other idiots parading as a government in Cameroon that should be embarassed. Can you open you hidden accounts to the public? An Australian once joked that the only country he would want to govern on the face of the earth was Cameroon, because it is the only country he knows of whose citizens are happy to work for free. Your government doesn't pay them, when you pay, it is piece-meal. The little they try to save ends up in banks that fail on a daily basis. Yet you have the balls telling the world you are ashamed? When was the last time you looked up the word in a dictionary? Monkey head son of a bitch.