By Chris Mbunwe & Nformi Sonde Kinsai
Felix Njini, 40, a striking worker of the Cameroon Tea Estate, CTE, Ndu, and one of those shot on Friday, December 1, by gendarmes has died.
Njini later died in hospital
Another death occurred yesterday when Fai Ngah Njamnsi, a factory hand was forced to operate the machines so that tea could be processed. Njamnsi refused. He was tortured and severely beaten. When he returned home, he succumbed to the racking pains and died.
It would be recalled that Njini and three others were shot when gendarmes opened fire on striking CTE workers in Tatum. The other victims, who are still hospitalised, include Pascal Banfogha, a Form Three student of GHS Tatum and Nformi Ndi, a tea harvester.
Banfogha was shot on the back while Ndi received a bullet around the abdomen. Julius Ngala Ngah, the third casualty, was shot around the knee. While the first two were rushed to the Banso Baptist Hospital, Kumbo, Ngah is receiving treatment at the Catholic Health Centre Tatum.
The gendarmes, who sneaked into Ndu on the night of November 30, attempted to protect some eight engine saw operators in the morning of December 1. The operators were involved in cutting eucalyptus trees the striking workers had used to barricade the road.
The exercise that started around the CTE head office extended towards the Bui end of the road.
At about 4 pm, the Fon of Nso drove past Tatum Market Square to the boundary with Donga Mantung. He drove back a few minutes later, urging the population to go back to their homes.The situation in the area remained tense.
The angry workers set two houses, said to belong to the strikers' colleagues accused of betraying the strike action, on fire. One of the victims was reportedly among four identified in gendarme uniform working with CTE.
At 8:50 pm on December 2, six truckloads of workers from Ndawara and Djutittsa, accompanied by gendarmes, drove past Tatum to CTE Ndu. While crossing Tatum, the gendarmes fired teargas.
Meanwhile, prior to the move by the gendarmes, the workers had given a deaf ear to an ultimatum issued last November 29 by the Senior Divisional Officer, SDO, for Donga Mantung Division, Godlive Mboke Ntua.
The SDO's order, read several times over the Donga Mantung Community Radio, DMCR Network, branded the workers a group of recalcitrant fellows who had refused to be brought to reason.
Mboke Ntua held that the striking workers have been doing everything to create a confrontation with the Donga Mantung administration.He said the workers have remained impervious to all advice, urging them to collect the FCFA 181,653,195 before re-engaging in further negotiations with the CTE management.
Nformi:Gendarmes also shot this form three student
According to the SDO, it is unreasonable for workers to be claiming over FCFA 3 billion, a sum, he said, that is far higher than the FCFA 1.5 billion which CTE used to buy the entire tea sector of Ndu, Tole and Djoutittsa estates.
The striking workers had, instead, reinforced road barricades, which they had mounted, blocking all entrances into Donga Mantung Division from Bui as well as the ones getting into Ndu Subdivision from Nkambe Central.
Meanwhile, in the night of November 29, the enraged workers, who had taken up day and night vigils on the boundary of Donga Mantung and Bui Division, marched to the homes of CTE Plantation Manager, Falalou Mohammed, and the Workers' Club President, Japhet Koni.
The two were taken hostage and forced to take part in the nocturnal demonstrations, which took the workers from the tea estate to Ndu Town, Ngarum, Nseh and Tatum, covering a distance of over 40 km.
The Post gathered that what sparked the November 29 night incident was news that the Ngarum stretch of the road was being opened for three full truckloads of the military to pass.
Stirred by such news, the workers moved from the boundary with Bui towards the tea estate where they took up positions in order to attack and prevent workers from Djutittsa and Ndawara coming to replace them.
When The Post contacted the workers, they expressed suspicion that the truckloads of the army came in from Koutaba in the West Province to reinforce the battalion in Nkambe.
They said that if the administration uses force to brutalise them, then, they are unsure of what would happen to the workers coming to replace them.On the other hand, the Plantation Manager, was quoted as having agreed to the workers that people from Djutittsa and Ndawara were on the way to replace the CTE Ndu workers.
They said Falalou revealed that about 67 workers have already received money, which the workers had rejected. Following an agreement, Koni was set free to go and keep intact the property of the club for presentation to workers on December 1.
Falalou, too, was set free in order to provide the list of workers who have already collected the money. But, on December 1, a meeting to get feedback on such issues could not hold as armed gendarmes invaded the area and started clearing the roads.

Gendasses destroying more Biafrans. When will the Biafrans start to destroy gendasses?
Posted by: Ma Mary | Thursday, 07 December 2006 at 10:24 PM
FELLOW S.CAMEROONIANS
All this shouting,the anger,the condemnations, the writings etc etc will not move S.Cameroonians an inch closer to freedom or even being treated as equals with those east of the Mungo.Many people have been shouting out their lungs and asking why the UN and the International Community has seemingly remain indifferent to what is unfolding in Cameroon.The truth is that the UN is,and will continue to remain silent because NOTHING is happening in Cameroon! You may say to hell with me but I don't care.What I'm saying is true.
Akwanga Ebenezar and others have said it several times that they have been advised by highly placed UN officials that S.Cameroonians need to do "something drastic" to attract UN attention to Cameroon.And what do my fellow brothers think this "something drastic" can be? Secretly burrying slain brothers and then shouting loud on the internet? Expressing anger on the computer keyboard? Blackmailing others and dining with the enemy? All these things make me laugh.
I have said it before that the only pen that S.Cameroonians need to sign their freedom is the AK-47.The only ink they need is their blood.The paper will be the streets of Bakassi, Kumba, Buea, Bamenda, Mamfe, Kumbo. Anything short of this is pure nonsense.
How do you expect that your oppressors who torment you and exploit you at will,who know that you are a coward and have told you straight in the face,will willingly and peacefully grant you freedom.How do you expect the UN to come to Cameroon when there is no "activity" going on there? Just take a look at the other places where the UN has intervened and you'll agree with me that there's nothing going on in Cameroon.
S.Cameroonians need to send a very strong message to la republique that they need their freedom.This strong message can never be court cases or internet condemnations of killings.This message can only be to kill them when the kill you.Gun down the Governor or whoever is ordering the killings.Burn or bomb any symbol of colonisation in your territory.Terrorism is not a crime.It is just a powerful and handy weapon for the weak against the strong oppressor.
In the Nigeria oil-rich Delta region,indegenious youths take up arms and fight for their oil wealth.They kidnapp workers and demand better shares in the revenue.And they have been succeeding. In Cameroon,S.Cameroonians are afraid to go near SONARA to even seek for jobs beacause they consider it as not belonging to them.How do you expect the French to leave?
I wept two days ago when I learnt from reliable sources that an AK-47 in neighbouring Nigeria and Rwanda will cost a little less than 19.000CFA. What then is holding back S.Cameroonians? FEAR!!! They want to get freedom but are not willing to pay the price.Freedom comes at a very great price.If freedom were that cheap the word "oppression" would have ceased to exist.Freedom is expensive.Until S.Cameroonians consider the "other alternative" and are willing to pay the ultimate price, any other thing they are doing is just a hobby.
Posted by: Muki StoneHall | Friday, 08 December 2006 at 12:40 AM
Oh My God, killing in Buea, Killing in Ndu, etc. When are we going to stop all these killings? Shall we keep listening and accepting all these evils in our land? Oh my God. Baba Danpullo stole our tea estates and does not even want to pay our poor parents and relatives. Oh my God, blood everywhere, because of greed. Why are they killing us all?
Posted by: rexon | Friday, 08 December 2006 at 08:14 AM
Blood, Blood , blood.
The milk and honey land of Southern Cameroon has been transformed into that flowing with military and blood.
Oh God, make haste to help us.Let not our enemies triuph over us. Good God, put them to shame.
Like Massamawo said, there is the maximum need to create awareness in all, beginning from Abonshi-Nwa-Fru Awa-Ndian-Bakassi. I have discovered that most of the people,s minds have been misdirected by so called Fons or "Mbehs". I pray God to cut away their right eyes and arms. This is the time. Like Sony okosun said "We are now or never". Let the whistle sounds louder. Everyone everywhere, do the maximum this time around to wake people up. It pains deep down the marrow. The above incidence is indifferent from June 6th afternoon in 1992.I pray God to grant the regime and Mr Oben Ashu long lives so as to face the judgement not long from now. And to those gendarms or police who are so excited with guns and using our people for their practical sessions, i hope u gonna be able to fight real war which appears to be at hand. When stung by the bees, u will all shoot at urselves. My people, rise up for this is the time. Everyone everywhere, pls, speed up awareness for that is the key.
Posted by: Ndi O | Friday, 08 December 2006 at 10:01 AM