Police Brutalise, Arrest Anti-corruption Activists

By Kini Nsom

The President of the International NGO, Citizens Association for the Defence of Collective Interest, ACDIC, Bernard Njonga, was Wednesday, December 10, arrested by elements of the Central Police District in Yaounde.

The activist and eight others were brutalised and arrested at the ACDIC headquarters at the Rue Ceper neighbourhood as they mobilised some 1000 farmers to state a protest march against what they call high level corruption at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

Two journalists, Jean Baptist Ketchateng of the French daily Mutations and Armand Okol of Satellite Radio and Television in Yaounde were also arrested in the police blind raid. They were later released from detention after the police identified them. The police detained Njonga and eight of his collaborators, accusing them of organising an illegal meeting.

The ACDIC President had mobilised over 1000 farmers from all over the ten regions of the country to protest against the fact that a circa FCFA 1.2 billion allocated to Common Initiative Groups engaged in the production of maize was embezzled with the complicity of officials in the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

In a an investigative study ACDIC published recently, it was revealed that out of the FCFA 5.2 billion allocated for CIGs involved in maize production from HIPC-I funds, 1.2 billion has been embezzled in three years through the use of fictitious CIGs by government officials.
Interpreting the study as a flagrant indictment of the Minister of Agriculture, the Divisional Officer for Yaounde III, botched its launching at the Yaounde Hilton Hotel on December 4.

He said so long as the Minister did not give his blessings to it, it was illegal. Journalists and onlookers who had come to witness the launching of the report surreptitiously left for the ACDIC headquarters where the report was launched.     

Another launching ceremony billed for the Hotel de Deputes in form of a dinner with MPs Tuesday, December 9, was banned by the administration. Njonga's arrest therefore is the culmination of his hide and sick game with the administration ever since he published a study of stinking corruption in the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. 

Paradoxically, the ACDIC president was arrested when government officials had roll out the drums to celebrate this year's International Human Rights Day under the canopy of National Commission of Human Rights and Freedoms.

Comments

[Dr A A Agbormbai]

This case of corruption deserves a thorough investigation with the perpetrators punished.

[Samba]

its sad to read about how police and gendarmes brutalise peaceful demonstrators in Cameroon. Certainly the situation should not only end in the arrest and detention of the Anti-corruption Activist. Cameroon is a state of law and any arrested persons must be charged and promptly brought before a judicial authority. Anything short of these make the arrests and detention arbitrary and exposes the government to liabilities. Demonstrations are a civilised way to express grievances and draw the attention of the authorities to vexing issues. If we choose to arrest and detain peaceful demonstrators, then we are pushing people into the jungle from where they will operate without faces and names. Do we really want that?

[rexon]

The bottom line is, this regime must be removed from power and all we need is a revolution. This is the most dangerous regime in the world and i do not understand why the world can focus on Mugabe alone while ignoring the atrocities of the Biya regime.

[Fonngang]

Let the police even shoot all of them down. These are the type of activists that ironically support that corrupt regime. Where on earth has any NGO succeeded in fighting corruption? It is only in third world countries that the western world hands out petty cash to maintain the self deception that we can fight corruption through some form of organisation be them NGO or whatever they term them. Now that a corrupt administration has brutalised them and thrown them in jail, what next?
The country is rotten and we cannot continue to select one aspect of the rotteness to correct.
Everything in the third world seems to become complicated beyond measure. It also seems that most of us have unfortunately developed a mindset that if the solutions to a problem is not complex just as the problem itself it would not work.
Let me state this clearly. There is only one way to fight corruption. Creating a REAL Democratic government with the people allowed to make their decisions through elected leaders. With the people in charge every single piece will fall in place automatically. Should I mention the case of the most recent coruption scandal in the US involving the governor of Illinois? The simple thing that will happen to him is that the peoples' representatives in their state assembly will sanction him accordingly. No sweat.
Let these so called NGOs join any political party and fight to oust this corrupt government and replace it with a real democratic one.
The foundations of the Cameroon house is now very faulty and does no longer support the entire structure. We cannot correct the situation by patchwork.
No NGO, No Anti corruption commision, can stop the situation in Cameroon today or any other Corrupt African country for that matter. For how many years today has this so called fight been going on? The solution to the problem is a political one, period, and it involves getting rid of the present regime. They know that and that is why they prefer pretending to fight corruption by creating useless commissions and then allowing the creation of useless NGOs to do same. Let the reader ask himself this question. Why would this government allow an organisation for fighting coruption knowing fully well that a successful fight will land almost of the leadership in jail? The amswer is simple. They know the NGO would never be effective. But a powerful political party or a union of parties will, and that is why it is the parties they do all to frustrate. A united front of parties can change things within a short time.

[Manga]

Fongang, how on earth will the "Creating of a real democratic government" occur if there is no watchdog pointing out the failings of the current system with hard numbers, viable statistics, etc. It is not the role of the NGO to oust Biya. Its role is to highlight corrupt practices. It is up to political parties, "freedom fighters" and democracy activists like yourself to use that information to bring pressure to bear on the Biya regime (peacefully or otherwise) to change its ways.

The real democracy that you advocate exists if an only if there is a vibrant civil society consisting of the types of organizations that you are ridiculing in your comment.

Too bad that Cameroonians want democracy but are quick to condemn the few organizations on the ground that can really make it happen. That is why Massa Biya will still be around after 2011 even if on a wheelchair and senile. We don't know who our enemy is...

[Dr A A Agbormbai]

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Do not forget that if this NGO had not done its job of bring out such malpractices to light we would not have known what really happened.

It is one thing to know in a general way (as we all know) that Cameroon is corrupt, but it is a completely different matter when you read an investigative account that clearly demonstrates that a whole ministry in the country exists solely for the purpose of embezzling any funds that are directed at it. This is grotesque!

I take Manga's point on this issue.

[biya_sucks_dick]

I agree with samba. at times I feel that our country has been totally wiped away from the map of africa.

[rexon]

Samba wrote:

"Cameroon is a state of law and any arrested persons must be charged and promptly brought before a judicial authority. "

This is a complete law. Cameroon is not a state of law. If Cameroon was a state of Law, Joe La Concience and Lapiro would not have been in jail. Cameroon is a state of lawlessness and the courts exist for the sole purpose of protecting the institutions of lawlessness, corruption and deceit that has been created by the Biya regime. Go to the streets of Mutengene as confirmed by Obi Roland Ayuk (a scammer who was exposed by the post), you will see many people who are supposed to be in jail, supposedly walking freely and terrorising our people. Instead those who go to jail are either criminals who have not coperated with the system or others who are there because they were against the regime and the institutions in place have decided to frame charges for them in their bid to send them to jail. You do not go to jail in Cameroon if you are a true criminal, instead you go to jail if you want law and order to prevail against lies and deceit.

By the way, you might to read through:

www.camerooninjustice.com

to make your own independent assessment of our judiciary.

[rexon]

first sentence should read: This is a completely false.

[red flag]

IF ONLY WE CAN TEACH OURSELVES AND OUR CHILDREN THAT, WE ARE A NEW COLONY OF A NEW AFRICAN COLONIZERS, AND THAT THE ANSWER TO ALL OUR SSUFFERING IS OUR LONG CHERISHED INDEPENDENCE, I MEAN BRITISH SOUTHERN CAMEROONS AKA AMBAZANIA

[Fonngang]

>Fongang, how on earth will the "Creating of a real democratic government" occur if there is no watchdog pointing out the failings of the current system with hard numbers, viable statistics, etc."
Mr. Manga
Do watchdogs operate in a vacuum? Ok, now that they have been brutalised and arrested, how effective can they be? Cameroonians have been fooled to believe that there could be anything better than a democratic environemnt. The only watchdog in any society is the people themselves. The question of watchdog seems important because the people have been used to the fact that there could be a organisation that will fight for them. NO. The people fight for their own rights. Democracy does not need a watchdog. It needs the people to protect their interests through the power of the ballot box. That is real democracy. Some of you might have heard about orgnisations in democracies like the US that fight for one thing or another. Get this. These organisations are truly termed "Interest Groups" or to be more precise "Special Interests Groups" In democracies these Interests Groups fight for their special interests based on the idelogies of those forming these groups.They never fight for the general interests of the citizens. Besides they operate in a democratic environment in the first place. How can we achieve anything without a democratic environment? Do we create such a conducuve environment by selecting issues and fight for? The conducuve environment is the only issue at the moment to fight for. Anything else is setting the cart before the horse.This is the truth. Again let me ask you. Now that they have been arrested what will you do? Create another NGO to get them released?
Cameroonians have one issue to fight for Cameroon - DEMOCRACY and we cannot be picking and selecting the convenient aspects in a democracy and start fighting over. Democracy comes in one single package otherwise it is not democracy
Have a nice day

[Fon.]

Fongang,
I am with u, however, I do denounce the brutalisation.