ABSTRACT
The hard handedness of the Cameroonian government‟s security forces against the peaceful demonstration by lawyers, teachers and civil society organizations from Anglophone Cameroon in 2016 escalated an already tense security situation in the country. The repressive response of the state security forces led to civilian deaths and the displacement of over 437, 000 people, mostly in the Anglophone regions of North West and South West of the country. Using a qualitative approach, the study examines the causes of the crisis as well as its ramifications on the people and on peace and development in Cameroon in general. The study found that the causes of the crisis are deep in history, and that the crisis had economic, political, social, and psychological ramifications on Anglophone Cameroonians and the country as a whole, as well as on Nigeria, its western neighbor. The study further noted the efforts of international actors such as the UK, US, and Switzerland, along with ECCAS and the African Union (AU), which have used largely diplomatic approaches to resolve the crisis. The study recommended, among other things, that these external actors intensify their efforts to bring a lasting solution to the crisis.
CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
1.0 Background to the Research Problem
The genesis of the Anglophone Crisis is traced to World War 1 when the country was unequally partitioned between France and Britain, following the defeat of Germany (Konings & Nyamnjoh, 1997). The Anglophone Crisis, as it is commonly called, refers to the divide between the English speaking and French speaking parts of Cameroon. This divide poses a major challenge to the efforts of the post-colonial state to forge national unity and integration because the Anglophone Cameroonians have allegedly felt marginalized in the predominantly Francophone country. This has resulted in heightened tensions between the two sides and has led to the reintroduction of arguments and actions in favour of „federalism‟ or even
„secession‟ (Konings & Nyamnjoh, 1997).
Unlike the secession cases of South Sudan, Kosovo, and Crimea that turned out to be relatively „successful‟, there have been some unsuccessful attempts at it. These include the attempted secession of Quebec from Canada, Scotland from UK and Catalonia from Spain (Sterio, 2018). On the continent of Africa, cases of secession include the unsuccessful attempts of Biafra from Nigeria, the successful secession of Eritrea from Ethiopia, (Keller, 2007) and more recently, the case of Cameroon.
The Republic of Cameroon which is situated in Central Africa, is bordered by Nigeria to the West and North; Chad to the Northeast; the Central African Republic to the East; and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and the Republic of Congo to the South. Since her attainment of independence in 1960, Cameroon has been faced with many challenges, primarily with regards to internal integration of regions that were previously under English colonial rule.
The claim by scholars such as Mukong (2016) that the Anglophone Cameroonians perceive a gradual assimilation of their identity into that of the French is made based on some events and developments in the political and administrative history of Cameroon. 1960 saw Nigeria and East Cameroun (also known as French Cameroon), which were Mandate Territories gaining independence from Britain and France respectively (Mukong, 2016). Soon after, a plebiscite conducted by the United Nations (UN) in February 1961 resulted in Southern British Cameroon becoming a part of the then La Republique du Cameroon (LRC) (Mukong, 2016).
Through the Foumban Conference of 1961, the country became a federation and guaranteed respect for the cultural identity of the Anglophone regions (Campbell, 2016). In May 1972, a referendum was organized for the whole Federal Republic, rather than just the Anglophone territory to decide on adopting a unitary system. With the francophone territory having a demographic advantage of about 80% as compared to the 20% of Anglophones of the population, they managed to get a landslide victory for the adoption of a unitary system. Hence the dissolution of the federal state leading to the creation of the unitary state (Mukong, 2016). Also in 1984, under the Presidency of Paul Biya, the United Republic of Cameroon had its name changed to the Republic of Cameroon which was quite symbolic because this was the official name of Cameroon prior to the adoption of the federal system (Konings & Nyamnjoh, 1997).
In October 2016, lawyers in the North West region of Cameroon embarked on a strike action after close to ten (10) months of appealing to the Justice Ministry to address some concerns they had put across. In November of the same year, some teachers of primary and secondary schools in the two Anglophone regions also decided to embark on a sit-down strike as well,
to draw the governments attention to some pertinent issues they needed to be tackled (Okereke, 2018).
On the side of the lawyers, their grievances included the call on the Ministry of Justice and the government to replace francophone magistrates and state counsels, who had been posted to courts in the Anglophone regions. These French-speaking officials who were handicapped in English were allegedly undermining the effective practice of the English law. The lawyers also demanded a translation of the main text of business law known as “Organisation Pour l‟ Harmonisation en Afrique du Droit des Affaires (OHADA)” into English to address the limitation caused by the language barrier (Mukong, 2016).
The teachers, on the other hand, complained of an increase in francophone teachers posted to the Anglophone regions (mainly Northwest and Southwest regions). Since they could not express themselves well enough, students found it difficult understanding what they taught and as a result failed their exams, rendering them unable to gain admission from primary into secondary schools and from secondary schools into good universities (Mukong, 2016). Other groups of aggrieved citizens joined the protests and strikes over unmet needs such as infrastructure, social amenities and employment opportunities.
Rather than addressing the concerns of the protesters through the appropriate state institutions, the military and gendarmes allegedly meted a crackdown on them in an attempt to disperse the protests and deter the others from following suit. The government‟s response, usually through the military, has been characterized by intimidation, arrests without charges, jail without trial, torture and other forms of inhuman abuses (Amin, 2018).
In response to the repressive actions of the military and the government, there seems to be a surge in the number of activist and nationalist groups mainly from the Anglophone regions to counter the military. Initially, the demand was for a peaceful settlement of issues, but as tensions heightened and attempts at dialogue failed, the demands evolved into complete secession of the Anglophone regions from the La République du Cameroun (Amin, 2018). Nationwide, the Anglophone Crisis has become a major topic of discussion, and despite the continuous presence of government forces in the region to calm the instability, it remains unclear the way forward or how the crisis will end. Undoubtedly, this crisis has had some social, economic and political ramifications on the peace and development of Cameroon.
Statement of the Research Problem
Since the inception of the Anglophone crisis in 2016, Cameroon has been discussed time and again on numerous media outlets over various unfortunate events that have taken place in the country, mainly within the two English-speaking regions. Unlawful mass arrests without trial, intimidation, torture, rape, and murder are some of the gruesome occurrences that have been meted out to sections of the Cameroonian populace (Farouk Chothai, 2018).
On the eve of New Year, President Paul Biya in his end of year address described the agitators as “a group of manipulated and exploited extremist rioters whose activities have led to the loss of lives, destruction of public and private buildings, crippling of economic activities and the desecration of sacred national symbols”(Okereke, 2018). This did not go down well with the aggrieved citizens who were only seeking their human rights and freedoms that were being trampled upon. Initially, the state security forces were accused of using these repressive methods to discourage the protests, but as it went on, various separatist groups emerged to fight the injustice and counter the security forces (Amin, 2018).
