| Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium | |
|---|---|
 Logo of CACSC | |
| Leader | Felix Agbor Balla [1] |
| Ideology | Federalism Anglophone interests |
The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium (CACSC) is an Anglophone Cameroonian federalist movement. [2]
| Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium | |
|---|---|
| Logo of CACSC | |
| Leader | Felix Agbor Balla [1] |
| Ideology | Federalism Anglophone interests |
The Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium (CACSC) is an Anglophone Cameroonian federalist movement. [2]
CACSC consisted of lawyers and teacher trade unions in Southern Cameroons. They opposed what they saw as threats against the language and common law system in the Anglophone regions, particularly the use of French in schools and courtrooms. On October 6, 2016, the organization started a sit-down strike, which was supported by peaceful protests in cities such as Limbe, Buea and Bamenda. This initiated the 2016–2017 Cameroonian protests. [2] The government responded violently; within a week, more than 100 demonstrators and activists had been arrested, and six were reported dead. [3]
In January 2017, the Cameroonian government created a committee to enter a dialogue with members of the CACSC led by Tassang Tilfred. At the first meeting, the CACSC refused to talk until the government released all activists who had been arrested. This was followed by more arrests, drawing condemnation from Consortium members. CACSC presented a draft proposal for a federal state, with autonomy for the Anglophone regions. As a response, on January 17, CACSC and the Southern Cameroons National Council were branded as threats to the unity of Cameroon and banned through a ministerial decree signed by minister René Sadi. A few days later, CACSC leaders Agbor Balla and Fontem Neba were arrested. [4] [5]
In the end, members of CACSC spent months in detention, while others fled the country and came to support complete separation of the Anglophone regions from Cameroon. With the outbreak of the war known as the Anglophone Crisis in September 2017, federalism lost support among Anglophone activists. In May 2019, the Cameroonian government announced it was ready to discuss federalism. [6]
Ambazonia, alternatively the Federal Republic of Ambazonia or State of Ambazonia, is a political entity proclaimed by Anglophone separatists who are seeking independence from Cameroon. The separatists claim that Ambazonia should consist of the Northwest Region and Southwest Region of Cameroon. Since 2017, Ambazonian rebels have engaged in armed conflict with the Cameroonian military, in what is known as the Anglophone Crisis, attempted to set up a government-in-exile, and supportive militias have exerted control over parts of the claimed territory. No country has recognized Ambazonia's existence as of 2024.
The Southern Cameroons was the southern part of the British League of Nations mandate territory of the British Cameroons in West Africa. Since 1961, it has been part of the Republic of Cameroon, where it makes up the Northwest Region and Southwest Region. Since 1994, pressure groups in the territory claim there was no legal document in accordance to UNGA RES 1608(XV) paragraph 5, and are seeking to restore statehood and independence from the Republic. They renamed the British Southern Cameroons as Ambazonia.
Anglophone Cameroonians are the people of various cultural backgrounds, most of who hail from the English-speaking regions of Cameroon. These regions were formerly known as the British Southern Cameroons, being part of the League of Nations mandate and United Nations Trust Territories administered by the United Kingdom. An anglophone Cameroonian is widely regarded as anyone who has lived in the North West and South West regions of Cameroon, who has received an education from institutions modeled on the British system of education and law.
The Southern Cameroons National Council (SCNC) is a political organisation seeking the independence of the former anglophone Southern Cameroons from the predominantly francophone Republic of Cameroon and achieving the unification with neighbouring Nigeria. It is a non-violent organisation with the motto "The force of argument, not the argument of force." Because the SCNC advocates secession from Cameroon, it has been declared an illegal organisation by the government of Paul Biya. Security forces regularly interrupt SCNC meetings, arresting members and typically detaining them for several days before release.
Paul Abine Ayah was a member of the National Assembly of Cameroon and a member of the ruling Cameroon People's Democratic Movement. Until recently, he joined the Opposition Party called the Peoples Action Party (PAP). In August 2007 he was elected as Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Assembly of Cameroon. He is a deputy for Manyu in the Southwest Region.
The Anglophone problem is a socio-political issue in the modern Republic of Cameroon, rooted in the country's German, British, and French colonial legacies. Anglophone (English-speaking) Cameroonians form a minority population of around 16 percent, mainly from the Northwest and Southwest regions that formerly constituted the Southern Cameroons, part of the former British Cameroon colonies. These Anglophone regions were formerly controlled by Britain as a mandate of the League of Nations, and then as a United Nations trust territory. During the Foumban Conference of 1961, territories with different colonial legacies were finally united into one state.
Agbor Nkongho aka Balla is an Anglophone Cameroonian human rights lawyer who is the president of the Fako Lawyers Association, vice president of the African Bar Association in charge of Central Africa, founder and chairman of the Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa and founder of Agbor Nkongho Law Firm an activist and freedom fighter who was arrested on 17 January 2017. Agbor Nkongho was born on August 23, 1970. He is a leading member of the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium (CACSC) which has been banned and its activities declared illegal in Cameroon.
Dr Fontem A. Neba is an Anglophone Cameroonian university lecturer, author and a civil rights activist who emerged on the Cameroon political stage as the founding Secretary General of Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium before it was banned by the government of Cameroon on January 17, 2017. He was arrested on the same day alongside Barrister Nkongho Felix Agbor and deported to Yaoundé overnight where they would both spend nine perilous months in the Kondengui Maximum security prison. Before becoming Secretary General of the banned Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium (CACSC), he was the Secretary General of teachers’ trade union of the University of Buea (SYNES) before his arrest on January 17, 2017, for staging a peaceful protest in the defence of Anglophone Cameroon common law system of education. He is the author of English Language Mastery and Academic Success which was launched on June 18, 2015.
The 2016–2017 Cameroonian protests were a series of protests that occurred following the appointment of Francophone judges in English-speaking areas of the Republic of Cameroon. In October 2016, protests began in two primarily English-speaking regions: the Northwest Region and the Southwest Region.
The Anglophone Crisis, also known as the Ambazonia War, is an ongoing armed conflict in the English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions of Cameroon, between the Cameroonian government and Ambazonian separatist groups, part of the long-standing Anglophone problem. Following the suppression of 2016–17 protests by Cameroonian authorities, separatists in the Anglophone regions launched a guerrilla campaign and later proclaimed independence. Within two months, the government of Cameroon declared war on the separatists and sent its army into the Anglophone regions.
Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe is an Ambazonian separatist leader from Ewelle village in Manyu division, and is the disputed first president of the unrecognized Federal Republic of Ambazonia. In January 2018 he was extradited from Nigeria to Cameroon, where he has been incarcerated ever since.
This is a timeline of the Anglophone Crisis during 2017.
This is a timeline of the Anglophone Crisis during 2019.
From 2018, the Anglophone Crisis drew increasing international attention, and became a challenge to Cameroon's foreign relations. Triggered by a violent crackdown on the 2016–2017 Cameroonian protests, the conflict escalated from a low-scale insurgency to a civil war-like situation. While Cameroon enjoys support from African countries, no country has openly supported the Ambazonian independence movements. However, many countries have put pressure on Cameroon to talk to the separatists. In addition, the separatists enjoy support from officers in the Nigerian Army, who have helped arrange arms deals for them.
The Interim Government of Ambazonia is an Ambazonian independence movement, and claims to be the provisional government in exile of the internationally unrecognized state. Formed in the early days of the Anglophone Crisis, the movement has since splintered into four factions that claim to be the legitimate Interim Government.
The Ambazonia Governing Council (AGovC) is an Ambazonian independence movement. The movement has been known as "hardline" compared to other major Ambazonian separatist movements, and unwilling to engage with federalists. Starting off with a complicated relationship with the larger Interim Government of Ambazonia (IG), following the 2019 Ambazonian leadership crisis, the AGovC officially allied itself to the faction of the IG loyal to the first President of Ambazonia, Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe.
Ebenezer Derek Mbongo Akwanga is an Ambazonian independence activist. He is the chairman of the African People's Liberation Movement, an Ambazonian separatist movement, and heads its armed wing, SOCADEF. A former student at the University of Buea, he and fellow activist Ayaba Cho Lucas founded a pro-independence student association. Their movement was soon outlawed, and in 1997, Akwanga was imprisoned for six years. Following his escape from prison, he joined forces with the Southern Cameroons National Council (SCNC). When the SCNC split into several factions, he became the leader of the Southern Cameroons Youth League (SCYL). The SCYL eventually transformed into the African People's Liberation Movement (APLM). In March 2019, he oversaw the APLM taking part in founding the Southern Cameroons Liberation Council, in an attempt to form a united front. Akwanga is also an advocate of the Biafran case, and has spoken in favor of an alliance between Ambazonian and Biafran independence movements. He has called for referendums on independence in both the former Southern Cameroons and Biafra.
The Major National Dialogue is the official name of a dialogue between the Government of Cameroon and various opposition parties, aimed at resolving the Anglophone Crisis. The event took place between September 30 and October 4, 2019.
Thomas Awah or Thomas Awah, Jr. is an activist and journalist from Cameroon born in 1969. Awah was arrested in 2017 and sentenced to 11 years imprisonment on charges of terrorism, spreading false news, hostility to the fatherland, secession, insurrection and revolution.
The Anglophone Crisis, an ongoing civil war between the Cameroonian state and Anglophone separatists who are trying to establish a new state called "Ambazonia", broke out due to grievances which built up within Cameroon at large and its English-speaking parts specifically over several decades.