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Hundreds of detainees organized a riot at Cameroon Central Prison in Yaoundé to demand better conditions of detention. The mutinous majority of English prisoners, captured on Facebook Live, showed burning buildings and shots fired when police stormed the prison.
The revolt has created a new fervor among the English-speaking population of Cameroon, as the government continues to face the Anglophone crisis in the north and south-west regions.
Nearly 600 prisoners – mainly English-speaking political opponents and separatists – took various parts of Kondengui prison in the capital Yaounde on Monday morning to protest their conditions of detention.
Men who call themselves Ambazonian separatists are heard to express their anger at the lack of food and water on Facebook live and to call for an end to arbitrary trials and overcrowding.
"Some of them have been in prison for two years, have not yet been brought to justice and believe that their procedure is not fair and they want the government to release them," Agbor explains. Nkongho, human rights lawyer.
Witnesses said other detainees had joined the mutiny, including French-speaking Cameroonians, bringing the number of rioters to more than 1,500, according to Reuters.
Police stormed the prison on Monday night and used tear gas to disperse the prisoners.
On Tuesday, reports said the protests were continuing.
"Because the prison is congested, it's not very easy to manage 4,000 people in a space intended for 1,000 people, just showing that the state can not really handle the problem," he said. Nkongho told RFI.
The Kondengui maximum prison is home to the vast majority of English-speaking activists in the three-year-long crisis in Cameroon.
Feeling of injustice
The protests were motivated by a series of daily grievances ranging from the inflexible school curriculum that favored the French-speaking majority to the legal system that makes justice more difficult for Anglophones to obtain.
The same sense of injustice underscores Monday's prison revolt, said Joshua Osih, vice president of the opposition Social Democratic Front (SDF).
"The prisoners with whom I have been in contact say that they do not understand why they are being deported to Yaoundé to be tried in French rather than in the north and south-west," he said. declared to RFI.
The transfer of detainees from English-speaking areas to Yaounde Central Prison has been criticized by human rights groups. In January 2018, the UNCHR condemned the arrest and deportation of 47 separatists who had filed asylum claims in Nigeria.
Among the plaintiffs were separatist leader Julius Sisiku Ayuk Tabe, president of the self-proclaimed "Republic of Ambazonia".
"The military court refused to use English at the trial of Ayuk Tabe and others.If this was not granted to the leaders of the English-speaking movement, I see no chance that this be granted to these prisoners, "Osih commented, adding that this added to the" feeling of injustice caused by this judicial system that no longer works in this country ".
The UN estimates that 1.3 million people need humanitarian badistance in northwestern and southwestern Cameroon.
Dialogue search
Paul Biya's government is under increasing pressure to engage with the separatists to end the crisis. In Europe, the Swiss government is leading the mediation efforts.
Meanwhile, on the ground, it is the Catholic Church that has most insisted on resolving the crisis, with Cardinal Christian Tumi calling for an Anglophone conference between the main leaders of the separatist movement and the government.
Parties like the Social Democratic Front have welcomed the initiative, but believe that this is not enough.
"The problem is not in Bamenda, nor in Buea, but in Yaounde," says Joshua Osih, vice president of the SDF. The government, in his view, has taken little account of Anglophone claims to date.
The government of President Paul Biya has reacted strongly to non-violent protests against the alleged marginalization of the French-speaking majority. By the end of 2016, this resentment has turned into an armed uprising.
For its part, Agbor Nkongho believes that a comprehensive solution is needed and that both parties must acknowledge their mistakes.
"The government can not continue to arrest people, where will they keep them?" The detainees shouted "that's enough, it's too much" and that reflects what Cameroonians want, did he declare.
The government held crisis talks all day Monday. RFI contacted officials for their comments, but received no response.
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