God the Politician

21. Hunter Hunted

153 21
Hunter Hunted ne of the most scathing criticisms often levelled against the Biya regime is that the executive lords over the judiciary and the legislature. This is particularly true in the case of the Supreme Court whose president, Alexis Dipanda Mouelle, confessed in 1992 that the numerous irregularities in that year’s elections were enough to necessitate cancellation, but that his hands were tied. While presenting the results to President Biya a few days later, Dipanda Mouelle pleaded with the head of state to grant the long-awaited independence of the judiciary as soon as possible. The subservience of Parliament to Biya is eloquent proof of the executive’s continuous stranglehold on the legislature. Concerning the courts, it can however be admitted that while Biya’s grip on power is not in danger, the judiciary is relatively free. Magistrates and other law enforcement officials who claim their hands are tied in ordinary criminal matters are certainly very dishonest persons who want to use judicial lack of independence as a justification for arbitrary and egoistic exploits. Such judicial officials are often persecutors rather than prosecutors. The manner in which the Cameroonian judiciary functions has already been illustrated by the SCNC detainees’ trial in which the judges were more the persecutors than the prosecutors. But as with every rule, there is usually an exception and the principles of objectivity oblige us to show the opposite. On 20 August 2004 the governor of the Northwest Province, Koumpa Isa, convened a meeting of the elite and stakeholders in the electoral process. The venue of the meeting was Ndop, the administrative headquarters of Ngoketunjia Division. During the period of questions and suggestions that normally follows the address of a keynote speaker, John Kohtem, SDF district chairman for Balikumba, complained that Fon Doh, the traditional ruler who was also a CPDM MP and mayor, was using his position to manipulate the electoral register and include the names of minors, among other electoral malpractices. Fon Doh was so vexed by this direct affront that he told Kohtem he was a lion and nobody challenges a lion and gets away with it. O 154 Although Kohtem drew the governor’s attention to this threat on his life, Koumpa Isa saw it only as the outburst of pent-up emotions that was normal among politicians who embrace opposite ends of an argument and so did nothing to protect the complainant. At 5:30 pm that same day Kohtem was found dead at the Balikumbat Small Market after allegedly being pursued and severely beaten. News of Kohtem’s death was received with shock by Cameroonians and international human rights groups. The SDF made political capital of it and paraded Kohtem’s corpse along Bamenda’s Commercial Avenue. The demonstration culminated in a rally at Liberty Square, considered sacred by the SDF because of the death of its six militants on 26 May 1990, the date of the party’s launch. During the rally, attended by Adamou Ndam Njoya and other opposition figures, Fru Ndi promised fireworks if Fon Doh was not immediately arrested, tried and sanctioned. There was much sympathy and support for Kohtem because he was lame and therefore considered helpless. Despite this threat and pressure from human rights groups and even Northwest CPDM barons, suspects in the murder case’s preliminary inquiry only began in June 2005, ten months later. Fon Doh and 11 other suspects underwent a grilling in the premises of the Ndop legal department. The panel that did the interrogation was led by Paul Evande Mwambo, one of the attorney general’s assistants. Justice Evande was generally known to be daring, incorruptible and one who could never call a spade by another name. The lifting of Fon Doh’s immunity by Parliament was the first indication that the trial would be fair. It is noteworthy that this was the first time MPs of both the ruling party and the opposition acted in unison on an important issue. The CPDM MP acted this way because they knew that their party leader, President Biya, wanted it and had instructed the vice prime minister in charge of justice to tell them so. This notwithstanding, Kohtem’s supporters still thronged the legal department grounds when a report in The Post, written by myself, disclosed that the verdict of the preliminary inquiry would be made public on 23 November. Kohtem sympathizers, most of them SDF supporters, threatened hell if Fon Doh were not punished. These included Pius Lecigah...