God the Politician

11. Home-Bred Terrorists

87 11
Home-Bred Terrorists he best time to hold peace talks is when guns are booming on the battlefield,’ said Paddy Mbawa, the erstwhile publisher of Cameroon Post, the most radical and influential English language newspaper in Cameroon at the time of the SDF launch and early confrontations with the Biya regime and just after he had served a prison term for defamation at the notorious New Bell Prison. Mbawa, who has since left the newsroom for the pulpit, was not in fact saying anything new as rebel movements the world over were already applying this philosophy, many of whom were yet to embrace the idea that a ceasefire meant that shooting should stop. Following its daring publisher’s departure, Cameroon Post suffered a number of epileptic fits before its final death. But its admirers believe it is simply lying comatose in anticipation of a joyful revival when the trumpet for all dead sensational newspapers sounds on the day of reckoning. On 27 March 1997, a group of supposed freedom fighters overran a number of military installations in the Northwest, killing three gendarmes in the process. While Fru Ndi and the SDF interpreted this as a motive by the Biya regime to postpone the parliamentary elections planned in less than two months, others saw it as a welcome move to restore the independence of Southern Cameroons or at least to force the regime to the negotiating table. Before the attacks, I had heard that a rebel force was being trained, one faction in Njimafor Quarter, two km from where I lived, and another at Alabukam on the road to Mbengwi, the headquarters of Momo, one of the seven divisions in Northwest Province. I did not believe the story until the night of 26 to 27 March !997. I was seated at a drinking spot with some neighbours quaffing beer in the Cameroonian fashion when I saw them approaching. They wore danshiki, a form of jumper with plaited strings at the bottom that is common among the Hausa. They also had white bands wrapped round their heads and wrists with green leaves stuck in them. Armed with bows and arrows, they walked slowly, not obviously conversing or only speaking in whispers. ‘T 88 Their appearance and conduct were so weird that the alcohol I had been consuming vamoosed from my brain and my hair stood on end. The next moment I was asking my legs ‘What have I ever eaten without giving you a share?’ My legs seemed to understand the plea sand conveyed me home more expeditiously than they had ever done before. I was awakened the next day by gunshots coming from the direction of the Mobile Intervention Unit. popularly known as the GMI. Driven by irrepressible curiosity, I put on jeans and canvas shoes and within five minutes was at the GMI. What I saw took my breath away: Captain A.K Samaki, commander of the gendarmerie brigade (Brigade Terre) was lying in a pool of blood. I was all the more startled by the story that he had been killed by a knife as he had a gun and had been firing at the ‘terrorists’ in selfdefence . The most surprising thing was that the terrorists were not in a hurry to get away but were apparently spoiling for confrontation with uniformed men. Some even came close to the crowd that watched in disbelief and announced that they were fighters for the freedom of Southern Cameroons and that all Southern Cameroonians should join them. What the crowd could not understand was that the GMI police made no effort to arrest them. The story I later learnt was that the terrorists were those weirdlooking men we had seen the previous day. They had gone to the gendarmerie brigade to warn them that all occupation forces in Southern Cameroons should quit. To pre-empt any call for reinforcements, the terrorists began by destroying telephone lines linking the brigade with the Gendarmerie Legion Up Station. Commandant Samaki, on seeing them, attempted exactly what the terrorists knew he would. He picked up the receiver on his table to contact his hierarchy but was informed that the move was not necessary as the lines had already been taken care of. The terrorists, who had earlier been to the Public Security Constabulary and judicial police stations in town warning Francophobes to leave, proceeded to give Commandant Samaki the same message. After that they left for GMI, passing near the Old Bamenda Fish Pond...