Politics

Ghana discovered its offshore oil and gas Jubilee Field in 2007. By 2010, it had started pumping the first oil – a historic moment. Since then, oil has been produced in commercial quantities, and over the next 20 years it could earn up to US$20 billion in export revenue for the country. It is expected that this will present an opportunity for the growth of the country’s economy, reducing the poverty rate amongst the people living in the coastal towns where the exploration work is carried out. But four years after entry into the oil business, critical issues have begun emerging from communities living close to where the exploration takes place. The sea provides a major source of employment for people living in the coastal towns. They fish to get their daily bread. But recently, their work has virtually halted as a result of the frequent washing ashore of dead whales.

Between August 2013 and December 2014, the carcasses of 23 whales appeared on the beaches of Ghana. Traditionally, in the coastal towns such an occurrence was seen as a sign of a bumper harvest of fish, and the local people celebrated and made merry. They buried the whale and gave it a befitting funeral, just like a human being. This was the practice in the olden days. But the number of dead whales recently has changed people’s ancient beliefs. They are now worried. Whenever a dead whale is washed ashore, they are out of business. They cannot undertake their daily work routines until the mammal has decomposed. In Asanta, a small fishing village of about 2,000 inhabitants located in Ellembele District in the Western Region of the country, more than seven dead whales have appeared. The chief fisherman of the village, Joseph Ebambay, explained in an interview that this development was unusual in the past and blamed it on the oil exploration in the area. “I can say there is a change in the environment, because we are now having oil fields and oil companies running within our deep seas. So, you cannot deny the fact that, as we say, it may be because of the oil find. We may be thinking like that, we may be thinking because of the oil drilling some chemicals fell into the sea and maybe these whales … drink some of the water or whatever it is,” said Mr. Ebambay.

Not only the chief fisherman and his people in the village suspect the oil exploration. At the Department of Marine and Fisheries Sciences at the University of Ghana, Professor P. K. Ofori-Danson, a sea mammal expert, said in an interview that the current rate at which the whales are being washed ashore is something that must be investigated. “The frequency of the occurrence of death is going higher. What new thing have we put there that made it go high? The sound waves inserted into the ocean floor during the exploration are 100 times the sound of a jet plane taking off. So, if you send strange waves to the sea bed, it interferes with [the whales’] echo-location and prevents them from moving, and they are likely to swim to the shallow area of the sea and eventually be washed ashore. So we suspect the oil drilling”, the professor said. The Ghanaian government representative in the area is worried about the rate at which the dead mammals are being found. District Chief Executive, Daniel Eshon said Ghana’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is not doing enough to help solve the problem, but declined to comment on whether the oil exploration is responsible for the death of the whales or not. “It will interest you to know that if it happens, the EPA people will call and say try and solve this problem, because they think that as the assembly is there ‒ the assembly is the local government in this particular area ‒ so you have to oversee everything. So in this case, most of the time, they rely on me to solve these kinds of issues. But for them … [to] do this kind of post mortem and proper analysis to determine the cause of death of the whale, they will not come,” he said.

Before oil exploration began, an environmental impact assessment was done for the government by the companies involved. In the assessment, it was identified that the exploration could cause some potential threats to marine mammals. But the mitigation measures that were outlined to reduce these threats have not been properly reviewed by Ghana’s environmental authorities. Friends of the Nation, an environmental issue advocacy group, has kept a close eye on the incidents and said in an interview that people in the area have reason to believe that the oil activities are responsible, since it was predicted that it could happen.But the environmental authorities have denied that the deaths of the mammals could be linked to oil extraction. ‘You must have evidence to say so; there has been speculation as to whether the oil activities might be responsible for this, [that] by generating seismic sounds that could disorientate the whales. But recent studies by the International Union for Conservation of Nature have shown that the evidence does not support it,’ maintains Carl Fiati, the EPA’s deputy director of natural resources, marine and costal environment.

Ghana’s environmental authorities are not making any concerted effort to uncover the mystery behind the deaths of the whales. Meanwhile, the migration period of the whales has just begun this year. From August 2014 till March 2015, they will be traversing Ghana’s waters, and probably more of them will be washed ashore, which will continue to disturb communities living along the coast.

Note: This article was first submitted to the Haller Foundation as an unpublished article. It was selected as the 1^st Runner Up in the Haller Prize for Development Journalism held in Nairobi-Kenya.

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Ngwa Bertrand

10.Feb.2015

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The republic of Cameroon will celebrate the 49th edition of the National Youth Day tomorrow Wednesday, February 11, 2015. There seems to be an absence of the excitement that usually comes with this day throughout the national territory. The CPDM think tank has chosen as theme "Youth and preserving peace for an emerging Cameroon". For the first time ever since the Ahmadou Ahidjo government concocted and implemented this so called National Youth Day celebration, the Far North region will not be a part. Reason: nearly 170 schools closed, 150,000 Cameroonian citizens internally displaced, over 300,000 Nigerian refugees now face starvation. The one time beautiful Far North region of Cameroon that occupied more than half of the cabinet positions in the Biya government is under the threat of a humanitarian crisis.

The traditional parade of the Youth Day will not take place in Logone and Chari, Mayo-Sava, Mayo-Tsanaga, Mayo-Danay--to be sure, in 4 of the 6 divisions of the Far North region.  In a country where the ruling party spends hundreds of millions every day all in a bid to stifle the opposition, there are now new signs that the real opposition to the Biya hegemony will come from soldiers returning from Nigeria and the Far North region of the country. Worsening urban violence is placing increasing demands on the Cameroon police force. The Cameroon army, the Gendarmerie including the police force are typically woefully underresourced, inadequately trained, unaccountable and distrusted by the local communities, leaving them ineffective in addressing the security challenges posed regularly by Boko Haram. This is what we of Cameroon Concord see as we cover the war on terror.

The special blood donation campaign announced by the Movement for the Revival of Cameroon on March 2015 to help save, wherever possible, persons injured in the war on terror in the Far North seems to suggest that Etoudi can no longer handle things alone.  John Fru Ndi has criticized the marginalization suffered by the people of the Far North region. However, President Paul Biya will address the Cameroonian people tonight. With age telling on him, a young family and his entire cabinet under a privileged form of “house arrest” due to many interrogations by the Special Criminal Court in Yaoundé, President Biya is expected to focus his speech on the Fotokol massacre. This also will be too little too late as the youth are not happy that nearly a week after the attack by Boko Haram on Fotokol, Biya is yet to issue a statement despite calls from the political class of the country.

Truth is like surgery, it may hurt, but it cures while a lie is like a pain killer, it gives temporal relief but has side effects later. We of Cameroon Concord think President Biya should announce his successor to the Cameroonian people soonest. The ruling CPDM party is no longer in need of grease but a new engine. To be accurate, the leadership of the party now functions like a teenager who has been given a new car and he keeps driving all over the place without having any destination in mind. For the first time in our nation’s history, thousands of our service men and women have come under enemy fire. Once they start returning from the war, they will longer be afraid of bullets!! This ageing regime should be making way for the new generation. A stitch in time saves nine

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Ngwa Bertrand

10.Feb.2015

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The body of a Chadian soldier was found on Tuesday afternoon in Kousseri. According to sources close to the Divisional Officer in the district of Kousseri, Logone and Chari Division of the Far North of Cameroon, the body found on Tuesday night was a soldier of the Chadian National Army.

Our chief intelligence officer in Maroua reported that he was found dead on Tuesday with a rope around his neck in an abandoned space raising concerns over allegations of suicide within the anti Boko Haram coalition forces.

The discovery of the body of the Chadian soldier has also caused a lot of tongues to be wagging on the effectiveness of policing groups in Kousseri who reportedly enjoy local support and knowledge. Cameroon shares a common border with Chad and citizens from both nations can cross the border on both sides from the N'guelli Bridge over the Logone River which separates the two countries.

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Ngwa Bertrand

10.Feb.2015

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The Boko Haram Takfiri militants in Nigeria have stepped up attacks in neighboring countries, kidnapping 20 people in Cameroon and exploding a car bomb in Niger. Security sources and residents said on Monday that the militants abducted 20 people aboard a bus in northern Cameroon and then killed 12 of them. The kidnapping occurred on Sunday when the victims’ bus came under attack in the town of Koza near the border with Nigeria. The Takfiri militant group is known for carrying out deadly attacks in Nigeria since the beginning of its operations in 2009. However, launching assaults on people outside Nigeria is not very common. In an attempt to rout the militants in Nigeria, neighboring nations of Niger, Chad, Cameroon, and Benin have decided to set up an 8,700-strong force to fight Boko Haram, prompting the Takfiri terrorists attacks in those countries.

As the war against Boko Haram intensifies, the perception that it is wedged by disaffected and jobless youths who oppose and hate Western Education is becoming pedestrian. The sophistication of the command and operational structures of Boko Haram leaves no one in doubt about this reality.    The weapons deployed to commit the ongoing pogrom appear to have been acquired and brought to the war zones through a complicated network. It is hard to believe that a conflict of this magnitude can occur without a complex network of individuals and organizations supporting Boko Haram’s criminal war effort. It may be reasonably suggested that it is a political establishment serving distinct interests in Nigeria and Cameroon. In Nigeria, it has never sought ransom for the many victims it has abducted. In Cameroon although officially classified as a nebulous or illusive enemy, it has turned abduction for ransom into a lucrative business. 

Boko Haram in Nigeria is a child of Nigerian history and the impunity of Northern Nigeria’s Military establishment. Armed conflict is part of Nigeria history. It is also a business which has enriched many.  People including generations unborn learn from history. The savaged brutality meted on civilians and civilian objects in Nigeria pre-exist Boko Haram. These acts of impunity were some of the methods deployed by successive military regimes, most of them from Northern Generals to accede and sustain power. The ongoing slaughter by Boko Haram follows the same pattern which in 1966 led to the Nigeria/Biafra War. The underlying cause of the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Southerners, mainly of the Ibo ethnic groups in the North was never comprehensively investigated, if at all.  There is no gainsaying that had the crimes been investigated, the result would have pointed to some powerful individuals within the Nigerian Military structure of Northern origin. For these, political power and control of the economy could only be attained through scapegoating communities whom they perceived as serious competitors.

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Ngwa Bertrand

10.Feb.2015

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Fighting reportedly took place on Sunday night between the Rapid Response Battalion and Boko Haram near the locality of Kerawa in the Far North region of Cameroon. Cameroon Concord has been reliably informed that 11 Boko Haram terrorists were killed and 10 Cameroon service men seriously injured.

According to information received from our military informant, Boko Haram fighters were preparing for a surprise attack at the end of this Sunday evening in the district of Kolofata, department of Mayo-Sava, the Far North region. The group of terrorist succeeded to infiltrate but were however spotted by a reconnaissance mission on patrol at Kerawa who ambushed them. Our source also revealed that some of the militants escaped to Wara.

At the time of writing this report news filtered to our news desk that 20 passengers travelling on a bus including six women, who were returning from a weekly market near Koza (Mayo-Tsanaga), were abducted yesterday by Boko  Haram fighters near the village of Adangadanga in the district of Mayo-Moskota some few kilometres from Nguetchewe.

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Ngwa Bertrand

09.Feb.2015

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Michael S. Hoza, US Ambassador to Cameroon in a press release, has put a 7 million dollar price on the head of Abubakar Shekau, the leader of the Nigerian Islamic sect Boko Haram. According to local media report in Cameroon, the American diplomat explained that a price on the head of Abubakar Shekau is justified.

The boss of the US diplomatic mission in Cameroon also added that the Nigerian Islamic sect has become synonymous with global terrorism, Islamic fanatism and barbarism. Ambassador Hoza further observed that apart from the physical manifestation of violence, the Nigerian jihardists also encourage moral violence.

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Ngwa Bertrand

09.Feb.2015

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