It could not immediately be established what led to the fire accident. But it was clear that the fuel, worth millions, was kept in plastic drums of about 200 liters each.

As time goes by, illegal fuel is gradually transforming the urban décor in Cameroon’s major cities. Vendors improvise unauthorized sales points along the streets. When night falls, they store the unsold inflammable products in warehouses, houses or makeshift hiding places on the roadsides, endangering their own lives and those of their entourage.

In the early 1990s, this fuel from neighbouring countries was already banned from sale, particularly because it reduced the market share of petrol stations owned mainly by multinational oil companies. Hounded from all sides by the forces of law and order, the sellers had, after several months of resistance, finally given up the activity.

But in recent years, they have resumed their activity with the discreet support of some state agents who are supposed to prohibit this illegal trade.

For months, three Cameroonian journalists working with The Museba Project, an online newspaper, have been investigating the supply channels of this fuel and how hundreds of millions of CFA francs end up in the pockets of certain officials while this business threatens the environment, the health of the population and the national economy.

These reporters gathered that as the owner of the depot at Botaland, Limbe, popularly known as Kouper, noticed the fire, he immediately alerted some persons close-by who swung into action in order to try and contain the fire. But they only succeeded in rescuing a few of the containers to a safe area. The sheer intensity of the flames did not allow them to do much. Without a fire extinguishing machine to assist them, most of the stock went up in flames.

when the bad news got to them, Public officials in Fako Division, led by the Senior Divisional Officer, Emmanuel Engamba Ledoux, quickly moved to the scene of the incident .

On their orders, a fire fighting van from the Fire Fighting Brigade of the National Oil Refinery, SONARA, was called in to help put out the fire. The house, under whose basement the fuel had been stocked, was almost completely damaged. The fire also touched some of the neighboring buildings.

The above incident did draw the attention of the public who witnessed, fully, how the illegal trade in imported petroleum products into Cameroon has been allowed to go on to the point where individuals run huge depots.

How the Business Thrives

The same administrative and security officials who rushed to the scene on that October 14th to see what had happened were no strangers to the thriving business of illegal petroleum products in Cameroon. They knew that Botaland is known as one of the landing points, if not the headquarters, for the importation and sale of this illegal fuel in Limbe.

The law in Cameroon forbids the illegal importation and sale of petroleum products. In essence, the law guiding Customs operations classifies illicit fuel imports as contraband goods. Thus, any person dealing in their importation, either from Nigeria or any other country is considered to be contravening the law. This is because those in the business, as we found out, don’t have licenses and do not pay  taxes to the state treasury. Therefore by law, they stand to be arrested and dragged to the law courts for adjudication.

However, since the Botaland incident happened, from our findings, again, no person was either arrested or dragged to court as a result of what happened. Secondly, there was no security raid either to prohibit others from carrying on with the importation and storage of this illegal fuel nor was there any effort to stop the business in Limbe and elsewhere in the country.

While fuel from the licensed petroleum dealers across the country is sold at recognized filling stations, this illegally imported fuel is sold along the streets in small plastic bottles from one liter and upwards. The vendors, sometimes, only display a bottle by the road that has been filled with water or one mixed with the fuel as a sign.

The roadside vendors of this illegally imported fuel depend on the big importers for their supplies. And since the Botaland incident, there has been no report of any of them having been chased from the street corners where they are found in Limbe and elsewhere. The business is still booming just as it has ever been.

The trade is organized in such a way that there are major importers who import in bulk and often from Nigeria. They import using plastic containers of 200 liters each. The major hubs in Fako Division where this fuel comes in are Idenau, in the West Coast Sub Division. In Limbe, reporters discovered that the entry points are Limbola village, Botaland, Wovia and the Down beach seafront. All the hubs are located along the Limbe coastline.

The importers have hidden depots located within the residential communities in the above named locations. We gathered from our sources that these depots are well known to the security. It is from these depots that the roadside vendors and other dealers from other towns or regions of the country come and buy from.

Thus, the fire incident of October 14, 2021, touched just one of such depots being used to store the smuggled fuel products. A security officer, who works with the State Security apparatus in charge of investigations known as the General Directorate in Charge of External Research, DGRE,  told us on December 14, 2021, that there are about 30 of these privately owned illegal petroleum depots in Limbe; that is, Down Beach, Botaland, Wovia, Ngeme and Limbola. Some of them are run by Nigerian nationals who have a direct connection with dealers or smugglers back in Nigeria.

From our investigation, in the course of 2021, a 200 liter container or drum is sold at FCFA 85,000 at the level of Idenau; FCFA 90,000 at the level of Limbola and FCFA 95,000 at the level of Botaland, Wovia, Ngeme and Down Beach.

But these prices tend to fluctuate depending on the rate of exchange of the Naira in Nigeria or when the Cameroon security or customs officials at sea or land decide to be hard on the big importers. From January to February, 2022, when Cameroon was hosting the African Cup of Nations, the Government, for apparent security reasons, decided to implement a naval blockade at sea. Consequently, the price for a 200 liter container, according to Mih Mbeng, a vendor in Limbe, went up to FCFA 110,000.

Bribes for the profiteers

In the course of 2021, we found out that those within the Administrative set up in Fako Division, the security forces from the top to the bottom, were directly or indirectly behind the booming trade.

The big importers and roadside vendors are those directly involved in the business of buying and selling to the end users. But the administrators, security officials, are the ones fuelling the existence of the business by way of collecting bribes and allowing the illegal business to keep thriving as if nothing was happening. The administrators who are supposed to clamp down on the trade are instead busy lining their private pockets while the Government is losing billions. Some of them, even unapologetically, buy from vendors who sell this cheap fuel along the streets.

In the Month of March, reporters interviewed over ten roadside vendors across Limbe and gathered that the business is so organized in such a way that all the roadside vendors have a makeshift union. That is, all those who buy from the above-mentioned depots and sell by the street corners in liters or smaller quantities. Each week, these vendors disclose that « each vendor has to contribute FCFA 1,500 to the union. »

There is a team of some four or five vendors who go round, every Wednesday and Thursday, each week, and collect the FCFA 1,500 contributions from the roadside vendors. When we met with one of the team members who spoke on condition of anonymity, he nonetheless said there are about 150 to 200 of these roadside vendors on the average. This gives a rough estimate of about FCFA 300,000 that is collected every week from the small time vendors by the roadsides. In a month, at least, these vendors turn in not less than an FCFA 1 million to the security heads managing the City of Limbe.

According to this vendor, the money is shared out to the heads of the gendarmerie company, the police, and other officers in the network. At this time, the Limbe Police Command was manned by Commissioner Nyebe Jean while the Limbe Gendarmerie Company by Captain Heffat Michel. But the vendor said it doesn’t matter who heads these security services at any one time. It is a network and whether there is a change at the helms of these services, they have to collect and hand the money.

Meantime, the big importers, like the ones at Down Beach, as we gathered also have their own makeshift union. This union also makes a similar collection from all their members who deal with importation from Nigeria. Their own quota, we learned, tends to be higher. One source told us that when they collect, they target the top administrators of the Division and even that of the region.

« Sometimes, they even send some of the money collected to some undisclosed persons in the Administration in Yaoundé », our source said.

« The envelope to Yaoundé is usually something like FCFA 10 million. When it is for the Administrators in Fako, they envelope is about FCFA 5 million« , this source added.

It is worthy to note that these are the security services in charge of keeping a check on the illegal importation and sale of this contraband fuel in Limbe and elsewhere. It, invariably, can be deduced that the illegal financial collections being made weekly by the security and top Administrative officials is reason enough to conclude why for the whole of 2021, there was no real security raid in the City of Limbe to either stop the sale of this roadside fuel or send a signal that what they dealers are doing is against the law. There was only one reported isolated case where the Gendarmerie Company in Limbe and the Ministry of Environment publicly displayed one catch of this illegally imported fuel.

The other case was in December, 2021, where there was a general raid against roadside vendors in the Limbe II Sub Division that was host to one of the Stadiums in Cameroon where the Africa Nations Cup, 2021, AFCON, matches were played. Some few containers of fuel were seized. But since the December raid, nothing has happened again. The selling of this fuel along the streets has continued just as it was before the raid.

This trade is not limited to Limbe. It extends its tentacles into the surrounding towns and other regions,  especially Douala. The arteries of the economic metropolis of Cameroon are flooded with illegal fuel, which is highly prized by commercial motorcycle riders. This is because it commands a lower price than the ones charged at the filling stations. The prices vary according to the neighborhoods concerned. In the suburb of Bonabéri which is the main entry point for products from Limbe, for instance, a liter costs FCFA 500; a little further into the city, a liter there is sold at CFA 550 while in the neighborhoods farther from the road, a liter is sold at FCFA 600. All these prices are still cheaper as compared to FCFA 630 per liter of Super in the filling stations.

After every 100 meters, one is certain to find the yellowish liquid displayed on makeshift counters along the street. The young and old, men and women, are all engaged in this activity every day and night. They carry out their activities peacefully under the nose and eyes of the authorities.

 « The first rule in this business, if you want to do it peacefully, is that you have to collaborate with the law enforcement and security forces. When they arrive, give them the money. You will never be worried, a vendor in Douala explained. Adding that  » if you get tough, they’ll bother you every day. And you’ll be the one to loose. Because when you don’t pay, they confiscate your goods. When the goods are already in their vehicles, you will have to pay hundreds of thousands to get them back ».

Every day, these vendors in Douala receive about eight to eleven controls, said another vendor who requested for anonymity.

« It depends on the day. We can have eight controls, nine controls, ten controls, eleven controls. Almost all the units of the forces of law and order pass by. They are the national gendarmerie, the GMI (Groupement mobile d’intervention – a unit of the national police), the ESIR (Equipes spéciales d’intervention rapide, another unit of the national police) and the elements of the judicial police. Thus, we spend 8,000 to 11,000 CFA francs per day, » he says.

Unlike in Limbe, there is no corporation or union in Douala. It is therefore difficult to put forward a comprehensive figure as to the number of vendors who occupy the sidewalks. However,  there are thousands of them in the city of 410 km2 and with nearly 4 million inhabitants, the ranks grow every day. After the motorcycle cab business, the fuel trade is the drop-off point for young people who are looking for work.

In other towns in Cameroon, there were reported raids by the security. For instance, on Wednesday August 25, 2021, The Guardian Post Newspaper, in its edition Number 02225, reported a story captioned: « Over 3000 liters of illicit fuel seized in Dibombari. »

In yet another publication on October 29, 2021, edition Number 02281, it reported about the seizure of another huge quantity of fuel, yet in the Littoral region captioned, « Over 7000 liters of illicit fuel impounded in Douala. »

Cameroon Is, Indeed, Losing Billions!

The General Manager, GM, of the Cameroon Petroleum Depot Company, SCDP, Veronique Moampea Mbio, is reported to have said that the smuggling of fuel is costing the state coffers 32 billion FCFA yearly.

The Southwest Regional Delegate of the Ministry of Water and Energy which has been making efforts to fight against the illegal importation of illicit fuel into the country, said Cameroon was, indeed, losing much.

The Delegate, Atabongfack Maurice, disclosed that at the level of his office, he has been struggling to carry on with the fight against this illegal importation at the level of the high seas within the Southwest coastline.

From his statistics of 2020 and 2021, his office in 2020, alone, turned in the sum of FCFA 52,485,500 from the sales of illegal fuel that they seized at the high seas from importers. He said this was money generated from the sale of a total of 149,852 liters of illicit fuel that was seized by his Ministry in 2020 from illegal importers.

He disclosed that his Delegation, as from January 2021 to September, 2021, had already seized, sold and paid into the Government coffers the sum of FCFA 44 million.

When asked why is it that, despite efforts made by his Ministry in all these operations, the presence of illicit fuel along the streets of Limbe and other bends in the quarters was still a common phenomenon, he disclosed that, his ministry was not getting full support in the fight « from the security services that are supposed to champion the fight. »

He stated that they often get assistance from the Naval Base Commander but very little from the police and Gendarmerie services.

The Customs Department has a duty to check this importation of illegal fuel which is classified among the contraband goods which they are supposed to fight against. The Customs service in the Southwest with Head office in Limbe has a brigade that works with the Military to fight against this illegal importation. Along the major highway from Idenau through Limbe and out of Limbe to Douala, the Customs have over four posts where their elements have been stationed with a mission to check against the smuggling and transportation of all illegally imported or contraband goods. But the vendors reporters interviewed disclosed that the customs are not left out of the corruption racket.

« At each customs check point, if you are caught with a drum of illegally imported fuel, you are obliged to settle with the sum of FCFA 2000 per drum. At the level of Down Beach, Ngeme, Wovia or Limbola where the importers come in with the drums, at least each boat that lands with fuel has an undisclosed amount that it pays as bribe to the customs officers. And here, too, the other security heads also come in, once they have been hinted by their informants of any fuel arrival, and collect their own envelope, » Mih Mbeng, a vendor said.

The vendors revealed that the usual amount vendors pay to these officials always vary per quantity of fuel involved.

Administrative Tolerance or Complicity?

One may wonder why the Senior Divisional officers of the Region or the Governor cannot order for a swoop on these illegal importers.

While Cameroon was preparing to host the African Nations Cup in January 2022 with Limbe being one of the host cities, the Southwest Governor, Bernard OkaliaBilai, during the launch of the ‘Keep Fako Clean,’ campaign, late in November, 2021, called on the local administrators to ensure that all roadside vendors of illegal fuel should be dislodged. Two weeks after his campaign launch, not even one had been removed.

It is difficult, therefore, to conclude that it is just mere tolerance from the part of the Government Administrators.

The security officer at the level of the DGRE told us crystal clear  that « everything in Cameroon is about money. Once you have the money to bribe your way, no case goes anywhere. »

And if it is by tolerance, then, it is tolerance at the expense of the very Government that they are serving and are expected to implement Government’s laws and policies for it to succeed in raising the revenue that it has to run the country with.

At the Limbe Police Station, the Assistant Police Commissioner, Attah Roy, had the same response. « We can only go out for checks at the SDO’s order » he said. The security control against those selling illegal fuel along the streets that was carried out before the AFCON tournament was just an isolated case, after more than a year that Limbe had not witnessed such a control.

These controls have not been going on for the past one year or more, as well as comment on the supposed regular sums which the roadside vendors say they contribute weekly and hand to the security services in order to pre-empt them from coming out to chase them off the streets.

Before the kickoff of the AFCON football tournament on January 6, following instructions that had been dished out by the Southwest Governor, a contingent of security officers went out on a rear control and chased away all the roadside vendors; at least, from open view.

After the AFCON tournament, very few of the vendors were displaying their sales plaques or empty bottles by the roadsides they openly did before. But the business is still on. The vendors have just simply changed their strategy from openly displaying their bottles by the roadsides to hiding them. While the bottles or their containers remain in hiding, they keep a permanent presence where they have been selling since most of their customers already know their sales positions.

We talked to a retired police officer, Joseph Nyenti, who said in their days in the police service, bribery was not as rampant as it is today. Asked why he thinks the sale of illegal fuel is still very prominent in Limbe despite the presence of the police and other security services, he said that the police sometimes collect money from the vendors not because it was their intention to do so. « They collect simply because they want to defend themselves in order to have something for the family. »

He further reiterated the fact that the police service today does not function the way it was during their time. He retired before 2010. He said that at the time when the Government decreed an increment in their salaries, they were sure to receive the increment in the following month.

« But today, when the Government announces a salary increment, it takes long before the increment is effected on your pay slip. You will have to compile documents and go to Yaoundé, sometimes, on several occasions, before you might succeed. Thus this is encouraging the aspect of corruption in the service today, » he said.

The Quality As a Concern

The quality of these illegally imported fuels, as most automobile users have testified, is not guaranteed. Many say those who use the fuel run the risk of damaging their engines either in the short or long run. We tried to get an expert from the National Oil Refinery to react to this but we did not succeed owing to some procedural requirements.

But notwithstanding the doubtful quality, a significant number of automobile users, especially the commercial motor bike and cab riders make use of the fuel without recourse to the fact that it has a potentially damaging effect. They argue that the cost of the illegally imported fuel is far cheaper than fuel sold at petrol filling stations, which is said to be of very good quality.

At the feeling stations, a liter of petrol, the ’Super’ type, is sold at FCFA 630 while a liter of gas oil for diesel engine cars is sold at FCFA 575.

Meantime a liter of petrol or the equivalent of Super, by the roadside, is sold at FCFA 400 in Limbe. Elsewhere or in other towns, the price may witness a slight increase like in Douala. A liter of gasoil by the roadside, we gathered, sells at the same FCFA 400.

The prices, nonetheless, do sometimes fluctuate. But, according to those who buy it, the fuel bought by the street corners is comparatively cheaper; thus, the reason why they go for it.

Health and Environmental Risks

Some of the fuel stored in  households due to its strong smell, comes to add to other factors that cause indoor air pollution. According to a recent study on the effects of Air pollution on human health conducted by Clean Air Africa in collaboration with the Faculty of Medicine and Pharmaceutical Sciences of the University of Douala, Cameroonian households stand a chance of getting stroke, heart diseases, lung cancer, and chronic respiratory diseases as a result of air pollution.

Researcher, Professor Bertrand Mbatchou says air pollution in general kills an estimated seven million people worldwide every year. While transporting this fuel to depots, some of it pours on the soil which affects the production of crops in the area, Professor Mbatchou explained.

Despite regular updates on customs or other administrative authorities’ crackdown on illicit petroleum, there’s still a lot to be done especially at the borders, in order to stop the influx of illegal fuel which is playing down on the country’s economy.

By Francis Tim Mbom, Kiven Brenda and Patrick Bihel

This story has been done with the support of MUSEBA Journalism project

The post Illegal fuel trade is enriching Cameroon Security forces, Customs Officials As Government Is Losing Billions appeared first on The Museba Project.

A few pieces of smoked antelope, monkey, deer and porcupine lie strewn across the table. Ahanda has been selling such products for five years, supporting her husband in feeding the family and sending their children to school. But since the arrival of COVID-19, the bushmeat business has been in steady decline.

“COVID-19 has impoverished us!” she exclaims. “There are no clients. There is also no meat coming from the hunters.”

Cameroon’s first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in March 2020. By August 2021, the number of cases exceeded 82,000 with over 1,300 deaths. This devastating disease, whose origin has been linked to wildlife trade in China, has had both positive and negative impacts on efforts to restrict the bushmeat trade in Cameroon. While many people are eating less bushmeat now, for a variety of reasons, others are eating more, as they run out of other options.

Supply and demand

Bushmeat trade — the commercial hunting and selling of wild animals for food — has been rampant in Cameroon in recent years. Vast numbers of monkeys, gorillas, snakes, antelopes, crocodiles, pangolins and other animals have been hunted, smoked and openly sold to be eaten. The trade has thrived, despite laws that prohibit the harvesting and sale of such species. That’s because Cameroonians of all walks of life have bought bushmeat from wildlife markets. COVID-19 has changed the dynamics.

In places like Bertoua, both supply and demand are down. Philbert Takam, a commercial motorbike rider there, says people used to hire him to transport bushmeat from nearby villages to the market. But since the outbreak of COVID-19, such trips have been rare. “This used to be a major revenue stream for me,” he says. “But now I rarely transport bushmeat.”

Several interrelated factors are at play. Customers are going to markets less due to COVID-19 travel restrictions and high transport costs. Job losses and rising costs of staple foods have reduced household budgets. Meanwhile, the price of bushmeat has nearly doubled, according to one trader in Bertoua. With fewer people buying bushmeat, fewer professional hunters are entering the forest. And both hunters and consumers may now be frightened of handling or eating wild meat, having heard that the virus emerged in a wildlife market in China.

Josephine Ahanda confirms that fear is a factor. She says that before the outbreak of COVID-19, the bushmeat market was vibrant, with many women selling huge quantities of game. It was the centre of bushmeat trade in the area, she says. Many traders came from as far as Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé, some 338 kilometres away, to buy bushmeat to sell to people who cook it in restaurants or consume it at home.

“But now, look at my table,” she says. “There is no bushmeat for me to sell. Even when we bring meat to the market, people don’t buy, saying that they are afraid of COVID-19.”

Illegal trade

At a wooden shack a few metres away, Joseph Ndzanga* is drinking a local alcoholic brew with a couple of friends. Ndzanga is a bushmeat hunter. Between sips, he explains how the pandemic has affected his livelihood.

“I used to go to the bush sometimes four days a week,” he says. “But since the outbreak of COVID-19, I go hunting once or twice a week. There are some weeks I don’t even go hunting. Many people are not willing to eat bushmeat because of the COVID-19 scare.”

He adds that wildlife officials have recently stepped up their crackdown on hunters, like him, who do not have permits.

Cameroon’s 1994 wildlife and forestry law forbids the sale and trafficking of endangered species, with penalties ranging from fines of between 3 million francs CFA and 10 million francs CFA, or imprisonment from one to three years, or both. The law respects the rights of indigenous people to hunt wildlife for home consumption, and allows other people to hunt non-endangered species if they have a permit.

This ‘permit de collect’, as it is called in French, costs 25,000 FCFA (US$45) for three months and limits the number of animals a hunter can kill. The permit allows hunters to use the meat however they wish, but getting hold of one is not easy because of cumbersome bureaucracy.

“For years now, we have not been able to have the permit because of the bottlenecks involved in obtaining it,” says Ndzanga. He, like many other hunters, continues to operate illegally.

‘Suppliers are no longer coming’

With illicit trade rife, in 2010, the Minister of Forestry and Wildlife issued an order banning the transport of bushmeat for commercial purposes. Nonetheless, tons of bushmeat continued to reach markets every week. But since the outbreak of COVID-19, this flow has dwindled to a trickle.

“Because of COVID-19, the world was almost at a standstill,” says Eric Kaba Tah, deputy director of wildlife law enforcement organisation, the Last Great Ape Organization (LAGA). “So, it became very difficult to move some of these wildlife products around. However, in a few cases, we could still see people using tricks to circumvent the bushmeat restrictions.”

The effects can be seen in Nyom, a bushmeat trading hub in Yaoundé I sub-division, in the Centre region. A bar called Chez Ma Po, located at Entrée Lycee Nyom, is a popular bushmeat-eating joint. In the afternoon of June 20, 2021, in a kitchen behind the bar, four women are busy roasting bushmeat on an open fire or slicing chunks of it to prepare the bushmeat pepper soup delicacy. People used to come from far to eat bushmeat there. But few do now.

“Meat is no longer available as before,” says the owner, Ma Po. She says she could previously source up to 50 pieces of bushmeat a week, but now the supply has dropped to far below 15. “Hunters scarcely bring the meat as they did before. Bushmeat has also become more expensive. We are now forced to deal with middlemen, unlike before when we got bushmeat directly from hunters.”

Poaching and anti-poaching

The species being hunted and sold are also different these days, according to Ponka Ebénézer Poincaré, a Bertoua-based specialist in conservation and management of natural resources.

“The species available in markets are mostly rodents, which can easily be hunted with traps in close-by farms without going far into the forest,” he says. “Species such as chimpanzees, monkeys, pangolins, deer and gorillas, which hunters need to go far into the forest to harvest, are scarcely found in the markets nowadays.”

To some extent then, the pandemic has been a blessing for Cameroon’s wildlife as it has reduced hunting pressure and disrupted the established trade in bushmeat. But there are also signs that some rural communities are now relying more on bushmeat as COVID-related restrictions have led to job losses, declining incomes and rising food costs.

Ponka says another negative impact of the pandemic is that some wildlife officials at checkpoints on bushmeat routes, fearing COVID-19, are unwilling to approach vehicles they suspect are trafficking animals destined to be consumed as bushmeat.

Anne Ntongho, senior monitoring and evaluation officer of WWF Cameroon also says anti-poaching activities slowed down after the arrival of COVID-19. She says that with fewer people to monitor what is happening — thanks to COVID-19 restrictions and fear of the disease — poaching may have increased in some communities.

Norbert Sonne, the African Wildlife Foundation’s country director for Cameroon, agrees. “When the pandemic initially broke out, people started avoiding bushmeat consumption because COVID-19 was linked to human proximity to wildlife,” he says. “Cases of bushmeat seizures reduced. However, this was short-lived. The rates of bushmeat poaching are rising.”

Food shortages

Sonne says that government-imposed restrictions aimed at containing the virus led to food shortages, and that the resulting food insecurity has increased pressure on wildlife. He mentions anecdotal evidence that people living near Campo Ma’an National Park and Dja Faunal Reserve are increasingly turning to bushmeat to feed their families.

A hunter, who gives his name as Pierre Didier, attests to this. He lives in Lomié, a town in the Upper Nyong division of the East region. The town is in the immediate periphery of the Dja Faunal Reserve, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Pierre Didier is sitting on a wooden bench at the back of his house. On the ground in front of him are about ten freshly killed animals. They include deer, porcupines, antelopes, monkeys, and pangolins.

“We eat some smoked and others fresh,” he says, smiling broadly as he points at a nearby grill fashioned out of a metal drum. On the grill, below which firewood glows with a light flame, is an animal that Pierre Didier is smoking.

“I now go to the forest for hunting more than before,” he says. “Because of the COVID-19 pandemic and its accompanying travel restrictions and preventive measures, there have been slight increases in prices of foodstuffs such as flour, sugar, rice and fish, among others, in our locality. So, my family and I now rely more on bushmeat for our subsistence.”

Alternative livelihoods

Sonne says communities around protected areas need to be self-sufficient in terms of food, or else they will turn to unsustainable exploitation of natural resources to put food on the table. To address this, his organisation is helping communities in Faro, Campo and Dja to adopt alternative sustainable livelihoods, such as beekeeping, agroforestry and adding value to non-timber forest products.

“The integration of cash crops such as cocoa and rubber with food crops with short growing cycles helps to meet household nutritional needs,” he says.

Some hunters are finding out on their own that other livelihoods are possible. In the evening of Saturday June 5, 2021, Pierre Awana* is leaning on the doorframe of his wooden and thatch house in Batouri, in Cameroon’s East region. He has been hunting bushmeat for decades. Some is consumed by his small household and the rest is sold to generate income. But since the outbreak of COVID-19, he rarely enters the forest to hunt.

“Previously, hunting was the mainstay of my family,” he says. “If I go to the bush in search of bushmeat [now], it is mainly for consumption within my household and not for commercialisation. The bushmeat business has dropped.”

“As a means to raise income for my family because I can no longer hunt and commercialise bushmeat, I have resorted to pig and poultry farming,” says Awana. “After doing this for just a couple of months, I have come to realise that it may be more lucrative than hunting and selling bushmeat. What’s more, it prevents me from often coming into trouble with wildlife enforcement officers.”

Uncertain future

While Awana has found an alternative way of making a living, the women in the bushmeat market of Bertoua’s Mokolo II Denier Poteau neighbourhood are in despair.

“You see how we are sitting idle?” says Helene Owono*, breaking from a group of women chatting. “There is no meat to sell.”

“Our livelihoods have greatly been affected,” she says. “We used to make money to save in [social groups] and plan for the future. But we cannot do that now. Our incomes have dropped drastically.”

Owono explains that she recently travelled to Belabo, a town 80 km away, to buy bushmeat but came away with only three pieces, whereas she used to buy as many as 50. “The money I spent for transport to go there was in vain,” she says.

Another woman interjects: “Now if you can have five or six pieces of bushmeat to sell, you just have to thank God. We can’t even pay our children’s school fees anymore. We are praying day and night for things to change.”

Mixed feelings

As Cameroon continues to deal with and recover from COVID-19, the fates of these women and of the country’s beleaguered forest wildlife will depend on various factors, from law enforcement to alternative livelihood development, from hunting rates to rural food security. A big factor will be the tastes and desires of consumers.

“Because COVID-19 was linked also to bushmeat consumption, I want to believe that many people are afraid to eat bushmeat, which is a benefit for wildlife conservation,” says Anne Ntongho of WWF-Cameroon.

But at a bar in the Nsimeyong neighbourhood of Yaoundé, on an afternoon in June 2021, feelings are mixed. Frederick Mvondo, who is drinking a beer at the bar, says he stopped eating bushmeat after COVID-19 was linked to a market in China. James Che, however, is one of a few customers who are eating bushmeat pepper soup.

“I don’t care whatever people say about COVID-19 having originated from animals,” says Che. “I still eat it as much as I did before. Bushmeat, to me, is tastier than beef, pork or chicken.”

*Names changed to protect sources from reprisals

(Text and Pictures by Solomon Tembang)

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Il s’agit de treize journalistes en provenance de dix pays. Leur mission: pendant douze mois, mener des enquêtes journalistiques sur des fléaux comme la corruption, les failles juridiques, le flux des finances illicites, etc, qui  favorisent la déforestation en Amazonie, dans les forêts du Sud-Est et du bassin du Congo.

Ces boursiers sont affiliés à des organes de presse régionaux ou locaux dans lesquels leurs articles seront publiés.

The Museba Project, initiative régionale de formation et d’enquêtes en Afrique centrale, a été sélectionné à cet effet par le Centre Pulitzer pour accompagner le boursier Christian Locka, dans la production et la publication de ses reportages d’investigation.

A travers le RIN, le Centre Pulitzer dit vouloir « créer les conditions favorisant un journalisme d’investigation transfrontalier indispensable pour traiter de sujets situés au croisement du changement climatique, de la corruption et de la gouvernance », en mettant un accent sur la collaboration entre les boursiers et des techniques avancées d’extraction des données.

Les boursiers travaillant sur le bassin du Congo sont:

Christian Locka, Cameroun, The Museba project

Madeleine Nguenga, Cameroun, InfoCongo

Glòria Pallarès, Cameroun et RDC, El Pais.

The post Le Centre Pulitzer et The Museba Project s’associent pour enquêter sur les forêts du bassin du Congo appeared first on The Museba Project.

It is not that there was never any money to build one, though. An annual budgetary allocation to construct the needed roads was made to a contractor, a Mr Ndifor (1), starting from the early 2000’s. When I encountered the elusive Mr Ndifor at a party in Yaoundé, I asked him about it. Ndifor said he did not know the said villages. Reminded that he was supposed to have built roads through these very villages, the man laughed and said: “Oh, that. Don’t believe everything you read in the state budget.”

That meeting took place fourteen years ago, in 2005. Today there are no roads in the Obang area save for the old timber extraction sand roads that were always there. And since the timber companies, after depleting it, have stopped extracting wood from the forest, they are virtually impassable now.

You should not believe everything you read in the state budget

Ordinary citizens of Cameroon have spent the past four decades, all governed over by President Paul Biya, now 86, like this: seeing money pass by like mirages and rarely receiving any benefit of it. During the October 2018 presidential election campaign in Cameroon, in a TV debate, a panelist for an opposition candidate asked a Biya representative to name just one single development project that his government in its thirty-six years in power had completed successfully. Hard-pressed for an answer, the representative started harping on Biya’s long experience as a head of state without answering the question.

Even official reports note that state activities very often do not benefit the population. The 2016 report of the Regional Follow-up Commission for Public Investment Projects of the East Region (2) says that in 2015 alone, forty percent of all investment projects earmarked for the region were abandoned. They included road infrastructure projects, health facilities, classrooms, and water bore holes: all executed badly by those charged with managing them and, probably, most often also fleeced.

Reports on losses to corruption in the country differ wildly, from two million US$ in a five year period to one and a half billion US$ over the past decade. Deciding which one you go with depends for a large part on your definition of corruption: where does it start and stop? Outright theft from state contracts -such as roads- may happen in a part of the cases, but what about state salaries paid to nepotist appointments of incompetent individuals, massive perks and bonuses for ministers and high officials, subsidies for development NGOs and catering companies that happen to be run by friends and relatives of ruling party politicians? The Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) calculated last year that President Biya spends at least three US$ million every year on visits to Geneva, Switzerland, alone (3).

The anti-corruption commission CONAC does good work in unearthing fraudulent state expenditure on big projects. But the political powers-that-be decide if the identified culprits go to jail or whether the report in question is ignored. (More on this below.)

 Ghost farmers

This, then, is Cameroon as we know it: a country that could hardly ever build or maintain a road, hospital, school, bus route, agricultural or employment project without it being used for own gain by those close to power; that is, to Paul Biya. It is the country where in 1982, the year President Biya came to power, a new paper mill burned down two months after its opening after ‘experts’ without much expertise -their feasibility studies were never subjected to verification or peer review- had pocketed the equivalent of sixteen million US$ (4).

It is the country where the farmers’ loans bank Fonader went bankrupt in 1989 after having loaned most of the moneys to non-existent ‘ghost’ farmer accounts behind which hid friends and relatives of the managers (5); and where the grains development initiative Sodeblé closed its doors after barely producing only one twentieth of the 120,000 tonnes of corn per year the government had promised.

The downfall happened amid much muttering about how the outfit had “financed voyages, baptisms, marriages and various kinds of gifts for senior staff of the company as well as administrative officials of the region.” (6) Sodeblé never reopened; Cameroon still spends around three million US$ of its foreign reserves yearly on the importation of corn alone.

Sodeblé had financed voyages, baptisms, marriages and various kinds of gifts

Immunity

Under the pressure of donor countries an anti-corruption commission was established in the country in 2006. The investigations of the Anti-Corruption Commission of Cameroon, CONAC, have since led to some hard-hitting reports, incidental recovery of moneys and occasionally even to arrests and imprisonment of culprits. Most notably among these was a former Prime Minister, Ephraim Inoni, who was arrested in 2012 after having been implicated in decades of large scale embezzlement that had bankrupted the national airline Camair. (Ironically, Inoni himself had kickstarted the judicial anti-corruption drive – called Operation Sparrowhawk – to add to the work of the anti-corruption commission six years earlier).

However, Biya’s inner circle and favourites always seemed immune. A report by CONAC in 2011 (7) that accused then secretary general in the Prime Minister’s office Jules Doret Ndongo of complicity in double-invoicing the state for the construction of a road in the centre of the country – at an extra cost of thirty-one million US$ – was strongly contested by the Ministry of Public Works, which called it “false.” Its implications were ignored and Doret Ndongo is still a minister today. Likewise, nothing at all happened when current Minister of Finance Louis Motaze – in 2011, when he was Minister of Transport – overspent twelve million US$ state money on an inflated invoice for two Chinese airplanes, even after opposition MP Joshua Osih accused Motaze in parliament of diversion of the funds to benefit a ‘mafia.’

Nothing happened when the Minister of Transport overspent US$ 12 million

Media and opposition parties have denounced Cameroon’s corrupt systems and judicial favoritism for years. But, like CONAC, these are often also ignored, which is made easier because of the abundant amounts of fake news and ‘brown envelope’ journalism – the practice whereby hacks in the media accept money from powerful individuals to publish stories that favour these individuals and slander their rivals in the country. As a result, the system always remained the system: to advance in Cameroon, you simply had to maneuver yourself as close as you could get to any Biya government and ruling party official, hope for spoils, and start living the high life when your efforts paid off.

As former Minister of National Education, now one of Cameroon’s opposition party leaders, Adamu Ndam Njoya once put it: “We are yet to see the day that, when a Cameroonian is appointed to a high post of responsibility, they bend their heads down and cry due to the heavy responsibilities that go along with the post. On the contrary, people always organise feasts to celebrate appointments and this because the appointees and their families and close ones see in the appointments the opportunities to enrich themselves from the budgets allocated to positions to which they have been appointed. The bigger the budget, the bigger the festivities ».

The bigger the budget, the bigger the festivities

Very unpopular

Even when new enterprises were established with the explicit intention to put them on good management footing, often with outside help, it kept going wrong. In 2012, a new farmers’ loan scheme, Credit Agricole, suffered the same fate as the previous rural bank Fonader, even though it had been assisted by the German Investment and Development Corporation (DEG) and was managed by an equally German manager, Hubert Rauch. When it was liquidated, Credit Agricole was owing its customers the equivalent of US$ 314 million due to bad debts contracted mostly by ministers, general managers of state corporations and other senior government officials.

And though a source in the Ministry of Finance at the time roundly admitted that “big government and ruling party officials had borrowed large sums of money knowing they would never pay back” and that “manager Hubert Rauch was induced in error to grant (the) loans to several barons of the ruling party,” the downfall was blamed on one sole individual: the bank’s liquidator Frederick Ekande, a judicial expert and former Member of Parliament. Convicted of embezzling the equivalent of over and a half million US$, Ekande still languishes in jail.

The pattern again repeated itself when in 2011 a new airline was started to replace the bankrupt Camair. Even though two managers had already been jailed, and a Prime Minister was about to follow the same fate, for the “mismanagement, embezzlement, and excessive borrowing,” that had destroyed the previous airline enterprise, the practice by “ministers and general managers of state corporations (to) take their wives and girlfriends on jolly rides round the world without buying tickets (8)” simply started again in Camair-Co. Once again, also, there was “excessive recruitment” of workers “without necessary qualifications” who had been “brought in by the usual godfathers in high places (9).” All this happened again, even if there were now two Dutch new managers seconded to the enterprise with an explicit mission to put the airline on the right path.

They lasted less than two years. At his departure in 2012 the first Dutch manager, Alex van Elk told local press that his attempts to “streamline the recruitment process according to international norms” had been thwarted by senior government officials who had once again imposed “unskilled staff” on the company. Johannes Boertien, who had been Van Elk’s deputy and took over after the latters’ departure, lasted until September 2013 but then also left, saying that he had not been able to “put into practice his management roadmap.” A Cameroonian publication revealed that Boertien had become “very unpopular for solely appointing a commercial director for the corporation without the concern of the other board directors,” with the directors’ concern, presumably, for the individuals they had wanted to appoint (10).

Even a whole series of six public-private partnerships – called CARPA (Conseil d’Appui a la Realisation des Contrats de Partenariat) – that was, under the watchful eye of French development organisations and the World Bank, to create tramways, a hospital, an entire university city and rail transport network from 2013 onwards- delivered little besides, as one Cameroon news site called it in April his year, ‘flops.’ “Most of those charged with seeing to the realisation of the projects are not enthusiastic about them because (…) they don’t see the possibility of personal gains for themselves by way of kickbacks and bribes”, a senior official in the Ministry of the Economy, Planning and Regional Development said when asked to comment.

Palace wars

But as Paul Biya ages, some change finally seems to be on the horizon. What anti-corruption investigations, opposition parties and foreign development partners’ consultancies could not achieve, -an end to the Biya kleptocracy-, might now occur naturally as its founder is about to turn 87 years old. The problem is that no one can foresee what will replace it.

The supreme godfather started leaving the reins of Cameroon in the hands of a new generation in January this year. A new state minister, a confidante of Paul Biya’s wife Chantal called Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, started taking over the day to day work of governing. It set tongues wagging in Yaoundé. Was Ngoh Ngoh going to be a seamless successor, a new Biya? Or was he, as a close friend of Biya’s much younger wife Chantal (48) – the two even came from the same village in Cameroon’s Nanga Eboko community – actually part of a new faction about to take power away from Biya’s predominantly ethnic Bulu elite? And if there was such a new faction, what would that mean in terms of privileged access to state coffers and legal protection?

Chantal was holding Paul Biya’s hands and doing his waving for him

Simultaneous new appointments in the government seemed to confirm that Chantal Pulchérie Biya-Vigouroux – whose flaming red big hairdos have inspired the creation of entire websites – had her own designs on power. Not only was her old friend Ngoh Ngoh, now the most powerful minister in Cameroon, another four new ministers and high level bureaucrats had all previously worked, or still worked, with Chantal’s office, charity foundations, or church. Chantal had for some time been seen as a force ready to take over from her husband, an impression that was reinforced again when she, at a public event in May this year, appeared next to a very old and weak looking Paul, holding his hands and doing his waving for him.

The rumours were fueled by the pan-African francophone monthly Jeune Afrique, which, in February this year, wrote about Chantal’s rise. Not to be outdone, the pro-Biya newspaper l’Avocat then even printed a picture of Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh on its front pages headlining “a mafia out to conquer power.” In a tweet Chantal Biya angrily denied having any such designs and insisted that she remained only interested in charity work.

But then, yet another former Biya acolyte, veteran minister Laurent Esso – now minister of justice – was said to make a play for the succession. Many a Yaoundé palace watcher interpreted the increased public antics of Esso’s close associate, TV mogul Amougou Belinga, as a sign of the justice ministers’ participation in the race. When Belinga’s TV Channel Vision4 published ethnic hate speech (11) of a kind that could have meant a prison term under the country’s strict defamation laws, not only did Belinga get off scot free, but the head of the Communications Commission, Peter Essoka, was fined the equivalent of US$ 30, 000 after Belinga complained that he had ‘damaged’ him by comparing his TV station to the genocidal Radio Mil Collines in Rwanda.

Next, relatively lowly Vision4 reporter Parfait Ayissi was mysteriously released after having been arrested for the rape of a 14-year old. When, after his release, Ayissi repeatedly mocked the girl on TV with impunity, too, Yaoundé’s elites started asking themselves which powerful new godfathers they should now turn to for assistance and protection.

 A weakened hand

It was surely not so much Biya anymore. Because even individuals who had always been close to the president, had recently been rounded up by the police. Last year that fate already befell businessman Mohammadou Dabo, a big sponsor of the ruling party and a close associate of Biya himself. Though the fact that Dabo had pocketed an advance of over one million US$ to renovate Garoua airport in 2011 and had delivered nothing since had not bothered the justice system for seven years, Dabo was suddenly in and out of court for interrogation and could, according to a source at the Special Criminal Tribunal, soon be doing actual jail time for “deceit of associates, crookery, forgery of commercial and bank documents and embezzlement of public funds.” “All indications are that it is almost certain that he will not (remain) a free man for long,” the source, a senior lawyer in the office of the prosecutor at the Special Criminal Tribunal, said.

Suddenly even ‘sons’ of Biya were arrested

Then in January this year, even more shockingly, former Minister of Defence Edgar Alain Mebe Ngo’o was arrested for a corrupt arms procurement deal with French company MagForce (12). The contracts in question had been signed years ago, in 2010 and 2011, and French justice authorities -who had arrested MagForce counterparts in France- had pressured Cameroon to take action against him since at least 2014, but publications both in France and Cameroon had surmised that Mebe Ngo’o enjoyed so much protection that he would never face the law. The man was always very intimately connected to President Paul Biya after all; Yaoundé pundits and their radio trottoir even commonly refer to him as Biya’s illegitimate “son.”

The arrest in January therefore sent a shockwave through Cameroon. The pundits, quoted in many a newspaper and on radio, now said that “the faction” of Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh and Chantal Biya were “behind the arrest.”

And then it happened to yet another Biya ‘son’, too (13). This time the target was Gilbert Baongla, a politician who leads the opposition Republican Party. Baongla, who has gone around saying he is Biya’s son for years without being contradicted, had also always enjoyed protection. He seemed to have an extraordinary privilege when it came to speaking his mind wherever and whenever he wanted: he even once accused powerful minister Atanga Nji of corruption, conspiracy and ‘betraying the people’ on prime time TV without suffering any consequence.

But in early June Gilbert Baongla, too was arrested, after a complaint by none other than Justice Minister Esso’s close friend, TV boss Amougou Belinga, whom he had accused of smuggling and espionage (14).

A good looking road

Whether the succession struggle, with its weakening of the presidents’ iron grip on the state, will result in a better-run country remains doubtful. The judiciary under Esso seem to suffer as much from favouritism as always, and new minister of State Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh -he who is associated with the ‘Chantal faction’ – has already been implicated in disastrous construction contracts around the African Cup of Nations, as a result of which – simply because needed roads, hotels and stadia were never built Cameroon lost the opportunity to host the soccer event this year.

There have been signs, though, even if ever so faint, that civil servants – perhaps motivated by uncertainty around their positions and career paths, or, in contrast, perhaps finally enjoying space to focus on their actual jobs – have started to achieve better results than before. The Ayos-Abong Mbang-Bognis road, the focus of the 2010 double billing scandal, is actually looking well-maintained today. A recent set of roads scheduled to be completed last year in the usually neglected south-and north west of Cameroon, has been almost totally completed.

Even if in some cases the roads had once again come with a heavier price tag than they should have had, and a few were delayed due to armed action by militants who have taken up arms against the Yaoundé state, our team (15) found that almost all had indeed been built. What seems to have helped is the increasingly rigorous practice by donor organizations of withholding money until actual results are visible.

Another new development is the establishment by law enforcement agencies of toll free numbers through which citizens can denounce wrongdoings.

The old elite may spawn new kleptocratic factions

On the other hand, as the interregnum plays out, there is a real danger that the victorious candidate for Paul Biya’s succession may simply re-establish the kleptocracy in his -or her- own image. Another scenario is a prolonged fight between the factions for access to various troughs, which will risk fragmenting the entire state. If that happens, the military may feel justified to take power with the excuse of re-establishing law and order.

A first sign of such a possible scenario unfolding was the circulation in the media, early June, of a rather curious unsigned declaration purportedly from senior military officers which criticised the factional fighting between what it called the (ethnic) “Bulu clan” around Paul Biya and Chantal Biya’s “Nanga Eboko” community. In the letter, the anonymous military men threatened to intervene if the situation was not redressed pronto.

If that letter is authentic (which it may not be, because you never know in Cameroon), there is a third force building up within the military. And with Cameroon’s military riddled with embezzlement as well as human rights abuse scandals, this would undoubtedly be the worst case scenario. The international community might take note.

This story is part of « Public Disservice: How poor African countries waste billions », a transnational investigation by African Investigative Publishers Collective (AIPC).

References:

1. Name changed; he has since died and could therefore not be asked for comment.
2. For the Regional Report see: https://allafrica.com/stories/201602241006.html.
3. For the OCCRP investigation click here https://www. occrp.org/en/investigations/7653-paul-biya-cameroon-s-roaming-president.
4. According to an investigation done by a group of journalists (of which Chief Bisong Etahoben was part) at the time.
5. The takeover by the ‘elites’ of smallholdings previously formally subsidised by Fonader is documented here: http://www.cifor.org/publications/pdf_files/ WPapers/WPaper139Nkongho.pdf.
6. According to interviewed Sodeblé staff members at the time.
7. The affair is described by Franklin Tougwa on www. researchgate.net.
8. According to Camair sources and later also CamairCo sources who were interviewed at different occasions over time.
9. Idem
10. See https://cameroonpostline.com/cameroonianborn-mbotto-edimo-is-new-camair-co-gm/
11. The hate speech was directed against Cameroons’ anglophone population, who have long felt disadvantaged by the francophone elite in Yaoundé. During the rant, the senior commentator on Vision4 equated all anglophones to a small group of insurgents now active in the country’s north west region and called for action against “all the terrorists.” See: http://cameroonnewsagency.com/40-bitter-anglophone-journalists-petition-ncc-hate-speech-vision-4-journalist-anglophones/.
12. See for example https://www.jeuneafrique. com/748540/societe/soupcons-de-corruption-au-cameroun-les-enquetes-qui-touchent-mebe-ngoo-sepoursuivent/ (French).
13. Biya has, next to his official offspring, at least three such ‘illegitimate sons’: Minister of Finance Louis Motaze -he of the Chinese planes-is rumoured to be the third one.
14. See: http://natimesnews.com/yaoundenational-timesthe-purported-eldest-son-of-president-paul-biyageorges-gilbert-baongla-has-been-arrested-and-detained-at-the-yaounde-judicial-police/
15. The NGO Data Cameroon http://datacameroon.com/ helped to map a set of roads and then carry out the check on their completion.

The post EXCLUSIVE: The Godfathers who own the projects in Cameroon appeared first on The Museba Project.

“These pebbles will be crushed, sifted and if you have the chance, you can find gold but it is difficult,” says the 45-year-old widow who sometimes earns 1500 XAF, approximately $2.8, after several weeks of digging.

Around her, a hundred people noisily search the yellow metal in a chain work at the Kaye craft quarry in Ngoe Ngoe, a village in the region of East Cameroon. Men dig the earth, crush the gravel and dry the holes with a motor pump. Women collect gravel from muddy waters or prepare food in a makeshift kitchen. The children have fun on the back of their mothers or sleep on pieces of cloth spread on the ground.

In November 2017, Sidonie Maboue nearly lost her life when she went with other villagers to search for gold at a Chinese-owned site near Kaye. “As I ran to carry the earth, I heard the cries of the survivors returning from the site and the young people removed the corpses with shovels,” she says in a low voice. She says she takes these risks to feed her offspring. “If I do not do that, how are we going to live. Since the death of my husband, I am the father and mother of the house.”

Gold and death

That night, nine people who extracted the gravel in this quarry operated by a Chinese company called “Lu and Lang” were submerged by a heap 0f sand about ten meters high. “The Chinese have arrived with law enforcement to drive the villagers out of the mine sites to better exploit our resources,” Yaya Moussa, the village chief of Ngoe Ngoe, says, widening her small black eyes. “So the villagers were forced to come in the night, in the absence of the Chinese, to extract gold and find food for their families. It was during one of these nocturnal outings that the earth fell on them.”

As in Ngoe Ngoe, artisanal mining of gold through the use of manual methods and processes draws crowds in several localities in the Eastern Region. But, the vagueness in the allocation of mining authorizations often creates conflicts between local gold miners and expatriates. According to the Mining Code of 2001, only craftsmen of Cameroonian nationality are entitled to an artisanal exploitation permit. In recent months, this exclusivity is threatened by the presence in the artisanal sites of Chinese operators who practice semi-mechanized artisanal mining through the use of mechanical shovels and loaders, gravel washing machines and chemicals.

Semi-mechanized artisanal mining was conducted for the first time in Cameroon in 2007. In that year, the government had asked the South Korean company C&K Mining to conduct an operation to salvage some 13 tonnes of gold that was likely to be washed away by overflowing water from the Lom Pangar dam. The authorities knew that this decision violated the 2001 mining code, which does not recognize semi-mechanized artisanal mining. At the time, they  used the emergency situation as justification. Later, this act by the government was capitalized upon by some unscrupulous operators who started semi-mechanized artisanal mining of gold.

In December 2016 President Paul Biya promulgated a new mining code that recognizes semi-mechanized artisanal mining. However, this exploitation should be carried under Cameroonian law which states that the shareholding in the companies, should have nationals controlling  at least 51 per cent. This mining code could have helped to reduce the impact of the confusion around mining permits and the rehabilitation of mine holes. But, the decree implementing the new mining law is not yet signed by the Prime Minister.

When contacted, the regional delegate in charge of mines did not wish to comment. “The minister has launched a mapping campaign with drones to identify mining sites and operators pending the decree implementing the mining code,” said anonymously a director at the Ministry of Mines who said he was not allowed to speak to the press. “All the time we hear of reports of deaths in mining sites and, we do not know who is who.”

Meanwhile, semi-mechanized artisanal mining, although illegal, is already doing damage to Cameroon. In 2017, open and abandoned mining holes by operators of the semi-mechanized artisanal mine including Chinese left 50 people dead in the Ngoura, Betare Oya or Ngoe Ngoe communities in the East, according to NGO Forêts et Developpement Rural (Foder) calculations. This civil society organization reported that 250 mining sites opened between 2012 and 2014 have not been rehabilitated by operators of the semi-mechanized artisanal mine. It therefore, launched an online petition to get the Ministries of Mines and Environmental Protection to intervene.

In a video published by Foder on the dangers of illegal mining, a farmer tells how Chinese gold miners grabbed her land and destroyed her plantation with excavators. “The Chinese entered my field and started mining gold without my permission,” says Philiphine Boh. “The Chinese told me that it is the authorities that sent them and they will give me 70,000 XAF ($ 131.2) for compensation. I said that this money is insignificant for a field of one hectare that they spoiled. Currently, I have nothing left,” said this mother of five.

Secret deals

The losses are not just human lives. In Ngoe Ngoe, a village of 2,600 inhabitants, Chief Moussa says that during the exploitation of gold the Chinese have destroyed rivers and that many domestic animals have been stuck in abandoned mining holes. Mahamadou Abdoulaye, a 42-year-old registered miner, noted that, “when the Chinese saw a local mining artisan, a Nagbata, discovering gold, they chased everyone out of the site including the artisans who have their card while we also paid, it’s not good,” he complains. “The government must intervene because these Chinese are threatening us.”

The local populations are often surprised by the Chinese presence in the mining sites. They wonder how these expatriate operators were allowed to exploit the gold on their land. The Center for Education, Training and Support to Development Initiatives in Cameroon (Cefaid), an NGO based in Yokadouma in the Eastern Region, reports that some local elites are signing secret deals with Chinese miners.

“An elite is collecting photocopies of ID cards from villagers under the pretext of wanting to bring in companies that will provide water, electricity and jobs to the village,” said Victor Amougou, Cefaid’s coordinator, who  knows by heart the tricks these people use. “With ten photocopies, this elite can obtain 40 artisanal logging authorizations equivalent to 40 hectares of land. Later, the elite brings in the Chinese operator with whom he has a contract. The villagers who ate and drank are not aware of the deal and only notice the presence of the Chinese who have in the meantime offered envelopes to the mining authorities and military officials to be able to calmly carry out their activities.”

In addition to corruption, some Chinese in their greed for gold do not care about taxes. After the death of nine people in Ngoe Ngoe, some local NGOs and media reported that the site in which the tragedy occurred was operated by the Chinese company called “Lu and Lang”. Yet neither the reports of the local branch of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (ITEI) nor the tax services know the name of the company responsible. The local official in charge of mines in the East refused to comment on this accident, indicating that this file is being handled by his bosses. “This company is not registered in our books,” says a source at the Ministry of Mines. “No Chinese company has obtained a semi-mechanized artisanal gold mining license in Cameroon,” the source said.

In fact, this fictional company is the initiative of lady Lu, an economic operator of Chinese nationality, who did not wish to comment. After Ngoe Ngoe, she and her employees moved to Colomine, another mining town in eastern Cameroon, where they continued to mine gold at a site guarded by soldiers.

“The mining sector is a mafia,” concludes Victor Amougou. “This crime unfolding before our eyes does not benefit either Cameroon or Cameroonians, perhaps an elite who would have received 5 or 10 million XAF”.

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