Open Letter to President Paul Biya - the Southern Cameroons Peoples Organisation on the so-called...

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    His Excellency,President Paul Biya,Unity Palace,YaoundeRepublic of Cameroon

    Your Excellency Mr. President,

    Subject: YOUR PLAN TO CELEBRATE 1ST OCTOBER AS RE-UNIFICATION DAY

    The Southern Cameroons Peoples Organization (SCAPO) is a political Partyin Southern Cameroons working to end the annexation and foreign occupation ofSouthern Cameroons since 1961.

    Your plan to celebrate 1st October 2012 as Re-Unification Day and to do soin Buea capital of Southern Cameroons takes many people in Southern Cameroonby surprise. Many do not know the reason behind the elaborate plans about thiscelebration which has not happened in the last fifty years. Your answers to thefollowing questions will clear the air about this new plan for celebration in Buea:

    - Why do you want to celebrate an event that did not take place?

    - Why a celebration when your country voted at the United Nations in 1961that they did not want Union with Southern Cameroons?

    - Why this celebration after your government (for 50 years) carried out yearlyharassment and arrests of Southern Cameroonians on every 1st October forcelebrating their independence day?

    - Why do you call the event Re-Unification?

    -Why a celebration after evading the dialogue proposal made by the AfricanCommission to be held between your country and the State of SouthernCameroons?

    Permit us to draw your attention to the following:1) That you are planning to celebrate an event that did not take place. In 1961

    the people of Southern Cameroon voted in a UN plebiscite to join with theirbrothers in the Republic of Cameroon. After that plebiscite, instead ofengaging in negotiation in good faith for that union to succeed in accordancewith UN principles and Resolutions, YOUR Country chose the path ofannexation and today Southern Cameroon is two provinces of your Country

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    that was supposed to be a partner in a Federation of two States both equal instatus.

    2) Mr. President, you will recall that on April 21, 1961 when the UN proposedthat Southern Cameroon joins your country (UN Resolution 1608X Vparagraph 4b) your country joined the rest of French Speaking Africa to voteNO to that UN proposal and Resolution. Your country has since neverapologised to the people of Southern Cameroon for that position on Unionwith Southern Cameroons. Your Countrys U-turn after this stand AGAINSTUnion with Southern Cameroons can only be explained in the light of thesubsequent annexation of Southern Cameroon by your country in utterdisregard of mutually agreed terms for the union and in defiance ofinternational law.

    3) That for 51 years now your government has harassed arrested and detainedSouthern Cameroonians each year on 1st October for celebrating a daywhich was named by the Trusteeship Council of the United Nations asIndependence Day for Southern Cameroon. Your present U-turn is thereforesurprising (as surprising as the dramatic U-turn and ambivalence of theRepublic of Cameroon about union with Southern Cameroon in 1961 at theUN).

    4) It will be recalled that your predecessor Amadou Ahidjo told the 13th session

    of the U.N.O on 25th of February 1959, I should not like the firmness and clarity ofour stand to be interpreted as a desire for integration on my part which would sound thedeath knell to the hopes of our brothers in the zone under British Administration.

    We do not wish to bring the weight of our population to bear on our British brothers. Weare not annexationists.

    In other words, if our brothers of the British zone wish to unite with an independentCameroun, we are ready to discuss the matter with them, but we will discuss it on a footingof equality.

    So what happened afterwards that your country went back on thesedeclarations and used the weight of your population in 1972 to reverse thevote of the people of Southern Cameroons people for a Federal Union? Whathappened afterwards that your country became annexationists?

    5) Mr President, you and your predecessor have insisted that in theplebiscite in 1961 Southern Cameroons voted to join what you claim to be themother-country which historically was German Kamerun. You therefore call theevent RE-UNIFICATION. Unless this wrong information is calculated to achievesome hidden agenda, we are sure that your lawyers and historians would tell you

    that the United Nations plebiscite did not set out to reconstitute German Kamerunin 1961 and that Germany renounced all her overseas colonies at the end of worldwar I (Treaty of Versailles) . They would tell you that when the former UN Trust

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    Territory of French Cameroun achieved independence on January 1st 1960 therewas no statute at the UN or anywhere in the world appointing your new country assuccessor to German Kamerun. They would tell you that your country can rightlyclaim to be successor to the former UN Trust Territory of French Cameroun and notGerman Kamerun. Your theory of a mother-country and of Re-Unification are bothwrong and unacceptable because they are a threat to the stability of the entire sub-region because there are portions of German Kamerun in what is today Chad,Gabon, Congo, Central African Republic, and Nigeria. It is therefore unacceptablethat your countrys pro-consuls are erecting structures within Southern Cameroons calledRE-UNIFICATION MONUMENTS while you are planning a big Re-Unification celebrationon 1st October.

    6) Mr. President, in this letter we have referred to the people of the Republic of

    Cameroon as our brothers. We use these words responsibly and we mean

    what we say. The peoples of the Southern Cameroons and those of the

    Republic of Cameroon shared the same political and economic space for 50

    years and the relationship between individual families have become

    intertwined.

    Unfortunately, the people of Southern Cameroons have lived through situations

    which convince them that, even two twins from the same womb have to live

    separate lives. The people of Southern Cameroons are convinced that the union

    with la Rpublique du Cameroun failed a long time ago, indeed, it failed before it

    started. We do not see our future as part of the political system which has

    governed your country during the last 50 years.

    The people of Southern Cameroons did not vote in the Plebiscite to sell out

    themselves, their territory and their political status to become two Provinces of the

    Republic of Cameroon. That is the reason why they conducted a signature

    referendum in 1995. The response to that referendum was that they

    overwhelmingly want a peaceful separation. The plan of SCAPO as a Southern

    Cameroon Political Party is to ensure that there is a peaceful separation between

    the two Countries. This is the key reason why the people of Southern Cameroonshave just filed a case at the United Nations Security Council. This case gives the

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    Republic of Cameroon the opportunity of showing the legal basis of their presence

    in Southern Cameroons, and of justifying their annexation of a State that wassupposed to be a partner with them in a Federation of two States (both equal in

    Stations). But which, they chose to incorporate that state as two of their Provinces.

    We can learn from events elsewhere: When the people of Czechoslovakia realized

    that their union was not working, they voluntarily decided to separate their two

    peoples into two separate republics rather than to trigger another war in the middle

    of Europe. After 75 years, the leaders of the country agreed to peacefully dissolve

    their union into a Czech and Slovak Republics on January 1, 1993. The two

    countries are now doing very well as separate states. The proposal for dialogue

    between Southern Cameroon and the Republic of Cameroon has been made by

    the African Commission for Human and Peoples Rights, Banjul and before then by

    Mr. Kofi Annan the then Secretary General of the United Nations. Mr. President,

    we are surprise that you should brush aside these proposals for dialogue with

    Southern Cameroon and are planning a celebration.

    Your Excellency, in working to restore our statehood our purpose is to revive our

    own form of democracy in which change was possible. Before coming under

    annexation and the suppression of our Statehood the government of the Southern

    Cameroons conducted free-and-fair general elections in Southern Cameroons. Dr

    E.M.L. Endeley the then Prime Minister of the Southern Cameroons conceded

    defeat when Mr J.N.Foncha (Leader of the Opposition) was elected by the people.

    There was a peaceful change of government which is rare today in Africa where

    incumbents hang on and on to power claiming popularity but refusing to create

    credible Independent Electoral Commissions and where frequent electoral and

    post-electoral strife manifest across the continent. For fifty years under annexation

    we have become more than convinced that we need to restore our statehood and

    revive our cherished democratic values.

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    Finally Mr. President, we think that with our Statehood restored we will develop our

    country better. We recall that twice under annexation the government of theRepublic of Cameroon has opened the Kumba Mamfe road (once from the

    Mamfe end by your predecessor and at at another time by a high ranking Minister

    of Government from the Kumba end of the road) and that these events remain the

    exceptional cases in Cameroon when un-tarred roads were ceremonially opened

    and tapes cut. You yourself know how many times you have visited Bamenda and

    told the people that you will construct the Ring-Road and other times that you will

    personally supervise the construction of that road. Still, the construction of the Ring

    Road has never taken off and the last we heard concerning the Ring-Road was

    from a Minister of your government saying that the Ring-Road was not a priority for

    your government. So who is fooling who in all these or in the plan for a big

    celebration in Buea on 1st October 2012?

    FOR AND ON BEHALF OF THE SOUTHERN CAMEROONS PEOPLES

    ORGANIZATION

    DR. KELVIN NGWANG GUMNE MR.AUGUSTINE NDANGAM

    Copy to:

    The Secretary General of the United Nations.

    The President of the French Republic

    The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and NorthernIreland

    The President of the UN Security Council

    The Chairman of the African Union

    The Chairman of the Peace and Security Council of the African Union

    The President of the Commission of the African Union

    The Chairperson of the African Commission, Banjul

    The Executive Secretary, ECOWAS

    The Ambassador, United States Embassy, Yaound

    The Canadian High Commission Yaounde

    The Ambassador, French Embassy, Yaound

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    The British High Commission, Yaounde

    The Ambassador, Russian Embassy, Yaounde

    The Ambassador, Embassy of the Peoples Republic of China, Yaounde

    The Nigerian High Commission, Yaounde

    All Political Parties with Headquarters in Southern Cameroons

    All Political Parties of the Republic of Cameroon

    All Traditional Rulers of the Southern Cameroons

    All Deputies of Southern Cameroons Origin in the National Assembly of LaRpublique du Cameroun

    All Mayors of Southern Cameroons Local Government Areas.