A man popularly referred to as Mallam has succumbed to bullet wounds incurred in Muea, a vicinity in Buea, regional capital of Cameroon’s conflict-stricken South West Region.
Reports say Mallam, as he was called, had been shot days ago by suspected separatist fighters, and would later be snatched by the cold hands of death after all efforts by medics to save him proved futile.
An eyewitness tells MMI that Mallam was in a bar in Muea with a friend when armed separatist fighters stormed the location and began to harass the bar tender.
“Maybe the bar man was selling beer they had asked bars to stop selling or maybe he had gone against their rules,” a source suggests.
Being close to the tender, Mallam’s friend is said to have tried to intervene, but was shot by the armed men who then turned on him too.
“His friend said they would not take the barman away, so they shot the friend and then shot him too. The friend died instantly but he survived and was rushed to hospital,” narrates our source.
He adds that “the doctor said Mallam was to be operated upon in a week’s time which was today, but unfortunately he died yesterday Monday”.
Mallam’s death makes him one of thousands of civilians killed in the ongoing armed conflict in Cameroon’s Anglophone regions.
The war has been tagged by some humanitarian bodies as the world’s most neglected conflict.
Mimi Mefo Info