Buea Mayor Tells Bike Riders To Work On Ghost Town Days For Ban To Be Lifted

The Mayor of Buea, Patrick Ekema, in
a radio message, has promised that the
ban on commercial motorcycles in the
municipality would be lifted if the riders
would work during ghost town days, that
is, Mondays.

The call for ghost towns by
Ambazonia leaders was
adopted by the Anglophone
Southwest and Northwest Regions
as civil disobedience to the Government of the Republic of Cameroon in
the clamour for the independence of
former Southern Cameroons since
the Anglophone Crisis surged and
has been raging for two years
Municipal and administrative authorities have engaged both fair and
foul means to kill the ghost town phenomenon, but the people are ap-
parently using it as a means of getting back at the Government which
they say has failed to deliver.

The radio message, purporting to
lift the ban on Monday, November
19, has been animating debates
among riders and users of bendskin
services.

In a discussion among
bendskin riders who ply the streets of the Sandpit neighbourhood of
Buea, one said: “I don’t mind work-
ing on Mondays. But the question is;
will there be passengers? I am saying so because potential passengers
stay indoors on Mondays. However,
if there are passengers, I think we
should work because we have been
suffering for the two months that the
ban has lasted.”

Another said: “If we come out on
Monday and do not have passengers,
what should we do?

Another group of bendskin riders
in the Street 7 area were overheard
discussing the ban and the Mayor’s
terms. One lamented that he has
four children, all of them going to
school.
“How does he think I am feeding
my wife and four children? How do I
feed our six mouths? That is my only
source of income. In fact, I have suffered a lot within these two months
of the ban.
“The Ambazonian leaders should
stop punishing us. How do they
think we’re living without working
for the past two months,” one asked?
Another retorted: “It is the Mayor and the DO that banned bendskins in Buea, not the Amba boys. The Mayor and the DO like other Government authorities think it is the bendskins who are fighting against
the Government. But since they
banned bendskin movement, why
has the fight not stopped. They should try to think before taking very harsh decisions.”

Bendskinservices were banned
prior to the October 7 election, when the DO announced, what he termed,the imminent visit of the Head of State to Buea for election campaign. Inhabitants of Buea distant neighbourhoods,who use bendskins
to and from work or business in the
urban centre,say they have been suffering since the ban was slammed on
commercial motorbikes. They pray
that the service should resume.

On Monday, November 19, when
the bendskin riders were expected to
resume services, none of them was
found at their usual stops.

Apparently, they have not yielded to the Mayor’s condition of lifting the ban provided they work on Mondays (ghost town day), or yielded to the warning by Ambazonia leaders requesting a total lockdown of towns and villages in the former Southern Cameroons territory, beginning that
Monday through the entire week, but which was later restricted to that Monday.

Yet, as at the next day, Tuesday, November 20, the bendskins had not working. They and their families are suffering because that is their only
livelihood, and the population that uses their services is suffering.

MMI