Cameroon: Separatist fighters open fire on women, kidnap over 30 for protesting against exorbitant levies

By David Atangana

Scores of people – mostly elderly women – have been hospitalized, while over 30 others have been taken under custody in Kedjom Keku (Big Babanki), a village in the North West Region of Cameroon, by Separatists who opened fire and brutalized the women for protesting.

A woman was injured by a separatist bullet, as she joined other women to protest against a compulsory monthly levy the separatists instituted “to get the population to sponsor their activities.”

Based on the new levy, each family must pay at least 10,000 francs (16.45 USD) to the separatists monthly.

While men are expected to pay 10.000 francs, women have been taxed 5000 (8.23 USD) and children 500 francs (0.82 USD) each.

Unacceptable

On May 19, women of Big Babanki took to the street in protest against the levy. They said it was too heavy for them, considering the ongoing crisis in the English-speaking regions has made things very difficult for them.

To their dismay, their cry was rather met with brutality from the separatist fighters, most of who are natives of the village.

A source told MMI the fighters got the protesting women well beaten and shot one of them in the leg.

“This is what Amba boys are doing to our mothers. It happened in Big Babanki. They imposed that every household including women and children should contribute to support. The women took to the street to denounce such demands and were beaten and shot,” the source said.

“Most of them were rushed to Mbingo Baptist Hospital where they are battling for their lives – like the case of one woman who was shot in the leg and may have the leg amputated,” the source went on.

One of the injured victims could be heard lamenting in Babanki local language saying “I am not scared of death. The are free to do as it pleases them,” she said.

In a viral video circulating online, several women kidnapped by the Separatists after the protest are shown sitting on the ground. A voice in the video is heard telling the abducted women that they deserved to die for being black legs.

‘We need a military base’

The recent incident has added to the frustrations of Big Babanki inhabitants, who now say they need a military base in the village to help curb the separatist excesses.

This was not the first time they are being exploited and victimized by Ambazonia separatist fighters, who have been fighting, since 2017, to carve an independent state out of the North-west and South-west Regions of Cameroon.

“This nonsense has got to stop. We are almost pleading for a military base,” our source said.

He told MMI separatists have harassed and threatened the population in the past, asking them to donate foodstuff and money as “support for the struggle.”