Stranded Cameroonian girls in Lebanon bemoan consulate’s ineptitude, stage protests

For several weeks, Cameroonian girls living and working in Lebanon have turned out massively at the Cameroon consulate demanding to be repatriated. The girls on several counts have been left frustrated by the consulate’s antics, making it impossible for them returning to Cameroon. The consulate is rather blaming the girls of haven mishandled the money donated by NGO’s to aid in their return to the country.

The girls say they need a need “permit” to be given to them from the consulate to enable them travel back to Cameroon without a passport. They say most of them ran away from their homes due to the maltreatment they received from their employers who equally won’t pay them their money.

“We came here to Lebanon to work on a contract basis. But while we fulfil our own part of the contract by working, we often do not get paid, we sometimes go for 3,4,5 months without our salaries. All they keep telling us is ‘there are no dollars to pay you’…”

laments a stranded girl in Lebanon.

They have maintained that the horrible conditions they were being subjected to forced them to escape their various houses more so without taking their passports. This has left them with no choice than to get travel documents from the Cameroonian foreign mission, to travel back to Cameroon without an international passport. 

The girls equally said that though an NGO has paid for a free flight for Cameroonians willing to return to the country, most of them would be willing to pay for their flights to return if they are provided the permit from the consulate.

“…Some of us here are even willing to pay for our own flights back home, though there is an organisation that has provided us with a free flight back to the country but they don’t want to give us the official Permits to travel back to the country”

decries one of the girls

“…They’ve squandered the money meant for that. We came here last week requesting for that and they told us to come back this week when they must have gotten a response from the General security. On coming this week, they had locked themselves inside the office and refused to open. There is no list, no Permits and no one to account for” she laments.

This has become the latest wave of agitations to return after a sour experience in the Middle East by Cameroonian girls. Some time ago in 2015, the agitations were felt stronger in Kuwait as many Cameroonian girls equally cried for a plea of repatriation after untold hardships in the Middle Eastern Country.  

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