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Obala: Bishop Sosthène Leopold Bayemi will be cleared of harassment charges

24/08/2025

His Lordship Bishop Sosthène Leopold Bayemi of the Obala Diocese is reportedly implicated in a sex scandal by a dodgy Francophone so-called whistleblower. An audio recording circulating on social media accuses the Roman Catholic cleric of sexual harassment.

Our senior correspondent in Yaoundé the nation’s capital reported late today that the Bishop of Obala will be cleared of charges of sexual harassment soonest and that the Diocese of Obala will emerge stronger and united.

“Bishop Sosthène Leopold Bayemi will be acquitted of making sexual advances against members of his community as alleged by a person operating deep within a political space in Yaoundé” Rita Akana said.

Rita Akana pointed out that the Roman Catholic Church in the Centre and South regions has been standing shoulder to shoulder with the corrupt ruling CPDM party and that Bishop Sosthène Leopold Bayemi is simply paying the price of trying to maintain the status quo.

“The Vatican is very much aware that the Roman Catholic Church in Cameroon does not have kissing and hugging issues! let alone porn videos,” Rita Akana furthered.

Bishop Sosthène Leopold Bayemi is heading a very poor diocese in the outskirts of Yaoundé that relies on financial donations coming mainly from senior political elites running state affairs in Yaoundé.

The allegations, reported by N’zui Manto, are causing uproar in the Christian community, especially as the bishop was among those at the Unity Palace to support the 93 year old President Paul Biya for the October presidential election.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Pentagon fires intelligence agency chief after Iran attack assessment

24/08/2025

US defence secretary Pete Hegseth has fired the Pentagon’s intelligence agency chief, just weeks after a White House rebuke of a review assessing the impact of American strikes on Iran.

Lt Gen Jeffery Kruse will no longer serve as head of US Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA), the Pentagon said in a statement. Two other senior military commanders have also been ousted by the Pentagon.

The defence department has not offered any immediate explanation on the firings.

In June, President Donald Trump had pushed back strongly on a leaked DIA report that found that attacks on Iran had set back its nuclear programme by months only. The White House declared the agency’s assessment “flat out wrong”.

Trump had declared the nuclear sites in Iran “completely destroyed”, and had accused the media of “an attempt to demean one of the most successful military strikes in history”.

Speaking at the Nato summit at the time, Hegseth had said that the report was made on “low intelligence” and that the FBI was probing the leak.

Kruse’s exit was first reported by the Washington Post.

The DIA is part of the Pentagon and specialises in military intelligence to support operations. It collects large amounts of technical intelligence, but is distinct from other agencies like the CIA.

It is understood that Hegseth had also ordered the removal of the chief of US Naval reserves and the commander of Naval Special Warfare Command, an anonymous source told Reuters on Friday.

In a statement, US Senator Mark Warner warned that Kruse’s sacking was a sign that Trump had a “dangerous habit of treating intelligence as a loyalty test rather than a safeguard for our country”.

Trump has removed a number of officials whose analysis have been seen to be at odds with the president.

In July, Trump said that he had ordered his team to dismiss Commissioner of Labor Statistics Erika McEntarfer “immediately”, after a report showed that job growth had slowed.

And in April, Trump fired General Timothy Haugh as director of the National Security Agency, along with more than a dozen staff at the White House national security council.

Hegseth has also pushed out a number of military officials at the Pentagon. In February, he fired Air Force General C Q Brown, who was dismissed along with five other admirals and generals.

Source: BBC

Biya seeks CFA930 billion loan for projects and unpaid state bills

20/08/2025

President Paul Biya of Cameroon signed yesterday a decree authorizing Finance Minister Louis Paul Motazé to borrow CFA930 billion from both domestic and international capital markets.

CFA350 billion of the total will be raised on the local market. This will be done either through Treasury bonds issued on the Central Africa Stock Exchange (BVMAC), or through Fungible Treasury bonds on the BEAC public securities market, or through both.

Another CFA250 billion will be secured through direct loans from domestic private institutions. In addition, CFA330 billion will be borrowed from international banking markets. The funds will finance development projects and clear pending Treasury bills that have been unpaid for about three months, commonly known as arrears (RAP).

The CFA330 billion in foreign loans will bring Cameroon’s total financing raised since the start of 2025 to CFA530 billion for arrears settlement. In May 2025, President Biya had already approved an international loan of CFA200 billion to support 2025 Treasury operations.

The growing stock of arrears, estimated by the National Sinking Fund (CAA) at CFA485.4 billion by the end of June 2025, has raised concerns for both the government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), as it undermines the cash flow of businesses working with the state. Under its 2021-2025 economic program with Cameroon, the IMF has urged the government to use capital markets to pay down arrears.

In July 2024, the government borrowed CFA323.9 billion from U.S.-based Citi Group for this purpose. In total, the government is authorized to raise CFA530 billion on international markets in 2025 to reduce arrears.

The new CFA930 billion borrowing plan will add to Cameroon’s public debt. The CAA reported that state debt stood at CFA14,105 billion at the end of June 2025, a 1.8% increase year-on-year. It added that this remains consistent with the medium-term debt strategy for 2025-2027, which sets a sustainability ceiling at 50% of GDP, compared to the 70% benchmark allowed at the regional level.

Source: Business in Cameroon

Biya regime seeks CFA165bn aid to rebuild Douala-Yaoundé road

18/08/2025

The Cameroonian government has asked the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) for CFA165 billion to rehabilitate the Douala-Yaoundé road, a 214.1-kilometer section of National Highway No. 3. The request, dated July 22, 2025, was signed by Minister of Economy Alamine Ousmane Mey.

This key route links Douala and Yaoundé, the country’s two largest cities. It handles heavy and growing traffic but is now in poor condition, requiring major reconstruction. Planned works include reinforcing the pavement, widening certain sections, building alternative lanes, and constructing junctions and interchanges. The project also calls for new road signs, lighting, and other safety measures.

The rehabilitation is part of the National Infrastructure Development Program (PNDI) and Cameroon’s emergence strategy. Alongside the IsDB, the World Bank and the French Development Agency (AFD) are potential co-financiers, along with other technical and financial partners.

The Douala-Yaoundé road plays a critical role in subregional trade by connecting the Douala-N’Djamena and Douala-Bangui corridors. It is a key link for moving goods from the port of Douala to Chad and the Central African Republic.

Upgrading the road is expected to ease traffic flow, lower logistics costs, cut accident rates, and boost economic activity. In the long term, it should give road users better access to services, business opportunities, and regional markets.

Source: Business in Cameroon

Suspected French spy arrested in alleged Mali coup plot

15/08/2025

Mali’s military rulers say they have arrested a French national on suspicion of spying for his country in an attempt to destabilise the African nation.

In a statement read on national television late on Thursday, the junta alleged that Yann Vezilier was working “on behalf of the French intelligence service”. Mr Vezilier is yet to comment on the accusation.

His picture was also broadcast, alongside those of a number of army generals arrested recently for allegedly planning to overthrow the military government.

“The conspiracy has been foiled with the arrests of those involved,” Mali’s Security Minister Gen Daoud Aly Mohammedine said in the televised address.

France, Mali’s former colonial ruler, is also yet to comment on the man’s arrest and allegations of destabilisation.

The West African nation has been gripped by a security crisis fuelled by an Islamist insurgency since 2012 – one of the reasons given for the military takeover but attacks by jihadist groups have continued and even increased.

Following days of speculation about the alleged coup plot, Gen Mohammedine confirmed that “fringe elements of the Malian armed security forces” had been detained for seeking to “destabilise the institutions of the republic”.

“These soldiers and civilians” were said to have obtained “the help of foreign states”, the minister said.

The French national acted “on behalf of the French intelligence service, which mobilised political leaders, civil society actors and military personnel” in Mali, the minister added.

He also confirmed the arrest of two army generals, including Gen Abass Dembele, the former governor of the Mopti region, who was recently dismissed from his position.

At least 55 soldiers have been arrested so far in connection with the alleged attempted coup, security sources told AFP.

Gen Mohammedine said a full investigation was under way to identify “possible accomplices” and that “the situation is completely under control”.

Political tension has been rising in recent weeks, which have seen the arrest of former Prime Ministers Moussa Mara and Choguel Maïga over accusations of harming the reputation of the state and embezzlement.

Mara, a recent outspoken critic of the military government, has been in detention since 1 August, while Maïga is facing judicial sanctions.

In May, the junta dissolved all political parties following rare anti-government protests, which Mara described as a severe blow to reconciliation efforts initiated by the military leaders last year.

Junta leader Gen Asimi Goïta, who seized power in both 2020 and 2021, had promised elections last year, but these have never been held.

In July, the transition period was extended by five years, clearing him to continue leading the country until at least 2030.

Alongside its neighbours Niger and Burkina Faso, it has enlisted the help of Russian allies to contain the jihadist attacks in the region after breaking ties with France – but there has been no significant improvements in security.

Source: BBC

Rome: Philémon Yang meets Pope Leo XIV

14/08/2025

Pope Leo XIV received Philémon Yang, the president of the UN General Assembly, on August 11, as his one-year presidential term nears its completion. Neither the Vatican nor the United Nations issued a statement on the topics of the conversation.

The president of the UN General Assembly, elected by his peers, chairs the meetings of the body. Shortly after Pope Francis’s death, Yang, a Cameroonian diplomat, paid tribute to the late Pontiff as “a moral voice and a global conscience. With humility and courage, he championed the dignity of the marginalized, the poor and the voiceless.”

Source: Catholic World News

Macron admits France’s ‘repressive violence’ in Cameroon during decolonisation

12/08/2025

Macron has acknowledged that France waged a “war” in Cameroon during and after the African country’s decolonisation in the late 1950s, marked by “repressive violence”, in a letter published Tuesday.

The letter, sent to his Cameroonian counterpart last month, follows an officially commissioned report, published in January, which said that France implemented mass forced displacement, pushed hundreds of thousands of Cameroonians into internment camps and supported brutal militias to squash the central African country’s push for sovereignty.

The historical commission, the creation of which had been announced by Macron during a 2022 trip to Yaounde, examined France’s role leading up to when Cameroon gained independence from France on January 1, 1960, but also during the subsequent years.

“The historians of the commission made it very clear that there was a war in Cameroon, during which the colonial authorities and the French army carried out repressive violence of several kinds in certain parts of the country in a war that continued after 1960 when France supported the actions carried out by the independent Cameroon authorities,” Macron said in the letter to Cameroonian President Paul Biya, published by the French presidency.

“It is incumbent on me today to accept France’s role and responsibility in these events,” he said.

Source: AFP

Nyene Mawn: Key takeaways and talking points from Paris 2025

11/08/2025

The Manyu Women’s International Organisation (Nyene Mawn) members gathered in Paris over the weekend for the association’s second annual residential convention. Chi Prudence and Soter Agbaw-Ebai report

The sun in Paris was shining, the good weather added to a sense of optimism for a Manyu women’s group that was clearly on the brink of collapse.

Despite social media negativity orchestrated by some rogue elements against Nyene Mawn, the mood in the French capital was du jamais vu indicating that Nyene Mawn queens had move away from the nasty past and the embarrassing so-called conference of presidents’ scandal which had attempted to destroy the Nyene Mawn brand.

Here are the key talking points from the Nyene Mawn Residential Convention

The President-General Dr Mrs Patience Abangma promised the Nyene Mawn queens that she was going to step down and usher in the new generation. This is after she repaired the financial damage caused by the disgraced suspended seven.

Dr Patience Abangma did not need to put a positive spin on her speech to get the Nyene Mawn queens smiling and sharing tears of joy as much as she was.

Delegates from all over the world were in great spirit at the respective meetings that started on Friday and ended Sunday evening.

Nyene Mawn is riding high with their favourite slogan: Nyene Mawn leads, others follow.

This time last year, Nyene Mawn queens crammed into a dour, stuffy hall in the middle of the afternoon in Brussels to discuss their progress and their plans for the future. The atmosphere among Nyene Mawn queens in Brussels that day might be described as quietly confident. If the sense that day was of a Manyu women association on the rise, then Paris 2025, in its glitzier environs, was that of a Nyene Mawn whose time had come.

When the convention started in Paris Noisy Le Sec, Nyene Mawn announced a new interim body headed by Queen Maureen Tabe as President-General, which aims to speed up development deep within the association while Dr Patience Abangma used her speech to promise the women of her complete and total support for the new governing body.

Nyene Mawn queens thanked their out gone President-General Dr Patience Abangma for sustaining the Nyene Mawn cause, the association, the argument against a vicious campaign of blackmail. “Mami Abangma didn’t just win for herself, she won for all the Nyene Mawn queens”, Chief Stella Ntui Arhewoh from the Federal Republic of Nigeria who also moonlights as Second Vice President said, describing how Dr Patience Abangma had challenged attempts aimed at destroying the image of the Manyu Women’s International Association.

Speaking exclusively to Cameroon Concord News, Nyene Mawn’s new strong woman Lady Maureen Tabe said “We’re not going to screw Mami Abangma’s legacy up; we’re going to make sure that we use her leadership style and use our majority following to transform Nyene Mawn and attract quality membership not quantity.”

Whether Nyene Mawn achieves its goals for the female child in Manyu Division in Cameroon remains to be seen. But what’s clear from Paris 2025 is that Nyene Mawn queens are now strong and growing in confidence.

At the gala night on Saturday evening animated by renowned Manyu artist Etando Moh Manyu, Soter Agbaw-Ebai caught up with the President General Maureen Tabe and pressed the new leader on a range of Nyene Mawn matters, including plans to recover the embezzled funds, the indefinite suspension of the dodgy seven and also the key issue of developmental projects back home.

According to Soter Agbaw-Ebai, Nyene Mawn’s new leader was able to provide strong assurance on the issues, and a discussion with our editor showed that Nyene Mawn finally emerged stronger and united than expected.

“I’ll put my hands up any day, any time and say I was one of the Nyene Mawn queens who fought tooth and nail to preserve the image of the Manyu Women’s International Association,” Queen Regina AyukEtah, First Vice President from the Kingdom of Belgium said, explaining that Paris 2025 has given birth to a new spirit in Nyene Mawn.

Inside business day at the Nyene Mawn Residential Convention

Lady Collect Tambeagbor, Nyene Mawn’s Communication Secretary predictably, spoke about getting Nyene Mawn building bridges with other Manyu women groups both at home and abroad.

Another issue that did not receive a clear answer from delegates was why Nyene Mawn decided to suspend the seven members indefinitely instead of the agreed dismissal as recommended by the general assembly.

Lady Priscillia Morand, the new Secretary General of Nyene Mawn spoke in strong terms about the importance of moving the association forward, explaining that Nyene Mawn should not be over reliant on its members in Europe but needed to tap into the Nyene Mawn worldwide diversity.

Support for the girl child in Manyu was also a theme in the residential convention discourse during the AGM, which saw a huge number of Nyene Mawn queens come together. Speaker after speaker gave barnstorming speeches at the AGM.

Many in Paris called for Nyene Mawn to empower its chapters in Cameroon if it wanted to fulfil its pledge to ensure growth across Manyu Division, and recognise this would not happen without transformative investment on the girl child project.

Conveniently, Nyene Mawn is currently trying to rebuild again on its image and finances.

Cameroon concludes AI training for indigenous people

11/08/2025

Cameroon on Saturday concluded a weeklong training for indigenous people in artificial intelligence (AI) as part of activities to mark the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples.

Minister of Social Affairs Pauline Irene Nguene said the Central African nation is working to ensure that indigenous people benefit from the opportunities provided by the advent of AI.

“Indigenous people should not be left out in the changing world. It is their right to learn and apply AI. That is why this training contributes to the fight against social exclusion,” Nguene said in Yaoundé, the country’s capital, while awarding certificates at the end of the training.

Efforts are underway to establish a tiered AI education system to guide indigenous people in rural areas from foundational cognitive awareness to practical technological innovation, according to Cameroonian officials.

The International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples is commemorated annually on Aug. 9, with this year’s theme being “Indigenous Peoples and AI: Defending Rights, Shaping Futures.”

Source: Xinhuanet

Six dead in Kenya medical small plane crash

08/08/2025

Six people have been killed after a light aircraft belonging to a medical charity crashed in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, according to a local official.

Charity Amref Flying Doctors said the Cessna plane took off from Wilson airport on Thursday afternoon and was en route to Hargeisa in Somalia when it crashed and burst into flames at a residential building in Nairobi’s Githurai area.

Kiambu County Commissioner Henry Wafula said four people on the plane were killed, including doctors, nurses and the pilot – as well as another two people on the ground, while two others were seriously injured.

Investigators have been despatched to the scene of the crash to establish its cause.

The plane lost both radio and radar contact with air traffic control just three minutes after take off, the Kenya Civil Aviation Authority said.

There were four crew and Amref staff on board, the charity said.

“At this time, we are cooperating fully with relevant aviation authorities and emergency response teams to establish the facts surrounding the situation,” Amref CEO Stephen Gitau said in a statement.

The Kenya Defence Forces and the National Police Service have been deployed to the scene to conduct search and recovery operations.

Patricia Kombo, an eyewitness, told the BBC that she was in a cab with her friends heading to Githurai when they heard a loud bang and a red flash ahead of them.

“Before I could take my phone to record the flash was gone and smoke was billowing. We then heard people screaming and running and so we ended our trip.

“We then discovered it was a plane crash and saw the sunken hole the crash had created in the ground,” she said.

In a separate incident, a train and a bus collided at a railway crossing near Naivasha town, central Kenya, killing at least four people, according to Reuters news agency citing a Red Cross worker.

The Kenya Pipeline Company, whose bus was involved in the incident, said it was carrying staff finishing their morning shift at one of its training centres and that all injured staff had been taken to hospital for treatment.

Source: BBC

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