CI-NEWS

Gov’t counters Kah Walla ‘revolution’: Marie-Therese Abena Ondoua, women’s affairs minister, organiz

2020-09-07

No: 529

Gov’t counters Kah Walla ‘revolution’: Marie-Therese Abena Ondoua, women’s affairs minister, organizes protest in black in Yaounde after ‘Stand up for Cameroon’ led a similar one in Douala last Friday.

In what was seen as move to water down a largely successful demonstration by the Kah Walla-led ‘Stand up for Cameroon’ group in Douala last Friday calling for a ceasefire in the North West and South West regions, the Cameroon government joined the fray last Tuesday, for another reason .

More than 200 women, all dressed in black, rallied on Tuesday in Cameroon's capital Yaounde to denounce violence against women in the country's English-speaking regions that have been ravaged by a separatist conflict since 2017.

Beheadings, mutilations, murders and all forms of violence against women in the regions must stop, said Marie-Therese Abena Ondoa, Cameroon's Minister of Women Empowerment and Family, who organized the protest.

"We have had enough. Attacks on women and children need to stop. We need peace and stability in the regions," Ondoa told reporters.

Protesters said women should feel safe and protected all over the country and demanded that gunmen lay down arms "to give peace a chance."

Criminal violences against women in the restive regions have grabbed headlines across Cameroon in recent months.

In August, there was outrage in the country after suspected armed separatists in Muyuka, a locality in the troubled region of Southwest kidnapped, brutalised, killed and then beheaded a mother of three whom they accused of conniving with government forces to leak their hideouts.

The Yaounde march was seen as intended to counter a vast movement led by CPP leader, Kah Walla, that has been making headline news for sometime. For several months now, the group ‘Stand up for Cameroon’ has been leading protests on Fridays, dressed in black.

Among other issues, the movement has been calling for a ceasefire in the North West and South West regions.

The protest this past weekend saw them accompanied by the group “Mothers of the nation”.

Speaking on Equinox TV, Kah Wallah, one of the key leaders of the group, raised concerns over the recent decision limiting the purchase of machetes in the North West and South West regions.

“You the government, you say you are stopping people from buying a cutlass but you have a DDR program where you see that those who have held the gun, who have kidnapped, who maybe have killed people. All they need to do maybe is come and put down their gun and you will accompany them to reinsert themselves in society. Still, the same government, you are holding in prison people who never held a gun, who never committed any act of violence.”

The government’s stance, she added, is more confusing as it “refused to dialogue with the community but now you want to take away their tools for doing their farming.”

Last Friday’s protest saw a huge mobilisation, as the protest remained peaceful as in past weeks.

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Gov’t counters Kah Walla ‘revolution’: Marie-Therese Abena Ondoua, women’s affairs minister, organiz