Fourteen people, including women and children, have been killed in Cameroon’s Northwest, regional governor Lele Lafrique Tchoffo Deben Adolph has said.
The attack took place in a locality called Gidado, Mbandfung, in Ndu Municipality, located some 127 kilometres away from the regional capital, Bamenda.
According to the Mayor of Ndu, Abdou Kanfon Borno, it was carried out by armed separatist fighters who have been clamouring for a breakaway nation called Ambazonia in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions of Northwest and Southwest.
The governor said the tragic incident happened about 5:30 am local time on Wednesday, January 14, as attackers opened fire on homes, awakening some who were still sleeping.
“This resulted in the killing, in cold blood, of fourteen civilians, amongst them a 40-year-old man, six women, seven children between two and eleven years, 10 persons wounded, amongst them two children who are presently under medical care,” Said Governor Lele Lafrique.
The attackers, aside from killing, also destroyed houses, stole motorbikes and riddled the mosque and cows with bullets, officials say.
However, no separatist group has claimed responsibility. The victims are Fulanis, an ethnic group that constitutes a minority in the region.
The Mayor of Ndu, Abdou Kanfon Borno, has qualified the killings as “a genocide against the Fulani”, calling the attack reckless, illogical and ridiculous and saying it is very unlikely to achieve its objectives. “It’s disheartening to helplessly watch our civilian population perish before our very eyes in such a disturbing number under such a disturbing circumstance,” he stated.
Several Human Rights Organisations condemn the attack
The killings have drawn widespread condemnation across the national territory, with rights groups describing it as “despicable”.
Condemning the killings in Gidado, human rights lawyer and President of the Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa, Nkongho Felix Agbor, called on all armed actors in the English-speaking regions to respect the most basic principles of human rights and laws of war.
However, the regional governor has called for calm, reassuring the population that the defence and security forces are “conducting a diligent manhunt to track down and bring to justice the perpetrators”
126 Fulanis killed since 2018 in Donga Mantung Division
Wednesday’s attack was not the first against the Fulani community in Ndu. According to the Mbororo Social, Cultural and Development Association (MBOSCUDA), the number of Fulanis killed in Donga Matung Division, in which Ndu is a subdivision, has risen to 126 since 2018.
However, the tragedy comes barely six years after 21 people, including women and children, were also killed in Ngarbuh, still a village in Ndu Municipality.
The separatist conflict in Cameroon began in 2016 and escalated in 2017. The United Nations say more than six thousand people have been killed, while over a million displaced internally and externally.
