Justice Denied: The Flaws in AKA’s Military Trial

The following is a a verbatim quote from the Lead Counsel to Abdul Karim Ali, who [AKA] was recently sentence to life by a military tribunal in La République du Cameroun, in absentia. Barrister Fru outlines some of the procedural short-comings:

The case against Abdul Karim Ali – AKA, like the thousand others against the APOCs, is procedurally and substantively flawed.

Procedurally AKA was abducted and kidnapped. He was not arrested pursuant to the procedures of the Criminal Procedure Code in cameroun. There was no arrest warrant or probable cause for his arrest. He was never caught flagrant delicto. He was held under inhumane conditions, in communicado, for several days – devoid of counsel and family.

AKA was charged under a terrorism law of 2014 that had been chastised by international jurists, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, as overbroad and a dragnet against fundamental freedoms and liberties.

AKA was charged with secession with no proof of any document proving:
1) that there is a union treaty/agreement/contract or document between the Trust Territory of British Southern Caneroons and La République du Cameroun; and
2) that AKA signed or was an accomplice in signing any document abrogating or violating the supposed Union Treaty or Agreement.

If anything AKA is being persecuted for his thoughts, political opinions, nationality and membership in a particular social group of citizens of the Former British Trust Territory of Southern Cameroons advocating for the sacrosanct right of self determination. Proof of this is ocular in the confrontations that arose during AKA’s numerous interrogations, almost exclusively without Counsel, in which AKA’s conversations with accredited Diplomats and Human Rights Advocates were targets – if these conversations were criminal as insinuated, how come these named Diplomats were not subpoenaed for direct testimony and open to cross examination, at AKA’s in absentia trial?

AKA was tried and condemned in absentia, as a civilian, in a military tribunal against all international instruments forbidding the trial of regular civilians in military tribunals.

AKA, in a letter to the President of the Military Tribunal, in Yaoundé, dated May 24, 2024, refused to surrender himself to the military tribunal, as a subset of the jurisdiction of La République du Cameroun, over his Southern Caneroons nationality and citizenship. His legal thrust argument is that since there is no Union Treaty or Agreement between La République du Cameroun and Southern Caneroons and since the physical boundaries of La République du Cameroun were Frozen at midnight on December 31, 1959, pursuant to the Addis Declaration of 1964 establishing the boundaries of African States, La République du Cameroun’s presence in Southern Caneroons is annexationist and illegal.

Pursuant even to the nationality laws of La République du Cameroun, once AKA raised the issue of his nationality, the military tribunal was supposed, even by its own motion, to decline jurisdiction, and refer the matter to the locality of AKA’s claimed birth place. This was was not done.

This is a miscarriage and travesty of justice. As his Counsel, we must decry it in the loudest terms.

We have appealed the decision and it is our hope that AKA’s legal foundations will set the grounds not only to redress this manifest injustice but open the door to the necessary political actions that need to occur for a just and sustainable resolution to the war that is at the basis of AKA’s prosecution and persecution.

Joseph Awah Fru, Esquire
Lead Counsel for AKA and APOC.

Understanding the Ambazonian Independence Pact of 2025

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The Leaders Summit

It is no longer news that Ambazonian Leaders have met and signed the Indepdence Pact of Easter 2025.

In this post, Ambazonia News attempts to fill in the gaps and answer some questions.

As usual, we welcome more insights from more informed sources.

Origins

The Consultative Commission is the old Coordination Team which come to life immediately in the mele of initiatives for conferences post the [predictable] collapse of the Canadian Pre-Talks. The collapse was when La République du Cameroun publicly berated Global Affairs Canada, in effect calling, its boss and Canada’s foreign Minister equivalent … names. La République du Cameroun’s actions were entirely predictable because they have no negotiating position, even if they had “anyone at home” and, secondly, because one of their strategies is to out-wait the Ambazonian Liberation Struggle. The have done this through many schemes designed mainly to time-waste, playing for time in the hope that the momentum of the Ambazonian Liberation would diminish. That is why their response to Melanie Joly, for she was the GAC boss who first disclosed holding of the Pre-talks was utterly predictable.

Before that they had ridiculed the Swiss Process, of infamous memory, similarly, including through Justice Minister Momo’s ludicrous attempt to paint the diplomatic bungling as the clever work of Mr Biya to thwart the international community’s pressure to resolve the Ambazonian Liberation Struggle. That particular bungle, if anything, served to show that the international community was not only interested, contrary to popular perception, but involved in attempts to solve it. It is for another post to address the appropriateness and suitability of the involvement.

Other delaying tactics include the GDN, and its baby, Special Status. GDN was neither a dialogue nor great, being more of a monologue of hand-picked RDPC stooges who, just to be certain, were not allowed to use the word “federation”, which in turn, by then, was no longer a popular concept among Ambazonian Circles!

Maybe the last overt delaying tactic was the infamous reconstruction plan which turned out to be, like most La République du Cameroun projects, another embezzlement machine.

The Coordination Team, therefore was the Ambazonian response designed to consult Ambazonians, establish their preferences and aspirations in order to inform how the Ambazonian Liberation Struggle should be steered thereafter.

The report of the consultation is published and available to download from this link.

The Pact

It is the outcome of the consultations that our Coordination Team carried out with our people, after several abortive attempts to move towards a negotiated settlement, which have resoundingly come out in favour of external self-determination – Independence.
The Agreement shows the maturity in the Liberation Struggle after reflecting on many natural learning points and the appeals from the people
It is a pact to collaborate to act in a more coherent and cohesive manner to expedite Ambazonian Independence and Freedom. By collaborating, Ambazonian Leaders will demonstrate to the citizens, La République du Cameroun and the international community that they are committed and intent on staying the course and taking the Liberation Struggle over the victory line. The necessary impulses will be applied to nudge LRC towards the realization that Ambazonian minds are made up, resolve solid and their faith strong and driving them to Freedom.

How it came about

After eight years of improvising the best they could in a struggle for which they were not prepared, which they couldn’t even claim to have been ill-prepared for, it was, still is, natural that they would stumble. They now understand that they have to get up each time they stumble and respond to the cries of our people to stand up collectively to the oppression and end the [illegal] occupation. They must hold their nerve and be mindful that La République du Cameroun’s ways of dealing with the Ambazonian Liberation Struggle include propaganda, some of which tries the deception that they are failing. Instead experience teaches us that Ambazonia is winning as even the La République du Cameroun’s worst excesses of terror and intimidation have come and done: village burnings, massacres, Moja…, “elites” have all proved failures and instead served to demonstrate how incompatible La Republique du Cameroun is to Ambazonia.

While [then] Southern Cameroons had a multitude of democratically elected Prime Minsters and peaceful transitions in less that ten years, La Republque du Cameroun is stuck on two President’s , non of whom have ever been democratically elected, for over six decades!

While Southern Cameroons ran an efficient public service providing utilities and maintaining infrastructure for social progress, La Republique du Cameroons, after six decades continues to regress and shows no embarrassment, rather pride, in being so backwards that they have to evacuate their ailing “leadership” overseas for simple health care.

Why it came about.

It is necessary for our people to access the same opportunities that all other people do. We need to end the skewed and corrupt system which has reduced our people to abject poverty as second class citizens in a chronically corrupt and incompetent regime where they literally have zero opportunities for social growth.

Our Ambazonian children are very talented and we owe it to them and humanity to harness those skills and talent for humanity’s collective future on an equal footing.

Ambazonia must emerge from the dark shadow of La République du Cameroun and realise her destiny of a bright and prosperous future in the community of nations.

We will work diligently and with conviction, knowing that we are linking arms to regain and possess our country. We will keep improving our ways and getting straight back up every time if we stumble. We are maturing into a nation relying on the resilience which has seen us to this stage even in the face of a clear perceived imbalance of power

Ambazonian Liberation is a righteous course. The Most High God is the Watchman of our Nation

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Ambazonian Leaders First Joint Briefing since the Easter Pact

Leaders’ Pact Boosts Ambazonian Independence Efforts

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The Consultative Commission has issue a press release to the publish a Leaders’ Pact signed in this Easter 2025.

The carries five points of emphasis but the key aspect is the evident convergence of minds and the collective will to progress the Ambazonian Liberation Struggle over the victory line. They will work closely to optimize the impact and to empower Ambazonian citizens to actualize their freedom and independence.

To this effect, the leaders are reported to have considered many separate and/or concurrent ways and means to expedite the advent of a free and independent Ambazonia.

The Consultative Commission Press release.

An image of the Ambazonian Leaders who signed the Leaders' Independence Pact

The Ambazonian Leaders' Independence Pact

The Heat Factor: Compelling La République du Cameroun to Negotiate

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For a time now the chorus of “the suffering of our people” has accompanied schemes and processes to get La République du Cameroun to the negotiating table “to stop the suffering of our people”.

The idea of getting La République du Cameroun to the table has been in the air since the Swiss Process and was present in the Canada Pre-talks which followed.

The positive of these micro overtures is that La République du Cameroun can be assumed to have recognised the need for a negotiation, though it has to be underlined that their idea of negotiation will not be the same as the Ambazonians’.

The ways of getting La République du Cameroun to the table start with the obvious proven one -namely “unbearable heat on the ground”. This proven as it was responsible for “enticing” La République du Cameroun to venture onto the Swiss and then The Canada Pre-talks. Even then, it has to be factored in that La République du Cameroun could use such encounters to play for time and wait for Ambazonian coalitions to fracture as Ambazonian still sadly has many gullible “leaders”.

The gullible leaders, though talking independence and probably meaning it display the naivety to have “bringing La République du Cameroun to the table” as an end it itself. They do not consider what will keep La République du Cameroun on the table and compel them to yield to the idea of Ambazonian Independence. La République du Cameroun This was PRAP’s ingenuity. To be fair to PRAP, they then figured that such a low bar was far removed from any idea of immediate independence so they honestly postulated the idea of stages, including a referendum in the future to determine that. While this might very well attract La République du Cameroun, it would empower anglophone unionists and give La République du Cameroun the leeway to buy self-interests and pervert any future referendum, assuming the process got there. The immediate danger is, in reality have to complete the “lure” by playing “dead”… and playing dead could engender actual death of the Liberation Struggle. It would tell the day-to-day victims that the leaders are trading in their condition and willing to callously risk their lives and livelihoods on trusting a La République du Cameroun which has definitively proved their untrustworthiness.

On the Ambazonian spectrum there is a more ludicrous group even than PRAP. They are the independentists who also use the “lure La République du Cameroun to the negotiating table” mantra but do not either think about the aftermath or talk about it. Worse, they too wish to rely on diplomatic overtures with only a very flimsy tenuous reliance on “heat on the ground”. They would be less successful than PRAP in luring La République du Cameroun as they would, being independentists, have to use the words “Ambazonia” and “Independence” – the ultimate repellent to La République du Cameroun! Hopefully times helps them to realise -unless they do already realise but have undisclosed intentions.

The simple clear and surest way is the “heat on the ground” which has the effect of communicating to all key stakeholders. If properly targetted and applied along the “Daring Move” parameters, heat will quickly compel not only La République du Cameroun but any of their backers with interests on Ambazonian soil.

They would also enthuse the Ambazonian citizens who have to live the daily oppression of La République du Cameroun’s occupation forces and show them that the leadership gets it and is on the right page to take the Liberation Struggle over the victory line.

Whichever method is used to bring La République du Cameroun to the table, it is crucial to have it figured out how to keep them there and get the desired result from the negotiation. Knowing that La République du Cameroun will employ the simple time-wasting method and wait for Ambazonians to tire, it is critical to ensure that “heat” persists and that the practical independence reigns on the ground.

Complimentary commitment demands that diaspora make their own part of the commitment the only way they can, which is to contribute material and time to support and communicate commitment to the civilians on the ground. On the ground, the civilians and the ARF+ have to have a mutuality which makes them one. The ARF+ will actually go out to bat in self-defence but the civilians need to implement Ambazonian independence by by-passing La République du Cameroun officialdom at every opportunity, especially when it comes to the education system. Ambazonia News is consulting to bring more practical suggestions for by-passing the La République du Cameroun-controlled system still choking the social progress of Ambazonian children with their corrupt assimilation system.

The Ambazonian Liberation Struggle is fateful and watched over by the Watchman of our nation. On their side La République du Cameroun is doing everything to antagonise Ambazonians and convince them, as if they still needed convincing, that the two countries are incompatible. On the Ambazonian side the PRAPs of this world, whatever iteration, are thwarted by, first the “lack of anyone at home in La République du Cameroun”, and the sheer illogic of their schemes whether to Ambazonian eyes or to La République du Cameroun’s.

Urgent warning from SCAC-Ghana

The Southern Cameroons Ambazonia Community – Ghana has issued an alert following the rescue of forty-three [43] people from modern slavery in Kumasi Ghana.

The victims were mostly of Southern Cameroons origin and are said to have been lured by the promises of Qnet, describe as a human trafficking network.

SCAC is urging Ambazonian families to ignore any promises of better opportunities made by Qnet or similar networks.

Read the letter here