Pathetic, 46years mother of four arbitrary detained for more than a year in need of a lawyer in Cameroon

The Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa(CHRDA), a Cameroonian based Human Rights NGO on 10 December 2021 published a story of Mrs Anastasia Ful, a 46-year-old mother of four and a teacher of Government Technical High School Wum in Mechum Division of the North West Region of Cameroon.

The Human Rights Body reported that the 46-year-old was arrested on December 7, 2020. She was arbitrary arrested, together with her two children and their friend in her son’s apartment in Baffousam, West Region, and detained at the Gendarmerie.

According to CHRDA, She was on a visit to her children who were schooling in Bafousam, West Region of Cameroon, with the objective to pay her sons school fees. As reported by CHRDA, “she left Wum on December 5, 2020, and set out to visit her children who were schooling in Bafoussam and to pay their tuition fee. On her way, she received a strange call from an unknown caller, purporting to be an armed separatist fighter. The person threatened her and ordered her to visit a particular detainee in the Baffousam central prison when she arrived there. The caller told her that, for her to be able to return to Wum again, she must visit the prison in Baffousam and check on an Ambazonian boy detained there and give him a sum of two thousand francs. When she arrived at her son’s apartment in Baffousam, she narrated the story to him, and he advised her not to obey the instructions. But the next day, when the son had gone to school, out of fear, she left the house and went to the prison facility in Baffousam to visit the detainee as instructed by the unknown caller and gave him the 2000 FCFA.“

The CHRDA narrates on December 7, 2020, her eldest son (Nevil) whom she hasn’t met in 4 years since as a result of the violence in Wum, fled to Yaounde, heard that she was visiting in Baffousam and he left Yaounde with his friend and travelled to Baffousam to meet her. When they arrived around 6 pm, her younger son (Smith) went out to receive them at the park and bring them to the house. The three boys finally came back home by 7:00 pm. When they came back home, while Smith was standing in front of his door, a gendarme officer dressed in assorted clothes approached him and showed him a display picture of a child on WhatsApp, asking him if he knew the child. The child was actually Mrs Anastasia’s grandson, and his picture was her display picture on WhatsApp.  Since Smith did not recognise the gendarme, he asked him who he was and why he was asking about the child. The military man left without saying why he was asking about the child, and after a few minutes, he came back with seven other gendarme officers, all dressed in assorted clothing as well. They forcefully entered the house and ransacked it, searching every corner of the house without even presenting a warrant. When the search ended without them finding anything, they took Mrs Anastasia and the three boys. They handcuffed them to their car parked a few meters away from the house and drove to the Gendarmerie brigade in Baffousam where they were detained for three days without food and savagely beaten.”

At the Gendarmerie brigade, they accused them of association with armed separatist fighters. All their telephones were confiscated and searched, and the phones were never returned back to them.  They denied them the chance to even call anyone outside and alert them they were being detained. They also forced them to confess that they were collaborating with separatist fighters, an allegation which they vehemently denied.

After a while at the Gendarmerie, a strange message from another unknown number entered her phone while the gendarmes were holding it, and it read, “Have you bought the bombs already?” “We have the bombs now; you can pay for them using a mobile money transfer.” According to her, the gendarmes who had her phone were replying to the messages. They demanded her mobile money password as the unknown number said she could pay for the bombs through mobile money. The gendarmes withdrew three hundred thousand (300,000) FCFA that she had in her mobile money account, being her children’s tuition fee. She also had about a hundred thousand (100,000) FCFA in cash in her purse and they took it. They also seized her son’s laptop and ear pods. They took the ear pods and started using them immediately. 

After withdrawing the money, Mrs Anastasia and her boys were detained for three days in a cell in Baffousam where they were tortured. They were beaten with cutlasses in the soles of their feet and also slapped on their faces. They were kept for all these days without food nor water before her children were released on the third day at about 6:00 pm, leaving her behind. Before releasing the boys, they took the young man who was just a friend to her children but was arrested with them, out of the cell to a bank where they forced him to withdraw a sum of one million (1,000,000) FCFA from his bank account which he had to pay to them before his release. They made him sign a document stating that he would not disclose anywhere that they collected any francs from him.  Their phones were never returned to them. On the fourth day, Mrs Anastasia was transferred from the Gendarmerie cell in Baffousam to SED in Yaounde.

After spending four months at SED, Mrs Anastasia was transferred to Kondengui Principal Prison where she has spent a year already without charge. She has never appeared before any court and no formal charge has been brought against her. She is facing torture in prison and has no lawyer or legal representative.

Click HERE to read the original publication from CHRDA official website

Berinyuy Cajetan, Publisher

Berinyuy Cajetan is the founder and publisher of Human Rights and Legal Research Centre (HRLRC) since 2017. He has intensive experience in strategic communications for Civil Society Organizations, campaign and advocacy, and social issues. He has an intensive experiencing in human rights monitoring, documentation and reporting.