A human rights observer points out that “the State, guarantor of the right to life of citizens, has failed in its responsibilities because it has not taken effective measures or provided the necessary means to arrest, judge and sentence to life sentences. ‘exemplary imprisonment all perpetrators and sponsors’ of ritual crimes.
Reported missing on July 13, 2023, Martine Ndjoumsi, was found dead, five days later, in a brush of the Barrière district in Yaoundé, capital of Cameroon. Her organs were removed in what appears to be a macabre ritual. Two days before this discovery, a wanted notice had been published following his disappearance. According to family members, Martine Ndjoumsi left Douala to attend funeral ceremonies in Yaoundé on July 13. She had called her older brother to give him directions. Later, his phone stopped responding.
Nothing was done by the security forces to geolocate his phone and spot the traces of his executioners in time. Following this inaction, Martine Ndjoumsi was manhandled and killed by her captors. She leaves behind three and an inconsolable spouse. An investigation has been launched in Yaoundé to trace the last moments of Martine Ndjoumsi and find her killers. According to initial information, she would have taken a taxi with five men on board. The authorities placed the victim’s body under seal pending the prosecutor’s decision. The members of Martine Ndjoussi’s family remain disconcerted and wonder what the investigations will lead to. Because many Cameroonian families have never known a sequel after the disappearance of relatives who were victims of kidnappings and killings coupled with mutilation of genital organs. And this gloomy picture, according to civil society organizations like the League of Rights and Freedoms in Bafoussam, is far from disappearing, impunity seems to be the rule in the treatment of these facts related to the commission of crimes rituals. This pushes the analyst to establish that it is common ground that “the State, guarantor of the right to life of citizens, has failed in its responsibilities because it has not taken the effective measures nor provided the necessary means to stop, try and sentence to exemplary prison terms all the perpetrators and sponsors of ritual crimes throughout the country”.
Miscarriage of justice
Reading an article written by Ben Christy Moudio on behalf of La Nouvelle Expression and taken online by the news site highlights the bankruptcy of the repressive and judicial apparatus of the State of Cameroon in matters protection of the right to life of citizens constantly threatened and flouted by the followers and perpetrators of ritual crimes: “The results of the crimes that were perpetrated between 2012 and 2014 in the city of Yaoundé are written in a flood of blood. The butcher’s shop in the Mimboman, Biteng and Nkoabang neighborhoods was intended to be a real lesson in anatomy: cut genitals, sunken eye sockets. From the first murders perpetrated in November and December 2012, the populations were quick to qualify them as “ritual crimes”. The gaze then falls on a body of trade enjoying a certain ease in access to young girls (the drivers of motostaxis)”, we underline while browsing this text.
Minister of Communication at the time, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, announced during a press conference in September 2013 that a dozen people supposed to belong to the gang of criminals had been identified. Indeed, between 22 and 26 May 2014, two bodies of young women were discovered in the area of Mimboman Lycée and Maetur Nkoabang. The psychosis is getting stronger. The Investigating Judge of the Mfoundi High Court, Pierre Ossé Mpondo, decides to release certain people, including businessmen. Public opinion cries out against injustice. The Judge also decides to keep five detainees. The latter are judged at the High Court for co-action murder, aggravated rape and violation of the corpse. Many questions still remain unanswered. The lawyers of the families of the victims of ritual crimes denouncing a vagueness in the procedures.
They make known the modus operandi usually used by the authors of the crimes in question: the group of assassins is subdivided into two. One in charge of prospecting for potential victims thanks to motorcycle taxis and the second in charge of shadowing and support in the execution of the macabre task. According to an account made in August 2014, by the daily Le Jour, the victims were molested, suffocated or stabbed. “The assassins removed the organs: either the breasts, or the kidneys, or the eyelashes, or the eyebrows, or the hair at the level of the nape of the neck”, one writes in the diary of Haman Mana. Seized by the relatives of the victims, the judicial system shines with detentions followed by the release of the alleged perpetrators. And ritual crimes continue and multiply in the Mimboman area and in other localities in Cameroon. The cities of Douala, Ebolowa, Bertoua, Foumban, Foumbot, Bafoussam and other localities in Cameroon are favorite territories for the perpetrators of these heinous acts. We remember that in June 2016, the city of Bafoussam was shaken by a ritual crime case.
The governor of the West region, Awa Fonka, was interviewed on ritual crimes in Bafoussam, in particular on the case of little Emmanuelle Nana, 11, which has just occurred. The boss of the decentralized administration replied: “There are suspects who have been arrested and if it turns out that they are guilty, they will be punished by law, in any case, an investigation was opened to establish the truth. Arrested and detained in Bafoussam prison, the businessman and traditional chief was declared “not guilty. The reminder of the facts indicates that after her disappearance, the body of little Nana Emmanuelle was found in a well in the Kouogouo district not far from the police station of the 4th arrondissement of the city of Bafoussam.
84 cases of body discoveries, after numerous kidnappings
In 2023, the spiral lengthens. 27 people kidnapped and released after payment of ransoms for an amount of more than 4,000,000 FCFA in the West region since January this year. The localities of Kouoptamo, Bangourain, Njimom and Magba are targeted. 84 cases of discoveries of bodies, in particular after numerous kidnappings in the towns and villages of Noun, Koung-Khi, Menoua, Bamboutos, Ndé, Mifi, Hauts-Plateaux and Haut-Nkam, are part of the assessment drawn up by the administration. These figures were communicated during the half-yearly coordination meeting held this fortnight in June 2023 and chaired by Awa Fonka Augustine, governor of the West region. However, in public opinion, certain forms of kidnappings perpetrated by judicial police officers or agents or military security agents are denounced, when it is their duty to ensure the safety and the safety of citizens. And above all to protect the right to life for all. A police officer points out that there are abuses of the “kidnapping” type because “police tactics” must strive for efficiency. For him, some kidnappings are ordered to intimidate “the citizen”.
Contacted by Journalists in Africa for Development (Jade), Me Serges Fohom, lawyer at the bar of Cameroon explains that, in majority, the police, the gendarmes and the prosecutors of Cameroon, do not have a propensity for the respect of human rights. For him, some judicial police officers behave, with impunity, as executioners of citizens. “They violate all the requirements of the criminal procedure code which enshrine the rights of the defense. The denial of justice and the rule of lawlessness seem to be normality for Cameroonian police and gendarmes. The right to life has no meaning for those…”, they denounce. Especially since the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights requires that “States parties to this Covenant undertake to ensure the equal right of men and women to the benefit of all the rights listed in this Pact. Everyone has the right to life. No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. More precisely, article 6 of the text recorded under the aegis of the United Nations (UN) prescribes: “The right to life is inherent in the human person. This right must be protected by law. No one may be arbitrarily deprived of life. »
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