Bamenda: Rights groups frown at abusive use of anti-terrorism law.

This condemnation was made Thursday February 16, in Bamenda during a two-day seminar organised by the North West branch of the Cameroon Human Rights Commission, CHRC. The seminar was for civil society organisations operating in the region in view of the promotion, protection of human rights and definitely the prevention of torture.

Luma Elvis Brown, one of the resource persons who made a presentation on detention conditions in some gendarmerie, police cells and other places of detention in the North West Region, disclosed that there has been abusive use of the 2014 law on terrorism in Cameroon.

According to him "this law opened the opportunity for many abuses on the part of authorities since it offers an overly broad definition of terrorism".

He added that following this law especially in the context of the separatist war rocking the North West and South West Regions, numerous arbitrary arrests on grounds of counter-terrorism have been carried out. It is for this reason he said that prisons in the two regions have witnessed overcrowding.

In his presentation, Luma suggested that the government should diligently respect international instruments on terrorism and healthy conditions in prisons.

He went further to state that not only are the prisons overwhelmed, the detention conditions are not the best.

“Prisoners who are deprived from their liberties must according to international law be sentenced in healthy, clean and safe environment which in practice is completely absent in many prisons and detention centres in Cameroon,” he said.

Sinsai Victor, North West Regional Head of CHRC, on his part, stated that one of the missions of the organisation is to prevent torture in places of detention. This, he said, has been carried out on weekly basis.

"So, the commission has been conducting regular visits to places of detention," he noted.

Places of detention, he said, do not only involve police and gendarmerie cells alone but include psychiatric centres and centres where youths are kept etc.

‘Human rights situation in Cameroon deplorable’

Presenting the activities of the North West Coordination of Cameroon Freedoms Observatory, CFO, a network of human rights movements put in place by CHRC to observe and report human rights violation, Gaby Ambo, its acting Regional coordinator, noted that the human rights situation in Cameroon is deplorable.

He said since the advent of the protracted armed conflict in the North West and South West Regions, there have been several incidents of people extra-judicially executed.

It is in that regard, he said, that his organisation has been involved in monitoring and reporting violations of rights by state actors and abuses by non-state actors.

In his final appraisal, Sinsai Victor, the Regional chairman of CHRC, concluded that because of workshops and sensitisation of the public on prevention of torture and human rights violation, the situation has greatly improved.

In a bid to continue with promotion and protection of human rights and prevent torture in the North West Region, the Regional branch of CHRC came up with a calendar of events.

In the month of March 2023, they said an awareness campaign on human rights shall be organised with a toll free number (1523) of the CHRC.

Equally, the regional branch together with the civil society organisations operating in the region, have planned to create human rights clubs in primary, secondary and institutions of higher education.

Plans are also underway to organise conferences on human rights, create alert mechanisms to handle human rights violations, put in place legal clinics to identify and address alleged human rights violations, provide legal assistance to victims of human rights violations and identify places of detention in the North West Region.