She voiced out her worries to Chamberlain Ntou’ou Ndong, Senior Divisional Officer, SDO, for Meme Division Monday, August 3.

The administrative officer was at the Kumba Main Market to supervise the City Council’s sealing of shops that remained closed in respect of a routine Monday lockdown ordered by separatists seeking the independence of a country they call Ambazonia.

Accompanied by security forces, Victor Nkele Ngoh, City Mayor of the Kumba City Council, KCC, today supervised the sealing of all unopened shops at the Kumba Main Market and its environs.

Besides the fact that buyers hardly show up to buy on ghost town days, the seller who owns a makeshift table on which her produce is displayed said they are regularly victimized by armed separatists for obeying state authority.

“As you are saying that we should sell on ghost town days, know that those boys (armed separatists) attack us for doing so.  The last time, they whipped me mercilessly and smashed the tomatoes I was selling,” the seller told the SDO in tears as she struggled to display her goods with the hope of finding buyers.

“Do not worry. The problem is going to be solved now,” the SDO replied as state forces guarded him. “You are here today. You are selling. We are going to sell the whole day together, not so? I am here.”

Victor Nkele Ngoh said the decision to seal the shops is intended to punish traders who are respecting ghost towns imposed by separatist fighters and their promoters. He expects that today’s action will serve as a deterrent to other business operators.

To the City Mayor, the socio-political situation in Cameroon’s North West and South West Regions has nothing to do with traders and thus nothing explains their decision to keep their shops closed on a normal working day.

Victor Nkele Ngoh says all those whose business premises and shops were sealed are expected to pay a fine of FCFA 25,000 before they can regain access into their shops.

On whether the security of the traders and their businesses can be guaranteed, the City Mayor said the state has taken measures to provide security. He regretted that the continuous respect of lockdown and ghost town calls has been a huge setback to the revenue-generating potential of the City Council.

It is not known if the City Mayor and his team of security, administrative and municipal officials will embark on a similar mission in other markets and business premises across Kumba. The Fiango Market and other business hubs in the city have for the most part remained closed, as business operators cite security concerns following threats from armed separatists.

Kumba is the economic capital of Cameroon’s South West Region and also the administrative capital of the region’s Meme Division. State forces have been battling to dislodge armed separatists who pitched their tent in Meme Division since the current crisis transformed into an armed conflict in 2017.

Corporate demands by Common Law Lawyers and Anglophone Teachers led to protests in November 2016. The street demonstrations later morphed into ongoing running gun battles between state forces and armed separatist fighters in the predominantly English-speaking regions, leading to untold destruction of human lives, their habitats, and livelihoods.