Colonel Cyrille Atonfack capture d'écran
A soldier is currently battling for life at the Yaounde military hospital after sustaining “severe bullet wounds” in an attack in Wum on New Year’s Eve, officials have said.
In a press release Wednesday, Navy Captain Atonfack Guemo Cyrille Serge, Head of the Communication Division at the Ministry of Defense unveils the circumstances under which the soldier sustained bullet wounds.
“On Thursday 31st December 2020, at about 10 a.m., a soldier of the 51st Motorized Infantry Battalion returning to base became the target of heavy fire from secessionist terrorists on the heights of the place called Waindu, Wum Subdivision, in Menchum Division, North West Region,” he said but failed to mention the name of the victim.
“The victim sustained serious bullet wounds. Thus, he was evacuated to Bamenda. Following the severity of the wounds, he was transferred to the Military Hospital of the First Military Region in Yaoundé for proper treatment,” the press release adds.
Navy Captain Atonfack Guemo said following the attack, defense and security officers carried out “research operations” which “led to the localization of a small group of terrorists in a house not far from the place of the assault, in the Zongokuo neighborhood.”
Soldier gravely wounded in Wum (c) Archives
His words: “Operations to arrest the occupants conducted on the night of 1st January 2021, unfortunately, led to the death of two members of the gang, under unclear circumstances. The victims are Kum Bah Gilbert alias Lion and Ngong Godlove, 28 and 23 years old respectively.
“Reliable intelligence holds that they were into underground operations and that they only reappeared in the locality during the end of the year 2020 festivities.
“Investigation opened by local administrative and defense and security authorities shall ascertain the causes of these unfortunate events.”
Cameroon’s state forces have been battling to dislodge armed separatists who pitched their tents in the North West and South West Regions since Anglophone protests 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.
Tit-for-tat killings, kidnappings, arsons, maiming, and outright terror have become part of daily lives in some parts of the English-speaking regions.
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