Ambazonia leader Sisiku Ayuk Tabe has censured the harsh and inhumane conditions of Southern Cameroons detainees in various French Cameroun detention centers. The leader also informed the AU, EU and the United Nations of a hunger strike action by him and his top aides held at the Kondengui High Security prison.

Speaking to our Yaoundé city reporter after we received a copy of a letter addressed to the international community, the Ambazonia head of state revealed that he wrote to many international organizations appealing to them to put pressure on the French Cameroun regime to immediately end the rights abuses of Southern Cameroons political prisoners.

Some pro Yaoundé Southern Cameroonians operating in Ambazonia have maintained a kind of silence of the lamb ever since the prison riots in Buea and Yaoundé. But are simply pushing on a French Cameroun agenda known as “Back To School”.

The Southern Cameroons Vice President Dabney Yerima urged European authorities in a statement on Monday to investigate allegations of torture, killings and other abuses against prisoners at the Kondengui prisons, located in the capital, Yaoundé, where the Ambazonian leader Sisiku Ayuk Tabe and members of his cabinet including an estimated 300 Southern Cameroons detainees have been on hunger strike.

The Kondengui detention facility has been holding a total of about 3,000 political detainees from the Federal Republic of Ambazonia-Southern Cameroons following Yaoundé’s sweeping crackdown on British Southern Cameroonians since 2017.

The Southern Cameroons detainees at the Kondengui and Buea prisons, while being subjected to a range of physical and verbal abuses, are deprived of their basic rights such as family visits, medical care, and legal consultation.

A lawyer representing the Southern Cameroons detained leadership told the BBC recently that the Southern Cameroons prisoners were being held in overcrowded cells infested with mosquitoes, flies, and other insects, with temperatures of more than 40 degrees Celsius and without any fans or appropriate ventilation.

By Chi Prudence Asong