The hearing started today at 11:14am with the counsel for the civil parties presenting their memorandum of appearance after which they made an oral application for an adjournment to consult the case file- an application which the defense argued vigorously against by citing several provisions of the law to buttress their points.

The prosecution on the other hand declared their readiness to open their case by calling their witnesses. The prosecution had 17 witnesses to prove their case. Conspicuous among the counsel for the civil parties was the controversial Barrister Achu Julius Tabe Ngu.  An application for bail to be granted to Barrister Balla and Neba by the defense was argued vigorously by Barrister Karim Khan, one of the human right lawyers from the UK attending trial. He argued the application for more than an hour citing provisions of the constitution and international conventions and treaties duly signed and ratified by Cameroon notably the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights of 1966, the Bill of Rights and the African Charter on Humans and Peoples Right. He ended his submission by saying that “judges try cases but cases do try judges”.

Other former bar Presidents four in their numbers and other senior colleagues also argued the bail application.  After the lengthy arguments from the defense for the bail application, the prosecution requested for adjournment to reply to the application which was granted. The matter was thus adjourned to the 24^th of May at the instance of the prosecution.