The closed to five years armed conflict rocking the North West and South West regions of Cameroon has been ranked as the second among the ten most neglected conflict in the world. The classification is contained in a Global Neglected Conflicts report published 27 May 2021 by Norwegian Refugee Council (NWR) – an international humanitarian organization helping people forced to flee.
Vehicles burned by gunmen as violence skyrockets in the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon
Crises in Africa dominated this year’s report from the renowned NGO, with DR Congo topping the chat followed by Cameroon, Burundi, Venezuela, Honduras, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Central African Republic and Mali.
The report touches on countries with conflicts with more than 200,000 displaced people reviewed many displacement crises based on the criteria of lack of funding, lack of media attention, and political and diplomatic neglect.
“The Covid-19 pandemic has caused millions of people who were already struggling to survive in neglected crises to fall even further behind. The little income they had is often gone, needs are skyrocketing and funding continues to dry up,” said Jan Egeland, Secretary General of NRC while launching the report from Goma, Eastern DR Congo.
The senior NRC official said for the first time this century, the global humanitarian appeals to support aid operations were less than 50% funded last year. In some of the neglected crises only a third of what was needed was received, even for lifesaving relief. This year, the aid appeal for DR Congo is only 12 per cent funded by mid-May.
Cameroon, which ranks second on this year’s list, topped the list in 2018 and 2019. The conflict in Cameroon has witnessed a spike in displacements during the last years, but little international pressure has been placed on conflict parties to stop attacking civilians.
UN estimates indicates that the ongoing conflict has killed over 3,000 civilians, soldiers and members of the non-state armed groups, displaced over 700 000 and forced over 60 000 to flee to neighbouring Nigeria as refugees.
The crisis which started in 2016 morphed into full-fledged armed conflict following government’s seeming highhandedness, negligence and lack of tact in handling the modest demands from Common Law Lawyers and Anglophone teachers.
The use of force on unarmed civilians and early arson acts from security forces during peaceful demonstrations which resulted to deaths instead radicalised the masses. Increasing violence in the two regions has made health and humanitarian needs of the population “massive and critical” according to officials of Doctors Without Borders, DWB.
By Doh Bertrand Nua
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