To give peace a chance:

Nico Halle seeks unconditional release of Anglophone activists

Barrister NtumforNico Halle, Bar General Assembly President

International peace crusader and president of the General Assembly of the Cameroon Bar Association, Ntumfor Barrister Nico Halle, has urged President Paul Biya to unconditionally free leaders of the outlawed Anglophone Civil Society Consortium and others in detention in relation to the ongoing Anglophone crisis.

                NtumforNico Halle made the call on Sunday, during CRTV’s live talk show program press hour.

                “Granting reprieve to all those arrested in the course of the crisis will be one of the surest ways of finding lasting solutions to the lingering crisis that has crippled activities in courts and schools across the North West and South West Regions,” said Ntumfor, who was one among three panelists on the program.

                “If I had my way, I would advise the Head of State, His Excellency President Paul Biya to grant general amnesty to all those facing trial in connection with this crisis. That is what is done elsewhere in situations like this,” Nico Halle prayed, during the one-hour show that was exceptionally anchored from Douala.

                The international peace crusader and elections monitor, amongst other issues also urged Cameroonians to turn to God in fervent prayers, arguing that “without God the labourerlabours in vain.”

                The outing of the Bar General Assembly president comes barely a week after he told a local newspaper that for the current crisis to be effectively laid to rest, there was need for justice and equity to be applied by the powers that be.

                “I have always insisted that for sustainable peace to happen there must be justice and equity. These are the preconditions for peace to be sustainable,” he suggests.

                He enjoined all the parties concerned in the crisis to exercise wisdom and desist from exchanging insults and invectives that can only blow things out of proportion.

                The call by Halle for Anglophone detainees to be released follows that by national and international human rights groups, as well as opinion leaders including the MPs of the NW region.

                It should be recalled that a report made public in Yaoundé recently, the National Commission on Human Rights and Freedoms, recommended the immediate and unconditional release of leaders of the now outlawed Consortium as well as others arrested who were not directly involved in the destruction of public property during the unrests in the North West and South West.

                It should be noted that of the total of 82 persons that were arrested during the crisis (official figures), 21 have been released while 27 are facing trial at the Yaounde military tribunal. Most of them are charged with terrorism-related crimes some of which attract the death penalty by virtue of the 23 December 2014 law on the suppression of acts of terrorism in Cameroon.