Crackdown on highway Criminality:

14 suspected highway robbers arrested in Muyuka

By Doh Bertrand Nua in Kumba

Uniform officers in Fako Division precisely in Muyuka have apprehended 14 bandits from the gang of highway hoodlums who were constantly harassing passengers and other road users  at the Mile 29 hill along KumbaMuyukaBuea road highway.

                The men of the underworld were arrested recently after the uniform officers boarded a passenger bus with civilian attire and embarked on the early morning journey like business persons heading to Douala in the littoral region to buy goods. The hoodlums stopped the bus thinking that they were only passengers not knowing that they were heavily armed uniform officers on board the passenger bus. 

                To their greatest dismay the bus had heavily armed uniform officers who were able to arrest two of the hoodlums on the spot while the others ran into the bushes.

                During the early hours of that faithful morning the uniform officers with the help of the two arrested bandits ended up arresting 14 of the young men who have been harassing and terrorising passengers and other road users around the Mile 29 vicinity. Most of the arrested young boys are said to come from Muyuka and Ekona. They are presently helping the police in investigations.

                It should be recalled that the crackdown on the highway bandits comes after the bandits had recently attacked the Mayor of Konye municipality, Dr. Barrister Musima George Lobe along the same road axis. Musima was attacked in the early hours around Ekona while he was travelling from Kumba to Yaounde on a business trip.

                Apart from the Mayor’s attack, other cases of highway robbery had been reported as taking place along the same road axis, where traders from Kumba on their way to Douala were attacked around the mile 29 vicinity. In one incident, a 19 seater bus was forced to a make a U-turn after money, mobile phones and other valuables were seized from the passengers.

                In another attack weeks back, The Median gathered the men of the underworld forced a bus driver on gun point to drive the vehicle into a robber plantation were the passengers were then beaten and values and money taken from then one after another.

                The police crackdown on the hoodlums around the KumbaMuyukasBuea highway observers say the security officers will also have to embark on a similar mission in the Kumba-Manfe-Bamenda road which is also a lucrative arena for the men of the underwold. It should be recalled that on Wednesday a forthnight ago a similar highway attack was recorded along the Batibo-Bali road in which a 70 seater bus belonging to the Moghamo transport agency was hijacked by highway robbers who collected huge sums of money from the passengers.