A homemade bomb has killed seven people, including a senior government official and a mayor in the South-Western part of Cameroon who were on a tour to raise support against the Ambazonia Separatist rebels.
The handmade bomb that killed the officials on Wednesday hit their car in Bekora village in the Ekondo Titi district of Cameroon’s English-speaking South-West region.
However, the Anglophone separatists in Cameroon have since claimed responsibility for the attack, while the government has also said that among those killed included Timothee Aboloa, the highest government official in Ekondo Titi, Nanji Kenneth, mayor of Ekondo Titi, and Ebeku William, the Ekondo Titi president of Cameroon’s ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement party.
Governor of Cameroon’s South-West region Bernard Okalia Bilai while confirming the incident said the explosion occurred at a nearby bush where the separatist was lying ambush also injured scores of government troops and caused the death of a military official who died while being rushed to a local hospital by the military.
Bilai during a media conference with local media including Cameroon state broadcaster CRTV said the officials were on a meet-the-people tour of Ekondo Titi to educate civilians on braving separatists and as well as relaunch economic activities in towns and villages.
However, the deputy defense chief of staff to be the largest separatist group in the Ambazonia region of Cameroon, Capo Daniel has told the Voice of America -VOA via a messaging app that only one of its fighters got missing during the shootout with government troops and that none of its fighters was injured as reported by Cameroon military.
Capo revealed that the operation was part of its liberation operations to end the Cameroon occupation and rule of the Ambazonia territory, adding that it will continue to battle and resist Cameroon’s rule of Ambazonia until the last Cameroon military is booted out of our territory,” he said.
The Cameroon separatist Rebels have been battling the Cameroonian government since 2017 in the bid to carve out an independent English-speaking state in the majority French-speaking Cameroon called Ambazonia.
Government officials have since been facing attack from the separatist whenever they carry out activities on behalf of the central government vowing to continue its attack until the central government withdraws its troops from the troubled Anglophone regions and so far, more than 3,500 people have been reported killed and 750,000 displaced according to a United Nations -UN report.
