Marafa leaves hospital in anger

His Swiss lawyer and members of his family were driven out of the hospital and in protest, the former SG / Pr decided to end hospitalization and return to his cell on Saturday. This was a few hours after the visit of Francois Hollande to Cameroon on Friday.

Mr Saskia Ditisheim, Swiss lawyer of Marafa Hamidou Yaya, after a meeting with the First President of the Supreme Court, Daniel Mekobe Sone, went to the General Hospital of Yaounde together with Mr Alice Nkom, one of the Cameroonian lawyers of the former Secretary General of the Presidency of the Republic, to visit their client who was detained recently.

They managed to brave the heavy security cordon deployed around the prisoner's hospital room. Both lawyers were allowed into the room and were happy to meet Marafa Hamidou Yaya with the president of the NGO Lawyers Without Borders-Switzerland expecting to have time to exchange a few pleasantries. Suddenly, a policeman showed up at the entrance of the room and ordered the exit of Mr Saskia and Nkom with the Chief of the General Hospital asking to meet with the lawyers.

In the office of Professor Elie Claude Njitoyap, the counsel learned that they cannot continue their visit as they have no authorization to meet Marafa Hamidou Yaya. They took offense.

"Dr, do you need permission to see your patients? No. It's the same for us. We are the lawyers of this gentleman who continues to have rights although in prison," Mr Alice Nkom said. Their opposition did not help as both lawyers were requested to leave accompanied by two gendarmes of the multi-role unit of the national gendarmerie (Gpign).

They refused to leave the hospital and the gendarmes restricted them downstairs waiting for instructions from their superiors before they can "free" them.

"Are we in custody?" Saskia asked. "No master," replied one of the gendarmes, smiling.

Mr Saskia and Nkom waited for an hour in their vehicle for "instructions" to open the gate of the General Hospital of Yaounde.

According to our sources, the intelligence services suspected that Mr. Alice Nkom had introduced a reporter to the hospital to conduct an interview with Marafa Hamidou Yaya.

The next day, Saturday, July 4, the nephews of Marafa Hamidou Yaya who used to visit him in prison decided to visit him by his bedside at the hospital. They were not permitted to meet him.

Informed of this, Marafa Hamidou Yaya in anger ordered the doctor at the hospital to discharge him and be taken back to SED where he was detained. An escort was then dispatched to take him back to his cell thus forced to cut short his medical treatment.

Respiratory and eye problems

After a relapse, the former Minister of State in charge of Territorial Administration and Decentralization was admitted at the Yaounde General Hospital on Wednesday 17 June. During his last media appearance, Marafa Hamidou Yaya said in an interview with Jeune Afrique in October 2014: "Psychologically and mentally I'm fine, but I have worsening respiratory and eye problems. My state is not compatible with detention, and the authorities know perfectly well. That said, I was eager to leave the hospital because my very presence disturbed the other patients and staff. For each stay, the hotel is transformed into a fortress with fifty armed soldiers patrolling the corridors and on the rooftops!" he regretted.

He then moved somehow to a second hospital in the space of a few days at the University Hospital (Chu) in Yaounde having felt unwell in his cell at the Secretariat of State for Defence in charge of the gendarmerie national where he was incarcerated.

The recent hospitalization at the Yaounde General Hospital is at least the third in a year.

Aged 63, Marafa Hamidou Yaya was arrested April 16, 2012 and sentenced to 25 years in prison for embezzlement in the case of a presidential plane.

An appeal was lodged against the decision of the Supreme Court where a trial before that court is imminent.