Kribi port: 10 members of local residents committee jailed

Since May 5, 2016, ten members of the commission for the identification and registration of the populations victims of expropriation as part of the project for the construction of the deep water port of Kribi, in Southern Cameroon, have been remanded in custody at the Kondengui central prison in Yaoundé, we learned from reliable sources.

Among those incarcerated, are Jean François Bilong, now retired former prefect of the Ocean department; the first prefectural deputy of this department at the time of the offence; the former deputy reeve of the Kribi 1 district as well as his deputy; André Joseph Eyebe Eyebe, who took office as the deputy reeve of the Bangangté district, in Western Cameroon, on April 25, 2016; and departmental employees of the Ministries of Lands and Agriculture.

All have been accused of tampering with the list of names of those to be compensated as part of the Kribi deep water port project. Indeed, during the distribution of compensations, some denounced the presence on said lists of unknown people, when a certain number of real local residents were omitted.

At the same time, the populations denounced the unequal amounts to be paid to those to be compensated, as well as acts of corruption and favouritism ascribed to members of the registration commission.

To compound these denunciations, were the reservations expressed by the IMF, who considered exorbitant the total amount of the compensations presented to the project team: FCfa 20 billion. Investigations led to the observation that the names of some beneficiaries were fraudulently added to the list of people to be compensated.

Acts which were made possible through the use of fake land titles or land titles issued prior to the presidential decree declaring the site as public area, or the production of titles for lands located far away from the area concerned by the compensations.

In September 2013, while concluding the compensation process for residents living close to the Kribi port, which had been launched in 2011 then suspended due to the ire of the populations; the Minister of Lands, Jacqueline Koung à Bessiké, had announced that after investigation and tidying up of the list of people to be compensated, the government was finally able to save a total of FCfa 9 billion.