A woman walks past a soldier of the Cameroon army s elite Rapid Intervention Battalion in the city of Buea in the Anglophone Southwest Region Oct. 4, 2018. (Newscom/Reuters/Zohra Bensemra)
Yaounde, Cameroon Several Catholic bishops in Cameroon s English-speaking regions are sharply criticizing President Paul Biya s violent, yearslong campaign to quell an independence movement in those regions.
In recent NCR interviews, three prelates suggested that Biya s government had initially underestimated the growing influence of those calling for the creation of a new, separate state and then responded with disproportionate force.
Retired Archbishop Cornelius Fontem Esua, who led Cameroon s Bamenda Archdiocese from 2006 to 2019, said Biya had erred drastically in late 2017 when he pledged to eliminate independence fighters.