Paul Atanga Nji, Minister in Charge of Special Duties at the Presidency, talks about the protests in Douala and why he thinks the constitution should be amended.

The night of Saturday February 23, breaking Sunday February 24, was turbulent in Douala as administrative authorities had to contain a protest on the Douala-Yaounde highway. What is your reaction to this incident?

It is a regrettable situation. I strongly believe that all these things are being orchestrated by the Social Democratic Front, SDF. Why I say so is because the SDF knows very well that political rallies have been banned in the Littoral Province until further notice. Yet, they insist on organising these rallies to expose the lives of innocent citizens. This is a wilful intention to create disorder in the province. The Governor of the Littoral Province said that until further notice, all political rallies have been banned. I believe that he arrived at this decision because people have made it a habit of not respecting the law. In the Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement, CPDM, we always take an authorisation before any meeting. So, if the ruling party can obey such laws, what more of the opposition? I think the leaders of these political parties, which want to create disorder, should realise that we have been living in a peaceful situation in Cameroon and the President has fought for 25 years to consolidate this peace, unity and stability. They should know that no one will accept any more of these irresponsible activities organised just to push the government to the wall. So, it should be clear that if they want to operate legally, they have to respect the rules of the land. On the contrary, if they do not respect the rules in force, they will be considered as vandals and treated as such.

Apparently, no political party was visibly present or has claimed responsibility for the disorder on the Yaounde-Douala highway. The population was actually demonstrating for some other reason…

There is instigation. And once again, I put the responsibility on those who have been trying to organise political rallies and have not been successful. But what is clear is that the political parties will never claim responsibility when there is disorder. But they indirectly instigate people to come out on the streets so that they will be in a position to face the forces of law and order. In cases like that, you know there is provocation. And in case of provocation, people loose their tempers. And the situation might degenerate.

But the SDF leader, Ni John Fru Ndi, says he is bent on organising rallies despite the ban?

This has been the habit of SDF since the party was launched in 1990. But people should understand that the SDF is inconsistent and has lost its base. The SDF started with 65 parliamentarians. Now they have only 14 parliamentarians after a lot of difficulties; it could have been less. This means the population has realised that the SDF is a party which is not constructive. They are only out to destroy all the achievements that the New Deal has put in place for the past 25 years. We cannot accept and we shall not accept. We will not even give them the opportunity to create disorder. As other political leaders have said, peace and stability are a great achievement that we have had in the country thanks to Paul Biya. We will not allow any person to jeopardise the peaceful situation in which we are living.

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