Chris Anu, a long-time spokesperson for Cameroon’s self-declared Republic of Ambazonia, said that he was elected president of the separatist movement on September 10, 2022. His election comes at a time when the movement appears to be losing support among southern Cameroonians, due to allegations of infighting, corruption and human rights abuses.

In an interview with VOA’s James Butty, Anu said that the movement will take the fight to the territories of the Republic of Cameroon (French speaking part of the country). He promised to also review the movement’s much-criticised policy of closing schools.

“We want the citizens of the Republic of Cameroon to feel the pain that Ambazonians have felt for the past six years,” he said. Anu lives in exile in Houston, Texas.

According to Dieudonné Essomba, a statistician and economist: “Anglophones will no longer return to the unitary state. In a post widely circulated on social media, he said that it is no longer worth spending resources unnecessarily. Anglophones came to Cameroon in 1961 with their state. Ahidjo [ Ahmadou Babatoura Ahidjo was the first president of Cameroon] suppressed this to create national unity. It was a big mistake. It was rather necessary to widen the federation, so as to maintain the specificity of the Anglophones in a generalised federalisation. Each English-speaking federated state having its own autonomy, we would have avoided the risk of a generalised demand for autonomy from the entire community.”

In the meantime, the conflict keeps escalating with the death last week of soldiers a in a rocket attack on their convoy in Manyemen Koupé-Manengouba sub division in the south west region.

Since the end of 2017, authorities have reported dozens of deaths and attacks on soldiers and police by separatists. Other observers point to a heavier toll. The number of deaths among civilians and separatists is still difficult to establish.