Disturbed by the recent controversial reports by some dailies and other online media that Nigeria may lose 24 local government areas to the new purported ‘’UNO state’’ Adamawa border communities have asked the Nigerian government to react and clear the air, describing the reports as ‘’ fake news.’’
The Guardian earlier reports that by July 10 this year, Nigeria may lose 24 local councils, by way of ceding, to a new country to be known as United Nations Organisation (UNO) State of Cameroon at its borders with la Republique du Cameroun.
The reports purportedly say that 24 local government areas to be ceded, in Borno (five), Adamawa (12) and Taraba (seven) states to form a new country.
The councils to be ceded to ‘’UNO State of Cameroon’’ include Bama, Gwoza, Ngala, Kala/Balge, Dikwa. Others include Madagali, Michika, Mubi North, Mubi South, Mayo/Belwa, Toungo, Ganye, Serti, Hong, Jada, Maiha and Jada councils
Reactions Trail
Though the Nigerian government is yet to comment on the controversy, however in a swift reaction some prominent Adamawa indigenes and community leaders were emphatic that Nigeria Won’t lose any Local councils, by way of ceding, to a new country to be known as United Nations Organisation (UNO) State of Cameroon.
The former of Adamawa Mr. Boni Haruna who is an indigene of Michika in his Facebook wall described the story as fake news.
Boni who was a Governor from 1999-2007, in his response he said:
“It is a well-crafted Fake News. Some of us are still very much around to say something on this claim. Alhaji Dahiru Bobbo was the Director-General of the National Boundary Commission from 1999-2006. He definitely has something say on the news of Nigeria ceding 24 Local Government Areas to be part of a so-called UNO State of Cameroon.
“Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar is also one personality that was well placed to say something. As Vice President then, he was the statutory Chairman of the National Boundary Commission. He was in a good position to know if there was anything that was done under his watch to cede 24 Local areas including his own LGA to Cameroon while he was in office as the number two man in the country then. If there was any document that was signed by President Obasanjo and Paul Biya in respect of ceding certain areas between their two countries, it was only with regards to the implementation of the judgement of the International Court of Justice in the Hague on Bakassi and the need to establish the boundaries of the two countries.
“The Adamawa State Government had cause to interface with the office of the DG of the National Boundary Commission then when the area ceded to Nigeria, Burha Vango was to be officially handed over by Cameroon. On 24th September 2005, the ceremony for the handing over of the ceded area was held in Burha Vango under the watch of members of the United Nations which included Nigeria’s Representative in the International Court of Justice, Prince Bola Ajibola, members of the Cameroon-Nigeria Mixed Commission which included our own, Alh Dahiru Bobbo, the Governor as representative of Adamawa state and the Governor of that region from Cameroon. It was a colourful ceremony
“Immediately after the area was handed over to Nigeria, the National Boundary Commission and the Adamawa State government took steps to provide basic facilities to the people towards ensuring their integration into their new country. This what happened in Adamawa in respect of ceded area. It is also to be recalled that Gwoza in Borno, Madagali, Michika, Maiha, Mubi North, Mubi South, Jada and Ganye in Adamawa, Serti in Taraba were then administered as United Nations Trustees until the 1963 plebiscite when the people elected to remain in Nigeria. It is not on record that people from these areas have ever agitated to renounce their citizenship to join UNO State of Cameroon. We hope this is not politics taken too far and a build-up to 2023 to cause confusion in the country.”
AbdurRahman Mutawalle a community leader in Michika one of the said designated councils that may be affected has asked President Muhammadu Buhari and other concerned authorities to clear the air on the controversy.
‘’ Much as I agreed with all the condemnations of social and mainstream media on the unfortunate reports on creation of a new nation or state out of Nigeria/Cameroun, by the UN , I may also ask some few questions that may need response:
- How many hours, days or months the issue been raised and published on the mainstream media?
- Why the issue now? I asked these two questions for now, REASONS:
- OBJ is alive we may need his voice
- The U.N. is still existing, there is need they respond too or Nigerian representative in UN
- The Nigeria foreign affairs ministry should come up with facts on the much talk and clear the air.
Mutawalle further advised ‘’ our leaders, at all levels should wake up and trace the roots of this matter. We should collectively not sleep on it. It is a serious issue that needs all and sundry to wake, ask questions and educate the citizens.
‘’We are all alive when Bakasi was transferred to Cameroun, Burha Vengo and others to Nigeria, it was like a play and it becomes reality. Then we have elected members of the National Assembly, but nothing was done, though, it was only Flourence Ita Giwa who was speaking on the issue.
‘’I call on our elected members of the National Assembly, to trace the roots of the issue/matter and inform the citizens accordingly,’’ he urges.
Hamman Tukur Saad who hails from Maiha Gari of Maiha Local Government Area of Adamawa in the Northern senatorial district said the decision of UN of creating a separate country from the former British Cameron through a plebiscite would win.
“I was in Primary school when the 1961 plebiscite was conducted. I still remember vividly, that there were initially three options given to the people: to join the Republic of Cameroon, to join independent Nigeria, or to remain as a separate country.
“Within a few weeks the third option was squashed at the UN by Nigeria and Cameroon with the collaboration of the British who were ruling the Territory on behalf of UN. Furthermore, the UN promised a confirmatory plebiscite after 10 years of union with either Nigeria or Cameroon.
“Again Nigeria and Cameroon squashed the intended plebiscite, it never took place. Ever since there are pockets of agitators for the creation of a separate country both on the northern side and the southern side under Cameroon. As a result of repression from Paul Biya the southerners took to arms demanding a separate country, Amozonia.
Dahiru Bobbo, a former Director-General of the National Boundary Commission has described as untrue reports that Nigeria may lose 24 local councils.
Bobbo in a statement said there was no summit between former President Olusegun Obasanjo and Paul Biya of Cameroun and there was no agreement to cede any territory to United Nations.
In his words “There is no iota of truth in the report purported to have been published in the Guardian to the effect that Nigeria may lose 24 Local government Area councils to new UN state on the basis of “OBASANJO,BIYA CEDED TERRITORIES IN 2003”
“As the Director-General of the National Boundary Commission of Nigeria 1999 to 2006, I confirmed that there had never been a Summit between Obasanjo and Biya throughout the year 2003. Therefore there could have been no agreement, treaty, communiqué or any other bilateral exchange of documents between Cameroon and Nigeria on cessation of territories to UN or to anybody for that matter.
“The records available confirmed only two meetings of Presidents Obasanjo of Nigeria and Biya of Cameroon on Paris on 5th September 2002 and Geneva on 15 November 2002 both on the invitations of the United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Anan. The Communiqués issued on the two Summits were in respect of the establishment Ofa Cameroon Nigerian Mixed Commission on the implementation of the decisions of the International Court of justice at the Hague(The World Court) on Bakassi Peninsula and the Land Boundary between Nigeria and Cameroon”.
“The Mixed Commission of which I was a member and Secretary handled the assignment and handed over territories to both Cameroon and Nigeria as ruled by the World Court including Dambore, Narki (BORNO)and Burha Vango (ADAMAWA)to Nigeria and Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroon”.
“The last two meetings between the UN Secretary-General and President Biya and President Obasanjo were held in Geneva on 11 May 2005,and at Greentree,New York on 12 June 2006 concerning the Modalities of Withdrawal and Transfer of Authority in the Bakassi Peninsula on the whole the ruling of 10 October 2002 of the International Court of justice.
Also corroborating, Yakubu Abdullahi Yakubu a veteran journalist and prolific writer posted ‘’ I attempted to draw a timeline of the adventure or rather misadventure of the Germans in Adamawa Emirate before and after the onset of colonial rule in 1900.
‘’I have tried to decipher the reason why the defunct German colony has taken center-stage in the recent discourse of a new so-called country out of Nigeria and Cameroon. Even though I have made a promise to myself not to engage in the stupid discussion over a fake ‘UNO of Cameroon’, I find it imperative to create this timeline (from my upcoming book) for the benefit of my friends on Facebook.
‘’To satisfy my curiosity, I said to myself: if the trouble makers want to go back into history to agitate for a country based on the German colony that collapsed after the First World War in 1918, why can’t they go the whole hog to 1882, that is a year just before the Berlin Conference, to return the so-called ‘territories to be ceded’ to the Lamido of Adamawa, from whose grandfather parts of the emirate were seized, carved, occupied, and colonised?
‘’Fortunately, we have come a long way from that point to where we have a democratically constituted government that gained independence in 1960,’’ he wrote.
THE TIMELINE
Giving the timeline Yakubu Abdullahi Yakubu further, ‘’1884: Germany begins its occupation of the Cameroons in Adamawa Emirate. They called the land – ‘Kamerun’ because they heard the Portuguese calling it ‘Rio des Cameroons’ which means ‘river of prawns’. The Spanish changed the name to Cameroons. The Germans raise a flag in Duala, to say we have come and we have conquered.
1893: The Anglo-German Agreement ignites a string of agreements that led to the balkanization of the emirate in the future. The Germans begin to take over the lands of the Lamido of adamawa from the south of the emirate.
1898: The French and British enter the Anglo-Franco treaty, a pact that comes to disintegrate the Sokoto Caliphate.
1899: The German Imperial Governor in Cameroon dispatches a military unit from Yaoundé comprising 350 soldiers and 4 commandants led by Von Kamptz. The operation code-named “Voute-Adamawa Expedition” attacks, occupies Adamawa in the most brutal, and bloody way seen in that part of the world.
1900: Sir Frederick Lugard is appointed the High Commissioner of the new Northern Nigeria Protectorate.
1901: Tibati, the strongest of the districts in the south of the adamawa emirate becomes a stronghold of the German Protectorate of Cameroon, with headquarters in Garwa. The two European powers, Britain and Germany set up protectorates. The British take over one-quarter of Adamawa with the capital at Yola, while the remaining three quarters go to the Germans.
1902: the German army marched on Marua, Mubi, and raided the Michika and Kilba districts.
1902: The German army marched on Marua, Mubi, and raided the Michika and Kilba districts.
1904: The Germans and British officials draw the boundary from Yola to Lake Chad without regard to the historical boundaries of the districts. The Germans take over seven-eighths of the lands.
1906: A second agreement is signed to demarcate the borderlines of German and British territories from Yola to the Lake Chad in March. Another boundary convention between Britain and France holds at London in May. The configuration of the International Boundary caused endless trouble and uncertainty in the early years of the occupation. Worse, the final settlement of the agreements deprived Adamawa of its richest provinces.
1919: In an Anglo-French Partition Agreement after the First World War, Britain receives some parts of the defunct German Protectorate. More than half the people of Adamawa Emirate are removed to the Cameroons. Three European nations have administered the emirate in less than twenty-five years. The Treaty of Versailles divides the German territories, extending from Lake Chad to the sea, between France and Great Britain under either British or French mandate with the supervision of the League of Nations.
1922: The League of Nations demarcates the former German territories and gives them to Britain and Adamawa Province to administer as ‘mandated territories’. In the Northern Mandated Area were eleven districts – Madagali, Moda, Michika, Mayo Bani, Mubi, Vokna, Maiha, Kowagul, Sorau, Wafango and Belel.
1926: The French colonial government concedes one-quarter of German Adamawa to merge with Yola. Incidentally, three-quarters of the territory remained with the French in what is now Cameroon Republic. At the peak of the emirate’s territorial expansion, it was 64, 000 square kilometers in size, extending to most parts of present Cameroon, and a part of Chad Republic right to the western fringe of DR Congo.
The Political Angles
While the state and Federal government yet to make categorical statement on the matter, some pundits sees political undertone ahead of 2023. Barr Sunday Joshua Wugira was emphatic that it could another way of diverting Nigerians’ attention to another unnecessary debate ahead of 2023 elections.
Wugira said, ‘’In my opinion, this news was contrived to divert the attention of Nigerians from certain things happening now in our country or whip up public sentiment against someone. Certainly, some big politicians in the government at the center may be responsible for this through the back door.’’
Another pundit Sa’ad argues ‘’
“The northern side faired better and weren’t clamoring for secession from Nigeria. For example, the political leaders on the Adamawa side that come from that territory include: Bamanga Tukur, Atiku Abubakar, Governor Boni Haruna, Gov Muhammadu Umaru Jibirilla Bindow,Former acting Governor Bala James Ngilariand current Governor Umar Ahmadu Fintiri.
“On the Borno side political heavyweights like Ali Modu Sherif, Ibrahim Bunu and even the late Abba Kyar, are from the said territory. So you can see why the clamoring is not audible to public. On the other hand others outside the territory may wish that they are exercised from Nigeria.
“Atiku enemies or even his friends within the PDP would want him out of the race ta Aso Rock. I am sure if it were possible for Obasanjo to sign such a document in 2006 he would have signed it as good riddance. Similarly the Borno political juggernaut Sen Modu Sherif is a thone in the flesh of many Borno politicians if not national playes, and a move that would exclude him would be welcome, even at the expense of the nation.” Saad Said
In the meantime, investigations have revealed that sometime before and in November 2019 members for the actualisation of UNO state of Cameroon held sensitization workshops in Gwoza, Michika, Mubi, Ganye, Serti and Gembu of Borno, Adamawa and Taraba States.to sensitize citizens.
In Michika Augustine Sah, one of the steering committee members for the actualisation of UNO state of Cameroon said, the ongoing workshops are to raise awareness of residents, both from northern and southern Cameroon on “rectification and regularisation’’ of their State by UNO.
Our Agitation is genuine- UNO committee members
Augustine Sah, leader of 19-member Steering Committee on UNO state of Cameroon had on this Sunday said that the UN Employed ‘Preventive Diplomacy’ For UNO State of Cameroon
He disclosed: “The December 2019 sensitization workshop in Gembu, Taraba state, was to raise awareness of citizens in 17 councils in Borno, Adamawa and Taraba state in Northeast, Nigeria.
“The sensitization workshops in Gembu, Michika, Mubi, Ganye, Serti, and Gwoza were in accordance with the rectification and regularization of UNO State of Cameroon by the UN.”
He reiterated that the workshops commenced with the awareness of former UN Secretaries General, Annan and Ban Ki-Moon with diplomatic consultations of Presidents of Cameroon and Nigeria.
He further disclosed that; “Ki-moon; on June 10, 2010 also gave two flags to Biya to be hoisted in former Trust Territory of Cameroon under the British administration now called: “UNO State of Cameroon” and the flag of independence of Cameroon.
“The two flags, were raised in the now territory of la Republique du Cameroon.
“The certified true copy of the national identity card of the UNO State of Cameroon for Prof. Ateh authorizes him to issue same IDs to citizens of new state.”
According to him, the UN flag was raised in Bamenda for UNO State of Cameroon in the premises of United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in May 2019.
While speaking on ceded councils, Sah said: “In Adamawa state, eight councils of Michika, Ganye, Jada, Maiha, Madagali, Mubi North, Mubi South and Toungo, including parts of Fufore, Mayo Belwa and Song, are to be ceded for UNO state of Cameroon.”
According to the Google Map of new state, five Local Government Areas (LGAs) in Borno state; are to join northeast part of UNO state of Cameroon.
The five councils include Bama, Dikwa, Gwoza, Ngala and Kala/Balge. While seven Local Government Areas are either wholly or partially demarcated to join the new state of Cameroon in Taraba state.
“The fully affected councils in Taraba, include Gashaka, Kurmi and Sardauna, while Ardo Kola, Bali, Takum and Yorro are partially demarcated to form new state,” said Sah; adding that the population of Northern Cameroon Trust Territory, is about 4.5 million, according to Nigeria’s 2006 Census.
Kimbi Mohammed Diallo of the UNO State of Cameroon in Bamenda told The Guardian that the Territory of the Cameroon UNO state (86,214 sqkm) was a follow up of the rectification and regularization of United Nations General Assembly Resolution 1608 (XV) of April 21, 1961.
He said the United Nations General Assembly through the then President of 64th Session, Dr. Ali Abdas-Salam Triki on May 20, 2010; handed the maps of the Cameroon UNO State and that of La Republique du Cameroun on January 1, 1960 at Unity Palace, Yaounde.
He explained that this was during the celebration of 50 years of la Republique du Cameroun’s independence and Africa 21st International Conference in Yaounde.
According to him; “The current and two former Presidents of the Federal Republic of Nigeria were also present and received their own copies of the maps,” listing the former presidents and Head of State to include; Olusegun Obasanjo, Goodluck Jonathan and Yakubu Gowon.
On creation of new state and flags, Diallo said: “On his way to opening ceremony of the FIFA World Cup in South Africa, Ban Ki Moon,the sitting Secretary General of UN made a stopover in Yaounde and handed to President Paul Biya two flags on June 10, 2010,” stating that the la Republique du Cameroun flag colour of “green, red, and yellow” without a star at independence of January 1960 were also handed over along with UN’s flag for UNO state of Cameroon.
“We’re still a Trustee of the United Nations; as the process of rectification, regularization, adjustment, and accommodation of UN Resolution 1608 (XV) of April 21. 1961 was still going on,” he said.
But reacting on ceding 28 councils to new state, Sah said: “From 2009, we could see the United Nations presence in our territory as the UN technicians and engineers were tracing pillars dividing us from the Federal Republic of Nigeria and from la Republic du Cameroun, the two neighbours to the West and East.
“This exercise went on from 2009 to February 2014,” stating that Nigeria has lost more territory, particularly in Cross River state; where 17 Local Government Areas were ceded to the new State; following the Anglo-German Treaty Boundary demarcation.”
While lamenting on the ‘faking and condemnation” of Guardianstory he said: “Well, when the truth is unveiled everybody will see for themselves.
“Do you think Nigeria is a fool that her territory being threatened and sits quietly?”
He, therefore; queried that if The Guardian story of last Friday; was false, they would not be moving around freely in the country.
‘’Let the Nigerian authorities deny the statements issued by the UN on UNO state of Cameroon.
“What happened in Gembu last December; should have proven the worth of what we are doing to actualize our new state,” he said.
According to him, the UN is basically employing ‘preventive diplomacy’ in handling the issue; which is moving progressively to meet the July 10, 2020 deadline for a new state in Africa.
“All the doubting Thomasis will and believe,” he said; adding that; “We’re coming out British Togo land. When you see you believe.”
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