Journalists of
different media houses who constitute panelists of the award-winning CRTV Buea
Press Club Programme are receiving death threats from anonymous sources for dissecting
certain sensitive matters of public interest such as what is now known as Fako
land-grabbing /illegal land acquisition by some administrative officers.
By so doing, the journalist-panelists
have stepped and are stepping - knowingly or unknowingly- on the toes of some crooked
public office holders who abuse their offices and commit other crimes, against
President Biya’s repeated call for good governance and a corruption-free
country.
The journalist-panelists
being threatened include Editor Chris Ambe of The Recorder Newspaper, Ayang Mc
Donald of Eden Newspaper, Dr.Ernest Molua of The Entrepreneur Online, Nana
Walter Wilson and Editor Bouddih Adams of The Post Newspaper, and Senior
Journalist Matute Menyoli of CRTV Buea who is the current presenter/moderator
of Press Club.
Matute Menyoli has already lodged a complaint
with, among other places, the Judicial Police in Buea,the State Counsel in
Buea, the SW Regional Coordinator of the
National Commission on Human Rights and Freedom ,as well as the Management of CRTV.
Before the formal
complaint, Matute Menyoli had earlier received several threats such as this
text message-“Good morning Mr. Matute. I’m called Alain Ndongo.Please call me
back for you are a target for death. One of your friends wants to kill you”.
 |
| Journalist Matute Menyoli |
But an anonymous call
last June 29 was particularly heart-breaking. It informed the club moderator that
he would be killed that day. That pushed Matute Menyoli to immediately alert
the police, who have since been monitoring his residence and those of the other
panelists.
Press Club, which is
aired from 8-9 am every Saturday, has been rated by listeners since its launch as
CRTV Buea’s best programme.
The programme has been
running for eight (8) years uninterrupted despite its critical content,which is
intended to cause defaulters in the
various sectors of society sit-up.
It was on April 29,2006 that the inaugural
edition of Press Club went on the air, with a pioneer panel comprising Nkeze
Mbonwoh(Cameroon Tribune),Chris Ambe,(then of The Herald Newspaper),Ernest
Molua(The Entrepreneur),Harry McYemti (Farmers’’Voice),Solomon Amabo(Eden
Newspaper),Molua Mensah Gbagado(International freelance Journalist) ,Pegue
Manga(The Post) and late Ezieh Christopher(The Heron)
According to Senior
Journalist Sam Bokuba, pioneer moderator/presenter of Press Club,the programme
was “born out of the desire to provide wider leverage to media professionals”
who are supposed “to make informed
comments and analysis on news events in consonance with the varied and conflicting tastes and
interests of CRTV-Buea Listeners” .
Although it is
essentially a discussion by journalists, Press Club sometimes invites a guest
or personality in the news to field questions from the panel of journalists on
issues of public concern. Guests who have featured on Press Club include: socio-economic and legal experts, traditional
and administrative authorities, university dons, diplomats, law-makers, health
professionals, political party leaders, educationists and ministers of God(the
clergy).
So important is Press
Club that Mr.Njomo Kevin, former manager of Mt Cameroon FM had it relayed for
several years on his radio station. Today it is being relayed by Radio
Bonakanda,a community radio in Buea,with
other radio stations intending to do same.
Worthy of note is the
fact that, Press Club’s edition of September 19, 2006 on speculative reporting,
got shortlisted for the finals of the 2007 BBC Excellence Radio Awards.
Recently, panelists of
Press Club strongly expressed their views on the alleged illegal sale and
acquisition of ex-CDC land ceded to Fako villages by some administrative
authorities.
The journalist-panelists
were joined by invitees and legal minds-Tambe Tiku Christopher, who is the Regional
Coordinator of the National Commission on Human Rights and Freedom and Ikome
Ngongi,retired UN legal consultant. Both the journalists and invitees, argued
with justifications that there was /is some mafia around land acquisition in
Fako, with local government officials involved.
The Government would later
set a commission of inquiry, a thing that has left “land grabbers” panicking
and some have covertly been threatening the lives of the press clubbers for
having the audacity to expose their wrong doings, which may lead to their
prosecution and eventual imprisonment.
In the face of these threats, the Press Club
panelists in their July 5 edition vowed to continue with their professional task
of exposing irregularities and illegalities in the public service, as part of
their contributions to a better society and President Biya’s anti-corruption war,
which has already sent many high-level government officials to prison(First Published In The RECORDER Newspaper ,Cameroon,of July 9,2014)
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