[stop-imf] IMF Sanctioned Privatization of the Cameroon Development Corporation Challenged (fwd)

[Robert Weissman]

BAKWERI LAND CLAIMS COMMITTEE-USA
P.0. Box 433,
Orono, ME, 04473-9998
U.S.A

Fax: (425) 955-9218
Email: blcc-usa@bakwerilands.org <mailto:blcc-usa@bakwerilands.org>
Web:  <http://www.bakwerilands.org>
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Mr. Horst K=F6hler
Managing Director
International Monetary Fund
700 19th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20431

June 16, 2000

Dear Mr. Managing Director:

Subject:  IMF SANCTIONED PRIVATIZATION OF CAMEROON DEVELOPMENT
CORPORATION (CDC), WITHOUT CONSULTATION WITH THE NATIVE
LANDOWNERS.

We, the Bureau of the Bakweri Land Claims Committee-USA (BLCC-USA),
together with our fellow Fako indigenes living in all continents of the
world, assembled through the revolutionary technology of the Internet,
have been made to understand that in June 2000, the IMF Board of Directors
reviewed the Enhanced Structural Adjustment Facility (ESAF)/ Poverty
Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) program of the Republic of Cameroon,
and that the Managing Director, Mr. Horst Koehler, will be visiting
Cameroon in July 2000.  The country's privatization scheme is being
carried out under this program.  Cameroon government-controlled parastatal
companies scheduled to be privatized under the ESAF/PRGF program include
the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC), an agro-industrial company
located mainly in Fako Division, home of the indigenous Bakweri people.

The Bakweri, speaking through the Bakweri Land Claims Committee in the
U.S.A. (BLCC-USA) hereby reiterate their unwavering opposition to any
privatization program that does not take into consideration the legitimate
rights of the natives whose ancestral lands the soon to be privatized CDC
and its colonial predecessors, have exploited without compensation for
more than a century.

We wish to state that more than 380 square miles of land currently
occupied by the CDC, virtually all of Fako division's most fertile land,
were forcefully and brutally expropriated from our forefathers without
compensation, by German colonizers in the late 19th century for purposes
of large-scale plantation agriculture.  In 1947, these plantations were
leased to the CDC by the British colonial government which had seized them
from the Germans after World War II, on terms that they would be held in
trust for the indigenous native Bakweri until such time that they were
able to manage the plantations themselves.  In 1960 the British colonial
administration ceded power to the Government of Southern Cameroons, which
has now been succeeded by the Government of the Republic of Cameroon.

Under the terms of the lease of these lands to CDC, the latter was
required to pay annual ground rent, for the benefit of the disposed
indigenous natives.  The native Bakweri have never been paid any part of
these rents, and with privatization looming in the horizon, whereby their
lands will be alienated to foreign companies, the Bakweri resolutely
refuse to recognize any privatization of the CDC that does not take into
account the just, long-standing and legitimate rights of the Bakweri over
their land.  (Please see United Nations Trusteeship Agreements of 1946 and
1947, and the 1960 Land Lease Agreement at the BLCC-USA website:

=09=09<http://www.bakwerilands.org>


The position of the Bakweri, the land owners, is that while they are not
opposed to privatization per se, the rental terms under which their land
is leased to foreign developers should be clearly spelt out and acceptable
to them, with a clear statement of the reversionary Bakweri interest in
the land.

It must also be pointed out that since this region is the habitat of many
endangered wildlife species including mountain gorillas, antelopes and
elephants, prospective lessees of lands currently occupied by the CDC
should also be made aware of their obligations within the framework of
internationally recognized environmental norms.  The terms of
privatization should be clearly spelt out and should recognize the
ownership of land as a distinct variable which, together with capital and
labor, makes plantation agriculture possible.

The BLCC position is consistent with the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, and Article 21 of the African Charter of Human and Peoples' Rights
of 1981 which states, inter alia:

"1.  All peoples shall freely dispose of their wealth and natural
resources. This right shall be exercised in the exclusive interest of the
people.  In no case shall a people be deprived of it.

2.  In case of spoliation, the dispossessed people shall have the right to
the lawful recovery of its property as well as to an adequate
compensation."

As the current impasse in Zimbabwe and Kenya demonstrate, land
expropriated from African natives by European colonialists a century ago
is the source of much contemporary unrest and instability. All
Cameroonians of goodwill bear witness that the Bakweri people have over
the years opted for a peaceful resolution of this CDC Bakweri land
problem.  However should the privatization of the CDC go ahead without the
input of the Bakweri on whose land most of the corporation's
agro-industrial activities are located, we reserve the right to seek legal
redress against the Government of the Republic of Cameroon, the IMF, the
World Bank as well as all lessees who derive title to the land by whatever
means, in any country of the world where such bodies are located.

In furtherance of the above stated objective, the BLCC-USA will associate
with the international mass media, environmental groups, Human Right
groups and other non-governmental organizations around the world, in its
just struggle against exploitation of ancestral lands without compensation
to the dispossessed landowners.

It is worthy of note to all concerned with the privatization of the CDC
that there is right now very high socio-political tension in the
English-speaking provinces of Cameroon, where the lands under discussion
are to be found. Privatizing the CDC without the consent and participation
of the native landowners carries grave risks especially to potential
investors, as the object lesson in Zimbabwe and Kenya amply illustrates. =
=20
The world must learn to prevent conflicts, as the cost of putting them out
is usually disproportionately high, in terms of human lives and resources.

BLCC-USA sincerely hopes that its timely appeals will be headed to, in the
interest of equity, peace, and national unity of present and future
generations of Cameroonians.

Please accept the expression of our highest esteem.

For and on behalf of BLCC-USA and the Bakweri around the world.


Lyombe Eko, Ph.D. Executive Director, BLCC-USA

Njoh Endeley, Ph.D.
Secretary General, BLCC-USA

Dibussi Tande
Director of Communications, BLCC-USA

Emil Mondoa, M.D.
Senior Adviser-BLCC-USA

Jack Endeley
President, Fako America


cc

The President
The World Bank Group
1818 H Street, N.W.
Washington, DC 20433

Mr. Serge Michailof
Country Director, Cameroon
Room #J 7-157
1818 H Street, N.W.
Washington D.C. 20433

Mr. Robert Lacey
Cameroon Resident Representative
World Bank Field Office
Street 1.792, No. 186
New Bastos, PO Box 1128
Yaounde, Cameroon

Hon. Jesse Helms,
Chairman, Foreign Relations Committee
United States Senate
Washington DC

Hon. Edward R. Royce
Chairman of the U.S. Congress Subcommittee on Africa
H I - 705 O'Neill House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515

 The Honorable Susan E. Rice
Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs
U.S. Department of State
Washington, D.C. 20520

Ambassador Jerome Mendouga
Embassy of the Republic of Cameroon
2349 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington DC, 20008