More than 250 ex-combatants have been rescued from terrorist networks in Cameroon since the end of January 2019, APA learned Tuesday from the relevant services of the National Committee for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reinsertion (CNDDR).
While the largest number of these ex-combatants, mostly made up of child soldiers and now admitted to re-education centers, comes from the Far North, where the Islamist sect Boko Haram is rife, the other repenting fighters hail from the northwestern and southwestern regions, still in the grip of a secessionist crisis since the end of October 2016.
In CNDDR, we justify the “somewhat slow” pace of the surrender by the terror that militias exert on their ex-comrades, but also the fear of retaliation by public authorities instilled in people’s minds by foreign jihadist networks.
In the rehabilitation and reintegration centers, and apart from the security that is guaranteed to them, in these centers, the demobilized persons are trained in small income-generating activities, such as agriculture, livestock and other small trades.
Established in November 2018, CNDDR, whose expected budget for 2020 is five billion CFA francs, targets Boko Haram ex-combatants and English-speaking separatists who wish to respond favorably to the peace offer by the country’s leader, by laying down their weapons.
FCEB/cat/fss/abj/APA