The Story of Mr. Joseph Y.T. - War Victim, Internally Displaced
The organization, Voiceless Advocacy (VOCAD), opened my mind on a lot of things concerning asylum issues, it was my first time to learn on the procedure to file for asylum. The personnel worked me on different appointments to guide me through a successful asylum process. I have referred the organization to more than 30 people whose impressions have been positive. Working with Voiceless advocacy, as an asylum seeker is 70% chances of winning an asylum case.
On May 20th 2019, the population of Muyuka turned out massively and occupied the ceremonial ground. We all gathered with peace plants to ask the government to organize a genuine dialogue to end the war, this resulted to a confrontation between the population and the police with a reinforcement from the gendarmes. It was the worst experience to be among those arrested by the security forces and locked up at the gendarmerie brigade where I was detained for three days from May 20th 2019 to May 23rd 2019 with no possibility of a bail because of my previous arrest records, I only escaped through the help of my brother’s friend who bribed a gendarme on duty with an undisclosed sum of money. Fortunately, my father’s close friend Mr. Joseph K. who works at the National Gendarmerie, Department of Territorial Surveillance and Investigations in Limbe in Fako-Division. He informed my father secretly of some classified and confidential information, from the government instructing all detention centers keeping detainees connected with SCNC activities and having two or more detention records who signed warnings, to be transferred to Yaounde Nkondegui-maximum security prison. They were to be charged ranging from; preaching the independence of Southern Cameroons, spreading revolutionary ideas to the population, preaching school boycott and to withdraw the imposition of the French language to English speaking students, all of them to face trial in the military court with the possibility of a death penalties or life imprisonment.
Immediately, the information reached my family, the help of my brother’s friend was solicited for a negotiation, the payment of an undisclosed sum of money for my escape from the gendarmerie cell in Muyuka under cover of night. As I remained in hiding making arrangements for my escape out of the country, I learned that the police and gendarmes arrived our family home in Muyuka searching for me. When they met my grandmother who couldn’t tell them my whereabout, they angrily locked her in the house and set the whole house on fire, she got roasted to death in the fire. This action precipitated my escape from Cameroon on June 1st 2019 through the help of a police officer in the Douala international airport. I continued my escape for safety till when I found myself in the United States of America to plead for protection.