Mayor Sues Newspaper Publisher for Defamation

FC Junior

The Publisher of The Monitor Newspaper, Amungwa Tanyi Nicodemus will be appearing before the examining magistrate of the Bamenda Court of 1^st Instance tomorrow April 12; 2013 to answer two counts brought against him. According to information filtering into our office, the Mayor of Santa council, Atanga Wankie Clement is the complainant.

According to our source Amungwa Tanyi Nicodemus (Publisher of The Monitor) has been sued for on drummed-up charges emanating from a story published in The Monitor in 2010 with caption- Did the mayor of Santa turn down cfa 200 million to step up electricity in Awing? And another investigative story published in 2013 captioned -Illegal exploitation of the Ngemba Forest -The trio trapped in the looting.

Sources say that Amungwa Tanyi received intimidating phone calls from Mayor Wankie who later seek solace in court action. This decision is coming after the arbitrary sanctions melted on media outlets in Cameroon by the National Communication Council. A school of thought holds that with the ax of the Communication falling journalists like trees in the bush, politicians have also dived the other way to stigmatize journalists that criticize their actions.

The problem in Cameroon is that journalists have decried that defamation should be decriminalized yet it has been falling on deaf ears.  It is alleged that the mayor of Santa is claiming that his political image has been tarnished and would like the publisher to prove the veracity of the facts of the story. However, public opinion holds that it would be very detrimental for someone who holds a prestigious position in the SDF like Wankie Clement to antagonize self with journalists especially as elections are in the offing. However one of the most surprising things in Cameroon is that every now and then, politicians always claim that their images have been soiled whereas no one has ever had the time to question the lies and or empty promises they make during campaigns.

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