“Widikum has become a battle ground between Military and ADF” –Lord Mayor

By Francis Ekongang Nzante

The Lord Mayor of the Widikum-Boffe Council Tayo Denis Aghem has declared that “Widikum has become a battle ground between the military and what many people call the Ambazonia Defense Forces” and that as a result, the populations have deserted their homes. He was speaking during the joint Widikum-Boffe council session for the presentation of the 2017 Administrative Accounts and update of the Council Development Plan on Wednesday April 25^th 2018 at the Council Hall in Widikum.

Mboh Barnabas Petiangha in speech while Mayor looks on

The session was rendered stormy to say the least by the confrontational stance taken by Mboh Barnabas Petiangha, the Divisional Officer for Widikum and Tayo Denis Aghen, Lord Mayor of Widikum-Boffe Council. The set up was rendered more eerie by the quasi deserted Widikum Municipality with its empty streets and sealed up buildings.

Reacting to the request from the Project Committee and from many other quarters within the council that bike riders should be permitted to work between 7 am and 4 pm, Mboh Barnabas Petiangha, Divisional Officer of Widikum said for any structure to improve, people had to continuously learn. He further said the Council was rated last in the Northwest Region by PNDP classification. This was viewed by the mayor and the councilors to mean they had not learnt anything and that the council was still being poorly managed.

Tayo Denis Aghen, Mayor of Widikum

The DO said bikes should be registered and that it was on the bases of the number presented to the Governor of the Northwest Region Adolfe Lele L’Afrique that permission could be granted. Commenting on the tense relation between the military and the population and the complete breakdown of confidence in the military by the population due to casualties following deadly confrontations, he pushed the responsibility to councilors calling on them to convince the population that the military was there for their protection and not the other way round.

Lord Mayor Tayo Denis Aghen on his part stated categorically that “Widikum-Boffe Council was not the last but among the last and our position was praise worthy considering the problems that we had.” Tayo Denis Aghen said such a comment from the DO was uncalled for since it referred to a particular time in the past and did not seem to take into consideration the fact that much had been done along the line to bring to justice individuals who were responsible for the financial imbroglio of the council. Such utterances he said were inspired by bad fate and could not be condoned at such sensitive times when every hand was needed on deck to push the municipality forward.

Tayo Denis Aghem summed it up in the following manner; “Everything went on well because we now have a seasoned Municipal Treasurer who replaced the former one. His accounts have been very administrative, very technical and straight to the point. Now things are moving on very well.”

The President of the Widikum Fons Union HRH Menti Ignatius Wancho said the session had taken two days with the first day dedicated to a detailed study of everything that had to be done on the day of the session its self. This was to make sure that things moved fast on the day of the session itself for purely security reasons. The council has been moving smoothly and this time we don’t suspect any embezzlement. The local Administrator who represented the SDO didn’t seem to be aware of this arrangement and it resulted in a little hitch at the tail end of it. We call on the administration to address the situation so that normalcy should return to Widikum.”   

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