(Nairobi) – Cameroon’s authorities should immediately reverse the suspension of a prominent human rights group, Human Rights Watch said today. The arbitrary suspension lacks a lawful basis and violates the right to freedom of association under both Cameroonian law and international human rights law.
On December 5, 2024, the minister of territorial administration, Paul Atanga Nji, issued a decree without prior notification suspending the activities of the Central Africa Human Rights Defenders Network (Réseau des Défenseurs des Droits Humains en Afrique Centrale, REDHAC) for three months. He cited as reasons, among others, “illicit and exorbitant funding,” and lack of compliance with the legislation regulating the activities of non-profit organizations. On the same day, Nji suspended for three months at least four other civil society organizations. Cameroon’s 1990 law on freedom of association says that the territorial administration minister can only suspend an association with prior authorization from the provincial authority and for public-order and security related reasons. The decision appears linked to the Cameroonian authorities’ pervasive crackdown on civil society, the media, and the political opposition.
“Ensuring that associations operate transparently may be a legitimate aim, but the Cameroonian authorities have no justification to trample on rights protected by the constitution and the law and to bypass the judiciary,” said Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at Human Rights Watch. “They should immediately lift the suspension and use the proper procedures established by law to go after any group against whom there is credible evidence of involvement in illicit funding.”
On December 9, REDHAC’s lawyers lodged an administrative appeal, saying that the decree represents an “abuse of power” and is illegal. They said it violates, among others, the 1990 law on freedom of association, and the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa’s April 2016 Regulation on the Prevention and Suppression of Money Laundering and Financing of Terrorism and Proliferation in Central Africa. The regulation says that only the National Agency For Financial Investigation (Agence Nationale d’Investigation Financière. ANIF), and financial and judicial authorities are entitled to initiate any proceedings against offenders.
On the same day, the administrative authorities in Douala, Littoral region, and the police sealed REDHAC’s office. Protesting this action, REDHAC’s board president, Alice Nkom, a prominent human rights lawyer, broke the seals. The provincial authority summoned her the next day. She will be questioned on December 19.
Since 2010, REDHAC has worked to advance human rights and the rule of law in Cameroon. In 2022, its leader, Maximilienne Ngo Mbe, a fierce human rights defender, received the prestigious Robert F. Kennedy human rights award for leading REDHAC and for her “persistence in the face of consistent threats and reprisals, and her dedication to the advancement of human rights.”
REDHAC recently submitted a report to the United Nations Committee Against Torture – a group of independent experts that monitors the implementation of the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment by its states parties – which reviewed Cameroon’s sixth periodic report under the treaty on November 14. In its report, REDHAC highlighted the widespread practice of torture by Cameroonian security forces in and outside Cameroon’s detention facilities.
Human Rights Watch has repeatedly documented the use of torture in Cameroon’s jails and prisons as well as against perceived political opponents and human rights defenders. Nji’s decision against REDHAC is the latest in a series of government moves designed to squash freedom of association and free speech ahead of the 2025 presidential elections, Human Rights Watch said.
On October 9, Nji issued a separate communique saying that the health of President Paul Biya is a “security issue,” that any media debate on the president’s condition is “formally forbidden,” and that “offenders” will face the law. The decision caused uproar among media professionals and opposition party leaders, who criticized it as step backward for freedom of expression.
In March, the government banned two opposition coalitions, describing them as “clandestine movements.” In June, gendarmes in Adamawa region arbitrarily arrested, not for the first time, a prominent artist, Aboubacar Siddiki, known as Babadjo, for “insulting” a governor. And in July, the head of the Mfoundi administrative division issued a decree threatening to ban anyone insulting state institutions. That same month, members of the intelligence services in the Littoral region arrested a social media activist, Junior Ngombe, for his TikTok videos advocating democratic change, and security forces forcibly disappeared and allegedly tortured Ramon Cotta, a social media activist known for his TikTok videos criticizing the Cameroonian authorities.
REDHAC’s suspension has led to a public outcry. National human rights groups and prominent civil society figures, including lawyers and political opposition members, criticized the decision as yet another attempt to restrict the already thin space for civil society organizations to operate in Cameroon.
“This decision has no legal basis,” Cyrille Bechon, executive director of Cameroonian rights group Nouveaux Droits de l’Homme, told Human Rights Watch. “It shows to which extent the authorities can trample on the rule of law and freedom of association in Cameroon.”
“This outrageous and abusive decision to suspend an important human rights group compounds the Cameroonian government’s already troubling assault on civic space,” Allegrozzi said. “Instead of harassing rights groups, the government should fulfill its obligations to provide civil society organizations with an environment in which to operate freely and flourish.”