B’da drivers should respect their limits - VP Mamfe drivers union

Mamfe drivers have been in conflict with their Bamenda colleagues recently. What is the problem?

We clando drivers in Mamfe do essentially farm-to-market clandestine transport; we transport people and goods from the villages to markets. But our brothers from Bamenda who do the same clando business do not want to respect their limits.

They think that they can leave Bamenda with their vehicles and drive straight to Ekok with goods and passengers. We told them that this cannot be. When we ask them to end at Mamfe so that Mamfe drivers can now transport the passengers and goods into the hinterlands of Manyu, especially to Ekok they refused to understand with us. We found this improper and very disturbing.

This was more so because our motor park in Mamfe was becoming highly underused. Workers at the park had no work to do from morning till evening on a daily basis because Vehicles that are supposed to stop there do not stop. They just pass straight to other parts of Manyu division.

So we said this must stop. Our Bamenda colleagues insist on going to Ekok even though vehicles from Mamfe are not allowed to cross Widikum or Bali and get to Bamenda. As soon as we get to Bali our vehicles are impounded and heavy fines inflicted on us.

The same Bamenda drivers who insist on driving across Mamfe straight to Ekok are the ones who also refuse clando vehicles leaving Bafoussam driving across Bamenda. They have succeeded to stop vehicles leaving Bafoussam and passing straight to Mamfe. Clando vehicles from Bafoussam cannot go across Santa. But when we ask them to stop at Mamfe they insist on getting right to Ekok. So we said this cannot happen; they should respect their limits.

Do drivers have the right to control vehicles entering or leaving a town? Is that not the prerogative of the administration and the councils?

It is not our role to control vehicles. But we cannot fold our arms and sit down when our rights are trampled upon and the administration is throwing a blind eye to it. In fact, we have no problem with licensed transport agencies like Moghamo, Musango, Vatican or any agency with a transporters license going any where in Manyu.

It is their right to go to where ever they want because they are licensed to do transportation in the country. But clando transporters as the name implies are illegal transporters. The administration allows us to operate but not on the highways.

Clando vehicles should not leave Mamfe and get to Bamenda and vice versa. That is why we asked our Bamenda colleagues to respect their limits while we also respect ours. That was our worry. We never said that licensed transport agencies should not ply the roads in Manyu as some body some where wanted to make the public to believe.

But the SDO says you took the laws into your hands and blocked the highway to vehicles from Bamenda?

That is not true. We never blocked the highway. The SDO should say the truth; he should not try to fool the public. I can recall that when recently the minister of public health was visiting Ekok for a campaign on Ebola, it was the Bamenda drivers who mounted road blocks in Bali and Widikum.

The SDO from Manyu had to go up to Widikum to convince the drivers to dismantle the road blocks. I say it loud that we never mounted any blocks on the highway.

But some of your members were arrested because they blocked the highway?

I still insist that no one of our members ever blocked the highway. I can recall that after the clean up exercise on that fateful Thursday, we sat here at the motor park drinking our beer when suddenly a combined unit comprising of police, gendarmes and army entered the park and arrested eight of us. We were later locked up at the gendarmerie and police cells.

When our lawyers went to the SDO to find out why we were arrested, the SDO said he did not know who ordered the arrest. The police commissioner also claimed not to know who ordered our arrest, idem for the state council. So we sent a delegation to see the paramount chief of Mamfe. When HRH went and saw the SDO, the SDO maintained that he had no hand in our arrest. We stayed in jail until Monday when the state council granted us bail. So until now that I talk to you we still do not know our crime.

But why can you not acquire transport licenses so that you can operate legally?

License is not the issue here. Clando vehicles are not given transporters licenses. Transporters licenses are given only for vehicles of 12 seats and above. If the government was issuing highway transport licenses for small vehicles then I should obtain the license even now that I am speaking.

I have three clando vehicles on the road and it is not a transport license that should be more than me. Even in Yaounde, the national capital, you have clando vehicles that take people to nearby places like Nfou, Soa, Awae, Eyomabang, Nkolbissong, Zamengoe etc. But a clando vehicle would not cross Boumnyebel for example and get to Edea or cross Bafia and get to Bafoussam. That is what we are saying. And I think the SDO is aware of this.

The SDO instructed the mayor of Mamfe to look into the problem. Were you satisfied with the mayor’s intervention?

The SDO should first of all say that he tried to solve the problem and failed. He should admit that his approach to solving the problem instead added salt to injury, and it was after he tried and failed that he solicited the good office of the mayor.

The SDO summoned Mamfe and Bamenda drivers in his office and said he wants to share out the days of the week between Bamenda and Mamfe drivers. He said Mamfe drivers will ply the Ekok road for three days of the week while Bamenda drivers will also ply the road for three dayss.

We rejected the proposal vehemently. We said we will not share what is ours with Bamenda drivers because they too will not accept to do that in Bamenda. We reminded the SDO that vehicles from Mamfe are not even allowed to get into Bamenda, not to talk of crossing Bamenda to get to places like Ndu, Nkambe or Ndop. So we refused to sign the document he presented to us to sign.

We told him that he could ban clando vehicles in Manyu but we would not share our rights with people who are not even welcoming to us in their own areas. They don’t allow vehicles from Mamfe to load in Bamenda. But we allow them to load at the Mamfe motor park. Our leniency and hospitality should not be taken for weakness.

Clandos have their limits. Even when we go to Kumba we end only at 3 corners Mabanda. We cannot get into Kumba. So why should Bamenda clandos cross Mamfe and get to Ekok. We understand that the SDO is from Bamenda and he was only trying not to hurt his brothers.

What is the situation now?

All is calm now. The mayor of Mamfe has solved the problem. He has placed a control point at the entrance to the Mamfe motor park where vehicles are controlled. Council workers do the control, not drivers. The Bamenda clando drivers have also agreed to respect themselves and their limits. So peace now reigns between and among us. There’s no problem any more.