CAR Crisis: Stakeholders recommend sustained dialogue

An international symposium to dissect present and future concerns ended in Yaounde on November 28, 2014.

Experts from the Central African sub region have parted company in Yaounde with the resolve to continue to support efforts put in place to stem bloodshed in the crisis-torn Central African Republic, CAR.

Security officers and strategists met at the International School for Security Forces, EIFORCES on November 27-28, 2014 for the second time in almost one year at an international symposium to seek ways of bringing life to CAR.

Last week’s symposium was organized by the EIFORCES on the theme, "which peace, which security and which sustainable development for CAR."

The Secretary of State in the Ministry of Defence in charge of the National Gendarmerie, Jean Baptiste Bokam, on behalf of the Minister Delegate at the Presidency in charge of Defence, who is also the Board Chair of EIFORCES, Edgard Alain Mebe Ngo'o, chaired the two-day brainstorming workshop.

He regretted the bloodshed in CAR inviting stakeholders to lay the groundwork for a sustainable development in the country. He recalled that CAR was a neighbour and friend of Cameroon. The crisis in the country is having and heavy toll on the country with increased refugees and instability in the border areas.

Jean Baptiste Bokam said organizing such a get-together was synonymous to seeking lasting solutions to problems faced by the country because of its ever-hospitable nature.

ECCAS sent a message of congratulations to Cameroon's Head of State, Paul Biya, on his inputs to the settlement of the CAR crisis.

Senegalese University don, Prof. Abdoulaye Bathily, Special Representative of the UN Secretary General for Central Africa noted in his inaugural lecture that CAR is a sickler since independence and its geographical location is having a toll on the economies of the countries of the Central African sub region.

Successive speakers said the country's rich mining, forestry, geological and petroleum resources have not impacted the livelihood of its population due to the shaky political leadership in the last four decades.

The Interim Director of EIFORCES, Partice Doum-Ndongo like the Director of IRIC, Jean Emmanuel Tabi, recalled that CAR was a friend of Cameroon and the sub region and international conertation was imperative in making life worth living again in the country.