“As someone who has been threatened directly and physically, I can’t say the threat is over yet because we didn’t have to deal with [just] an organized force. We were dealing with a terrorist force.
“Generally, the sponsors of mafia networks have far-reaching powers even when they are behind bars [as is the present case]. I am stupefied that we’ve come to this. Very appalled to say the least,” Mana said.
‘A State Crime’
“He provides a detailed description of how Zogo was followed for a week, in order to establish the pattern of his movements, until his abduction on the evening of Jan.17 by members of the General Director of External Research [similar to FBI] including Danwe, who was the one in charge,” partly reads the RSF’s report.According to Danwe’s confession, Belinga himself then beat Zogo in the basement of his building and telephoned justice minister Laurent Esso, to whom he is close, to ask him what Zogo’s fate should be.
Sadibou Marong, director of Reporters Without Borders’ sub-Saharan Africa bureau, told The Epoch Times that Zogo’s death is testament to how far “press freedom predators” can go in planning to silence the media stakeholders.
Saw Death Coming
A few days before he was killed, Zogo’s name—including that of close to a dozen other Cameroonian investigative journalists and whistle blowers allegedly lined up for murder—had gone viral on social media.“There is a common thread that connects all the journalists earmarked for murder on this list: those who took interest in denouncing the alarming public procurements and [other] funds which were being channelled into Amougou Belinga’s accounts,” confirmed Mana of the Le Jour local tabloid who was also blacklisted.
Zogo, 51, was known for using his Embouteillage (traffic jam) daily programme on the Amplitude FM radio station to tackle cases of corruption—often going as far as questioning important personalities by name.
The Epoch Times saw a report that the late Zogo had compiled as evidence of Belinga’s fraudulent acquisition of 46 billion central African francs (approximately US$74 million) from such emergency funds between 2013-2021 with the complicity of some state officials.
Copies of which he filed to the anti-corruption commission, centre regional appeal court, the supreme court, the prime minister’s office, the secretariat general of Cameroon’s presidency, among other key state institutions, for appropriate action to be taken.
The said amount represents just a “tiny part of the overall sums received from the public treasury by Belinga through his various companies which were not declared to the taxation office,” Zogo wrote in the report.
Mana still vividly remembers his last moments with Zogo prior to his death.
“The day before his kidnapping, Martinez Zogo came to my office [our offices are just 100-150m apart] and asked to see me. He asked for the door to be shut. After this, he told me: ‘I will be murdered ... I will be murdered. You have to be on your guard because you yourself are on their list’,” he told The Epoch Times.
But Mana took this at the face value. “To say that I saw his death coming … honestly I didn’t think it could come to that.
Journalist Killing Time
Brutal killings such as Martinez Zogo’s, are unfortunately all too common to many journalists in Cameroon.Both Ola Bebe and Martinez Zogo were outspoken voices against corruption—always using their platforms on radio to denounce cases of alleged misappropriation of public funds.
Ola Bebe, who was at the forefront in calling for justice and accountability for the murder of Zogo, reported receiving regular death threats that he suspected were from authorities.
He was only confirmed dead 10 months later but his body has never been handed over to his family.
“Zogo’s murder was pure evil, but was I surprised? I’m afraid not,” said Angela Quintal, the Africa program coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
“I could not help but think of Samuel Wazizi, whose death in custody was very personal for me,” Quintal told The Epoch Times in an email.
“Countless other journalists have fled into exile, and we are aware of censorship and self-censorship amid a pervasive fear of reprisal if they report independently, for example, on the Anglophone conflict or on Boko Haram in the north of the country,” according to Quintal.
Attempts To ‘Sanitise’ Deaths
The swiftness with which the arrests of Zogo’s suspected killers are unfolding is an unprecedented happening in Cameroon, unlike when authorities have often attempted to “sanitise” such deaths—seen in the death in custody of Wazizi in 2019 and that of Bibi Ngota in 2010.To this day no one has been held accountable, laments Quintal.
“There now appears to be an appetite by sections of the government to act, and CPJ has welcomed this, but we want to more than just arrests, there has to be full justice.”
Quintal went on: “There have been sensational claims and high profile arrests, but at the time of writing this, there has been no transparency and no credible or public accounting by authorities.
“No one has been formally charged or brought to court and tried or convicted in terms of internationally accepted fair [trial] standards for open justice.
“Until that happens, we cannot say that there will indeed be justice for Zogo, the kind of justice and accountability that was unfortunately denied Wazizi and Ngota.”
Sadibou of RSF said the fact that Zogo’s murder was “planned by very high-level profile in the state hierarchy” offers some glimmer of hope such that those who took part in it will have “nowhere to hide from justice.”
“Martinez Zogo was a journalist who took great risks to expose the truth about corruption and bad governance. He was useful to his country,” said Sadibou.
Lawyer Says Detention Illegal
At a press briefing in Yaounde on Feb. 17, Belinga’s lawyer Charles Tchoungang said his client’s arrest was “illegal”—citing the warrantless searches conducted at Belinga’s house and at his media group’s offices in Yaounde.He also accused the investigating team of failing to visit the crime scene.
Journalist Haman Mana of Le Jour privately-owned newspaper expresses fear that Zogo’s heinous murder and the global indignation that followed it, could easily divert public opinion from the core of the matter—which is the outright looting of Cameroon’s state funds.
“If corruption continues to be one of the hallmarks of society, l won’t be afraid [denouncing it],” he said.
“The Cameroonian society was completely outraged [by Zogo’s murder] … and rose as one man to demand justice. That’s why things went so fast.”
She said the CPJ was considering turning to international remedies to seek justice for Wazizi after all internal remedies in Cameroon got “exhausted.”
“To this day, Wazizi’s body was never handed over to the family and there have merely been lies and obfuscation from the authorities,” according to Quintal.
“There has been no autopsy report, or credible, independent and transparent inquiry into Wazizi’s death. Was he tortured like Zogo, for example? Unconfirmed reports say he was, but without an independent autopsy, there is no evidence.
“We can only imagine the barbarity and cruelty that Wazizi had to endure, because that is how Cameroon’s security forces have been allowed to operate with no consequences and no accountability and with a complete disregard for the sanctity of human life. Impunity breeds more impunity,” she said.
“CPJ has done a lot of advocacy around Wazizi’s case and we will certainly not give up trying to ensure that there is justice and closure for his family, in the same way that we will continue to seek justice for Zogo and other killed journalists in Cameroon and the continent more broadly.”