Breaking News: Autopsy Results Show Cameroon Senator, Barr. Kemende Was Stabbed, Not Shot Dead by his Captors

Two weeks after a Member of the Upper House of Cameroon’s National Assembly was killed in Bamenda, capital of the North West in the restive Southern Cameroons, the government in Yaounde has uncharacteristically maintained sealed lips.

Timescape Magazine has been informed that a team of medical doctors assigned to carry out an autopsy on the body of the deceased lawmaker who was also a Barrister at law have concluded their work.

A Member of the team who spoke to Timescape Magazine from Cameroon on conditions of anonymity for fear of reprisals revealed that the Barrister was not killed by a bullet.

“Barrister Henry Kemende was pierced with a poisoned dagger straight into his heart where he could not have any chance of survival,” the Physician told Timescape Magazine.

The autopsy report, a copy of which Timescape Magazine obtained, notes there was no entry point and no exit point. The report states that there was “…no bullet within the body.”

The college of doctors, confronted with these shocking revelations turned their examination to “…death from stabbing.”

In total bewilderment, the Physician who spoke to Timescape Magazine was categorical that “Senator Kemende was not killed by a bullet. He was stabbed with a poisoned knife right into the heart by someone deemed highly professional seeing the precision of the stab.”

Barrister Kemende, generally seen as a brave and fearless defendant of the truth, and of the Southern Cameroons’ cause, was killed on Tuesday, January 11, at the Mile two neighborhood in downtown Bamenda. The Senator was cornered by yet to be identified armed men at a fuel station and killed minutes later at Mile two in Bamenda and his car taken away.

The Senator’s bleeding body was later taken to the PMI hospital in Nkwen, where frantic efforts to rescue him and save his life failed, leaving his spouse, supporters, and sympathizers wailing into the night.

Senator Kemende was known to be a strong advocate for the former UN Trust Territory of Southern Cameroons. In March 2019, he wrote a letter to the President of the Republic about the armed conflict in the region. He criticized the government’s handling of the conflict that continues to claim lives.

The Cameroon Bar Council Representative, Barrister Mbah Eric Mbah after visiting the family called on the powers that be to throw light on the killing of the legal luminary. But to date, there has been no visible effort by the Yaounde authorities to shine the light on the gruesome assassination.

The National First Vice President of the SDF, Hon. Joshua Osih claimed in an interview with Agence France-Presse (AFP) that “We recovered his body, his chest riddled with bullets.”  An account that has now been proven inaccurate by the autopsy result which is yet to be made public.

Hon. Osih also claimed, without evidence, that Southern Cameroons pro-independence fighters carried out the killing because they are opposed to the SDF, accusing the party of participating in the political life of the French-speaking Republic of Cameroon and is opposed to the people’s quest for self-determination.

That claim by the SDF Vice President, well-known for always rushing to make unfounded claims and draw baseless conclusions, unsurprisingly met with immediate rebuttal from the public. A political observer in Bamenda said, Hon. Osih by that claim even before any investigation is made, was trying to shield the actual killers.

Hon. Osih was one of the signatories to the infamous petition to the United States government seeking the deportation of Cameroonians opposed to the Paul Biya regime back to the country for trial before military courts. A position his party vehemently opposed and even asked him to withdraw his signature from the petition.

The SDF Secretariat in Bamenda, headed by Hon. Evaristus Njong condemned the assassination and called for a thorough investigation into the incident so the killers are brought to book.

A retired SDF Member of Parliament in Bamenda who opted to talk on basis of anonymity because he also feared for his life, pointed to several video footage of the late Senator circulating on social media in which he condemned government corruption and openly fought for the right of the people of the Southern Cameroons for self-determination as reason enough for the government that does not tolerate dissent to kill him. The Deputy also highlighted the case of another former Member of Parliament of the SDF, Hon. Joseph Wirba, who fled the country to the United Kingdom after making strong declarations asserting the right of Southern Cameroonians to freedom and self-determination.

Barrister Kemende was elected to the Senate on the ticket of the SDF in 2018 and was a high-profile critic of the government’s myriad failures to address the conflict.