Cameroon: Paul Biya denounces "the excesses" on social networks
Players urged to be vigilant on social media, especially during sensitive period of World Cup AFP/Archives
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2 mins
In Cameroon, the youth festival took place on Friday, February 11.
On this occasion, the day before, President Paul Biya addressed his traditional message to "
his young compatriots
", a speech in which he notably returned to a subject already mentioned in his wishes for the new year, namely hate speech. on social networks, "
drifts
" that the Head of State declares to deplore.
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Paul Biya refers to the insulting messages or messages with a discriminatory connotation that can be read recurrently on Facebook, messages that attack in particular the
Beti
tribal group associated with the Yaoundé regime or the
Bamileke
group associated with the opposition party. of the MRC.
The phenomenon has amplified with the English-speaking crisis which has lasted for five years and also since the last presidential election of 2018.
Several forms of hate speech
This hate speech takes several forms: fabricated information conveying false ideas about this or that tribal group, turns of phrase that imply divisions between Cameroonians (“
us
” versus “
the others
”) or even content that is, without ambiguity , insults.
According to Desmond Ngala, of the NGO Defy Hate Now, which educates young people about the impact of social networks on real life, there are indications that these are not spontaneous remarks but orchestrated smear campaigns.
“
We observe speeches that are expressed from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., then it stops.
And it starts again the next day.
There are also the times when the message comes with a spelling mistake and the same mistake is picked up by different accounts in the same way.
This makes us believe that there are people working on this, that it is not by chance that these messages end up on the Web
, "he explains.
For Paul-Joël Kamtchang of the Adisi Cameroon organization - a civil society organization that campaigns for credible and reliable information online - what is happening on the networks crystallizes the latent tension in the country.
“
Social malaise
”
“
It is the transposition of a social malaise.
With frustrations, political blackmail, this lack of jobs, these selective jobs.
You see that it is the only place where Cameroonians can express themselves at the moment because in terms of public freedoms (demonstrations, political meetings), everything is almost subdued
”,
he underlines.
In November 2019, the Cameroonian penal code was modified.
Anyone guilty of tribalist hate speech is liable to one to two years' imprisonment and a fine of up to three million CFA francs.
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