Cameroon sentences opposition leader to 25 years in prison

A military court in Cameroon has sentenced an opposition leader on Monday to 25 years in prison, for hostility against the homeland and contempt of the president said his lawyer and Amnesty International who denounced the trial as politically motivated.

The court convicted Aboubakar Siddiki, the president of northern Cameroon's main opposition party, of hostility against the homeland as well as revolution and contempt of the president over accusations he plotted to destabilize the country.

We are going to appeal this decision, which does not seem to us to be at all just, Siddiki’s lawyer, Emmanuel Simh, told Reuters.

Meanwhile, international rights group, Amnesty in a statement, said the prosecution was part of a government campaign to stifle its critics which it said came after an unfair trial. It called for his release and that of well-known notary Abdoulaye Harissou who was sentenced to three years in prison for non-denunciation.

Dozens of people have been killed and hundreds arrested in a crackdown in recent months on protests in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions.

Residents there say they suffer social and economic marginalization in the predominantly Francophone country.