My First Ghost Town in Bamenda Since 2018: Here’s What I Learned

By Hans Ngala

“Can you hear the drums, Fernando?
I remember long ago another starry night like this
In the firelight Fernando
You were humming to yourself and softly strumming your guitar
I could hear the distant drums
And the sounds of bugle calls were coming from afar
They were closer now Fernando
Every hour, every minute seemed to last eternally
I was so afraid Fernando
We were young and full of life and none of us prepared to die
And I’m not ashamed to say
The roar of guns and cannons almost made me cry”
These lyrics from the song Fernando by Swedish pop group, ABBA, remind me vividly of my first Ghost Town which I experienced in Bamenda in 2016. I literally thought I was going to die then. I was teargassed around PC Ntamulung and at Ngeng Junction as I covered protests by irate youth. The Prime Minister at the time, Philemon Yang had come to town with an entourage following brewing tensions after teahcers and lawyers staged a strike but instead of addressing the issues in a more appealing way, they showed up in CPDM regalia and turned it into a partisan affair, prompting the ire of some youth. Amnesty International reported three young people killed in Bamenda that December 2016. Cars were torched as youth protested. Cars were set alight. A ghost town was declared the following day. I remember stepping out into Ghana Street, not far from where I lived, but the streets looked like something out of a dystopian movie. I retreated home.
This July 23, I went up to Bamenda again. The plan had been to visit Bamenda, meet a few friends and family and then travel for another 1 hour 30 minutes to Kumbo and possibly on to Ndu. But first, I had to make a stop in Bamenda of course and meet with Aaron. He’s a colleague from when I used to work in Bamenda. He came to the bus station and picked me up. It had just rained heavily in Bamenda and for a city that sits at an elevation of 5,295 feet – temperatures can drop as low as 15 degrees even. This particular day, the weather notification on my phone said the weather was 19 degrees. Having spent some time in Yaounde where it can get as hot as 30 degrees Celsius, 19 degrees in Bamenda was too cold than I could remember. My teeth chattered and my breath turned to vapor as I spoke.
“Let’s get some tea” I told Aaron.
He showed me a spot at Mobil Nkwen. The guy made us scrambled eggs with spaghetti, slices of bread and mayonnaise.
Just across the road was the Mobil petrol station where the area gets its name from. A different petrol station now stands there. Cars honked, pedestrians and rowdy bike riders jostled for space on the pot-holed filled road in front of the Mobil petrol station where just a few months ago, a man’s decapitated head was thrown in the middle of the street by unknown men.

“Hans, you see how we live in Bamenda now, right?” Aaron asked as he took a sip of his tea from a mug.
“This is how it is. It can look calm like this, and then in a second, gunshots can ring out and everyone scampers for the nearest exit they can find” he laughed as he dug his fingers into a slice of his bread.
Aaron reminded me that in Bamenda now, people don’t discuss politics openly nor do they fear that much anymore. It is all a question of survival now.
I had arrived on a Saturday, hoping to do a few things within the week. But in Bamenda, the week only starts on Tuesdays now. Ghost Towns – days of civil disobedience imposed by separatists, are still a tradition in the city. Hospitals only attend to emergency cases, businesses shutter and life comes to a grinding halt, with the exception of a few motor bikes and hawkers braving it all to sell food or commercial bike riders who provide the only form of transportation and take advantage to raise their costs to exorbitant levels – and who can blame them, given how tough life has become in Bamenda?
However, the intrastate conflict has seen Bamenda improve its real estate developments. As I stood at Finance Junction and looked over at Up Station and New Lay-out, I saw high-rises that did not exist when I lived in Bamenda nearly 10 years ago. This proves that people in more remote villages and smaller towns in the province, have moved to Bamenda due its relative security – and have invested in landed property.
“That is a hotel that was built just within this crisis” my host Aaron pointed to an impressive fives-storey building standing prominently at New Lay-out.

I also saw many other impressive structures, giving a new face to the skyline at Up Station, one of the wealthier neighborhoods located atop an impressive hill overlooking the rest of the city. There were signs that the conflict had not crushed the spirit of the people but had taught them to be resilient. People took out loans to build, others withdrew their lifesavings and invested it in their houses. The ongoing intrastate conflict between Ambazonia separatists has taught everyone in the NW of Cameroon – to think out of the box.
Nevertheless, as people live in this region, insecurity remains a very real and present danger. “I’m lucky to have a phone. Someone came in with a gun while we were at a drinking spot and emptied our pockets. Almost took our phones but decided against it” *Ronny my friend told me. Ronny is one of very few journalists who still lives in Bamenda. While he reports primarily on health issues and even prefers to identify more as a “writer” than as a “journalist” – that is still pretty risky. He reports mainly on health issues and around the same period I was in Bamenda, he was held at gunpoint, having seen other horrible things in Bamenda.
As I drove to Mile 3 to have lunch with my friend, I could not help but notice the heavily-armed soldiers and their armored car around Amour Mezam bus station. Many more soldiers were standing around Commercial Avenue, Ngeng Junction and around Bambili along the road to Mbingo as well. The military presence felt akin to 2016 prior to the lawyers’ and teachers’ strike. At the time, SDF opposition leader, John Fru Ndi had warned authorities that heavy militarization at a time when there were no armed separatists – would only fuel unnecessary conflict. It seems he wasn’t wrong at all. Now, armed men (and gangs according to some sources), have infiltrated the town and insecurity is so rampant that the town shuts down as early as 8:00p.m. and everyone carries ID with them. Everyone is a suspect to the other and no one discusses their personal views openly, especially with a presidential election just months away.
With an ongoing conflict, voter turn-out in the NW is likely going to be low. Also added to this, is a kind of “media fatigue” whereby local Cameroonian media feel inundated with killings or the insecurity in Bamenda and as media stays out of coverage, they have also not been as vocal on educating the population in Bamenda on elections. And given that some people have been attacked or killed for participating in previous elections, this might actually not be the time for news organizations to encourage people in Bamenda to do politics if it will endanger them. This leaves the population unsure how to navigate the uncertainty.

For me, it was just watching elderly women selling food at the Bamenda Food Market, business people struggling after their shops were burnt to the ground after a fire incident at the Bamenda Main Market. It was a heartwarming experience driving by St. Blaise Hospital and seeing the impressive structures they have raised to cater to the population and other unsung heroes like teachers, who educate us all in society.
I don’t know how or when this conflict will end, but one thing I know for sure is that Bamenda will be a better place someday. This city has suffered, yes—but it has also endured. It has been bruised, but not broken. Beneath the anxiety and fear, there is a pulse that beats steadily with resilience and quiet determination.
Bamenda has seen so many firsts—so much history that it almost feels symbolic of Cameroon itself. It was here that the ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (CPDM) was created, and it was here too that the Social Democratic Front (SDF), Cameroon’s first major opposition party, was born in 1990 amid gunfire and resistance. This city has seen democracy tested and protests met with both hope and horror. It has seen marketplaces burned and rebuilt, dreams crushed and reignited.
So yes, Bamenda is more than just a conflict zone. It is a place where stories are still being written—by the women who show up each morning to sell food, by the journalists who keep telling the truth despite threats, by the builders, the teachers, the doctors, and the bike riders who keep the wheels of life turning even when the roads are rough and the times are harder.
As I drove out of town, back toward Yaoundé, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Bamenda was whispering something to me—not just in its silence, but in its stubborn survival. Something in the air said this place is not done. This is not the end of the story.
And maybe, just maybe, someday soon, the drums we hear in Bamenda won’t be drums of war or warning—but drums of celebration, hope, and new beginnings.

• Ronny is a pseudonym that has been used to protect his identity since Bamenda is an active conflict zone and identifying him by his real name could be risky.