History of Bakassi political-status claims

Sources for this page

Each number marks a specific claim. Notes give the source, its locator and how it relates to the claim.

1. 1.

   Claim: On 10 October 2002, the International Court of Justice ruled that sovereignty over the Bakassi Peninsula rested with Cameroon, based principally on a 1913 boundary treaty between Britain and Germany, the colonial powers then administering Nigeria and Cameroon respectively. Following this ruling, Nigeria and Cameroon signed the UN-brokered Green Tree Agreement on 12 June 2006, guaranteed by Britain, France, Germany and the United States, under which Nigeria agreed to hand over the peninsula, completing its military, civil-administration and police withdrawal from Bakassi by August 2008. This bundle treats this interstate territorial resolution as distinct from local Bakassi self-determination claims.

   • Land and Maritime Boundary between Cameroon and Nigeria (Cameroon v. Nigeria: Equatorial Guinea intervening) (International Court of Justice) link, Judgment section. Source record
   • Implications of the Bakassi conflict resolution for Cameroon (African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD)) link, Green Tree Agreement and withdrawal sections. Source record
2. 2.

   Claim: The Bakassi Movement for Self-Determination (BAMOSD), founded in 2006, is a local Bakassi organisation pursuing independence for a proposed "Democratic Republic of Bakassi," distinct from either Nigeria's or Cameroon's territorial claim; it issued declarations of independence in August 2006, following the Green Tree Agreement, and again in July 2008, when it designated Akwa Obutong as a proposed capital. Early leader Tony Ene Asuquo died in a car accident shortly after the first declaration; Ebi Dari subsequently led militant operations, including reported involvement in a 2008 hostage-taking incident this bundle does not narrate in detail. BAMOSD has been reported, per media accounts this bundle presents as documented but not independently verified, to have received backing from the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) and the Southern Cameroons People's Organisation (SCAPO), a group associated with Ambazonian independence advocacy.

   • Bakassi Movement for Self-Determination (Wikipedia) link, Founding, declarations, leadership and affiliations sections. Source record