Cameroon: the man who tried to make fake decrees read on CRTV jailed in Yaoundé.

The events date back to June 12, at the headquarters of Cameroon Radio Television (CRTV), in the Nlongkak district of Yaoundé. Johann Adriel Sitchom Kuate appeared there with several documents that he claimed were important, including a decree attributed to President Paul Biya.

The text, which appeared to have the characteristics of an official document, was to be read on air following the procedure usually applied to presidential decrees. However, CRTV journalists suspected a maneuver and alerted their superiors, as well as Cameroonian authorities.

The document was then formally identified as a forgery. One detail notably caught the investigators’ attention: the name of the person presented as vice president was that of Johann Adriel Sitchom Kuate himself.

An investigation opened for undermining state security

The affair unfolded while Paul Biya was in Geneva, where he arrived on June 7. The attempt to broadcast the fake decree immediately raised questions about the intentions of its author and the possible existence of accomplices.

The authorities opened an investigation to determine whether it was an individual initiative or a more organized operation. At the end of this procedure, Johann Adriel Sitchom Kuate was placed in preventive detention and charged with “attempting to undermine state security with the complicity of foreign powers.”