BAMENDA, Cameroon – Pope Leo was travelling to the biggest city in Cameroon’s conflict-hit anglophone region on April 16, the latest stop on an ambitious four-country Africa tour amid attacks on the pontiff by US President Donald Trump.
Mr Trump’s attacks on Pope Leo, who has emerged as a vocal critic of the Iran war, have caused dismay in Africa, where more than a fifth of the world’s Catholics live.
US Vice-President JD Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, joined in on April 14, saying the pope was wrong to say that disciples of Christ were “never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs” and that “it’s very, very important for the pope to be careful when he talks about matters of theology”.
Pope Leo told Reuters on April 13 that he would not stop speaking out about the war and has avoided responding to Mr Trump directly since then.
After arriving in the Cameroon capital Yaounde on April 15, he urged the government of the Central African nation – led by President Paul Biya, at 93 the world’s oldest ruler – to root out corruption and resist “the whims of the rich and powerful”.
Pope Leo’s trip on April 15 to the anglophone city of Bamenda has stirred faint hope that steps might be taken to resolve the conflict there, rooted in the country’s complex colonial and post-colonial history.
Cameroon, a former German colony, was partitioned by Britain and France after World War I. The French part won independence in 1960 and was joined a year later by the smaller English-speaking British area to the west.
More than 6,500 people have been killed and more than half a million displaced in fighting between government forces and anglophone separatist groups, according to the International Crisis Group.
Priests are frequently kidnapped for ransom and some have been killed. A separatist alliance said it would observe a three-day ceasefire to allow civilians and visitors to move freely during the pope’s visit.
Mr Biya has not travelled to the anglophone regions since the fighting began.
Thousands lined the streets under a brilliant mid-morning sun near Bamenda’s airport ahead of the pope’s arrival on April 16, waving Vatican and Cameroonian flags as a press convoy drove by.
The route the pope will take, along an unmarked concrete road, went through a neighbourhood of simple housing made with corrugated roofs and mud bricks. People were sitting on chairs outside their homes, where some had laundry drying on a line. REUTERS