At least 160 inmates fled a prison in Cameroon’s troubled anglophone North-West region during a dramatic overnight jailbreak, officials said Sunday. Around 50 armed men who were “shooting from everywhere… broke down the prison doors,” local official William Benoit Emvoutu Mbita told state radio CRTV. They then used fuel to “set fire to all the buildings” of the prison in Ndop, added Mbita, the local administrator. Inmates who return “voluntarily” will be transferred to a prison in Bamenda, the capital of North-West region, Mbita said, adding that a manhunt was on for the escapees. Anglophones today account for about a fifth of the West African country’s population of 22 million.

Source: Punch July 29, 2018 15:22 UTC