Cameroon: at least eleven dead in landslide in Yaoundé

Many families had gathered on a hill for a tribute to their deceased when the soil stolen.

MO12345LEMONDE with AFP

At least eleven people died on Sunday, November 27 due to a downturn in a popular district of Yaoundé, the capital of Cameroon, announced the governor of the region on CRTV public radio. Four bodies covered with white sheets were evacuated at the beginning of the evening by police in the popular Damascus district, on the outskirts of the city, reports a journalist from the France-Presse agency (AFP), evoking hundreds of reflected residents looking for loved ones.

Many families had settled under several large tents on a vacant lot at the top of a hill, for a meeting in tribute to deceased, when the ground has sagged under a part of the audience, have told to AFP several residents on site. “Research continues to find other bodies underground,” said CRTV Naseri Paul Bea, the governor of the Center region, of which Yaoundé is the chief town.

Four large white tents were always stood in the evening at the top of the hill, but on the verge of what seems to be an edge beyond which the ground has disappeared, describes the AFP journalist who was able Approaching the places of the landslide before being blocked by a cord of police officers, in front of whom a host of crying people were massaged. Rescuers descended into sagging to try to find people below.

The vacant lot is surrounded by both relatively opulent houses and in good condition and very precarious dwellings, like those innumerable, sometimes made of wood and sheet metal, which cover the sides of the seven hills forming part of the relief of The Cameroonian capital, populated by more than 4 million inhabitants.

/Media reports cited above.