Thousands of Cameroon nationals living in the US are about to lose their right to deportation protection. That's because the Trump administration decided that conditions in the central African country no longer merits US protections. How true is that?
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00:00The United States can extend deportation protections to any foreigner who is in the
00:04country and can't return home because it's unsafe to do so for reasons such as conflict
00:09or environmental disasters. But the Trump administration has just made Cameroonians
00:14and Afghans ineligible, saying the two countries are now safe and basically it's time to go home.
00:20But is Cameroon really safe and where are the receipts? Welcome to the flip side.
00:24The Trump administration pulled the plug on temporary protected status for Cameroon and
00:30Afghan nationals on April 11, saying the conditions in the two countries have improved and it's time
00:36to go home. The U.S. says conditions in the two countries no longer merit U.S. protections.
00:42By June, some 7,900 Cameroonians alone are expected to lose the status and face deportation,
00:48though the move has raised alarm in Cameroon and the diaspora.
00:52Cameroon is still very much unsafe, especially in the northwest and in the southwest. Even the U.S.
00:57embassy here in Cameroon has decided that their workers should not go to the northwest and the
01:01southwest because of the political instability. If the president of the U.S. decides to send back
01:06all the Cameroonians who are out there, they are going to come here and suffer the insecurities
01:10just as we are suffering. Cameroon is not yet safe. So the president of the United States decision
01:17not to renew the protection right automatically means that those Cameroonians who are in the U.S.
01:24will have to be deported back to the country. And being deported now will bring them into a lot of
01:29insecurity, more especially with the knowledge of the insecurity taking place in the northwest and in
01:34the southwest. A brutal conflict between armed separatists and the government forces is still
01:40ongoing in Cameroon's English-speaking northwest and southwest region. So why would the U.S. put anyone
01:45from the country on track for deportation?
01:48Trump had been campaigning before even when he became president in 2016 that he's going to do
01:55a massive deportation of immigrants. And so it's not surprising that as he came to power he's trying
02:03to make sure all non-citizens which are not have the legal rights to stay in America should be deported.
02:11And it seems as if, as he came across many people, he noticed, this is with reference to other
02:20countries like Venezuela, Chile and Haiti and many other countries, they noticed that there was the
02:28TPS which is the temporary protected status. The deportations are set for May and June. Experts
02:36say families in Cameroon could see their loved ones return from the U.S. in Chakos to possibly face the
02:42very persecution they escaped. That's something that the families back home should be most afraid of
02:49because those that sought political protection here in the United States based on persecution
02:54back home, you're sending them back home again to be, you know, we don't know what the end result
02:59will be if they come back to Cameroon. It's barely five months since the U.S. itself issued a travel
03:05advisory with a do not travel notice for six regions of Cameroon, including the northwest and
03:10southwest regions. It also warned its citizens to exercise increased caution in Cameroon due to
03:16armed violence, civil unrest, crime, health, kidnapping and terrorism. So if Cameroon isn't safe enough
03:23Americans to visit, how could it be safe for the 7,900 Cameroonians the Trump administration wants to send
03:29back there? And that is the flip side.