The coronavirus pandemic and lockdown forced Cameroonian President Paul Biya to cancel the government's planned feasts and parades to celebrate Cameroon's annual Unity Day.
But for opposition leaders and separatists, the day signifies anything but unity: rather they view it as the date Cameroonian authorities unjustly cancelled an agreed federal system of government, and consolidated the head of state's power.
No unity to start with
In an interview with DW, opposition leader Kah Walla in Cameroon questioned the very existence of unity in the country.
For Dorothy Njeuma, who voted in the 1972 referendum, the over-centralization of power by national government in Yaounde is provoking Anglophones and separatists to take up arms against the state.
Foreign intervention not an issue
On social media, separatists have criticized the canceling of the federal system in 1972 via a referendum as unjust because the voting population was heavily skewed in favor of French speakers.
