Urgent Action Outcome: Detained activist gets medical and family access

Political activist Serge Branco Nana is currently serving a two-year prison sentence for ‘mutiny’ in Mfou Prison, southern Cameroon, after having been accused of inciting a riot whilst in pre-trial detention in 2019. He has now been granted access to a doctor and his family have been allowed to visit him in detention.

NO FURTHER ACTION IS REQUESTED. MANY THANKS TO ALL WHO SENT APPEALS.

Serge Branco Nana is a political activist, member of the opposition party MRC (Mouvement pour la Renaissance du Cameroun) led by Maurice Kamto. Following the October 2018 presidential elections, the MRC called for peaceful marches against alleged mass irregularities during the electoral process. Hundreds of protestors were arrested on 26 January 2019, including Serge Branco Nana, and subsequently sent to the Kondengui prison in Yaounde, Cameroon’s capital. On 22 July 2019, a riot reportedly broke out in the prison. According to reports, detained armed separatists from the Anglophone regions and opposition members took possession of the prison yard to denounce overcrowding, judicial delays and deplorable conditions. Security forces later stormed the prison and fired gunshots. Part of the prison was reportedly burnt.

Serge Branco Nana was accused of being among the initiators and sentenced to a two-year sentence in August 2019 for ‘mutiny’. He was sent to a prison more than 50 km from Yaounde and far from the region where his family and relatives live. He was reportedly tortured at the State Secretariat for Defense (Secrétariat d’Etat à la défense-SED) in Yaounde before he was sent to the prison in Mfou, in southern Cameroon, where he complained of pain in his abdomen, back and feet and was as a result in need of urgent medical care. On 1 February 2020, his brother was denied access to him.

Serge Branco Nana has now been granted access to a doctor and his family have been allowed to visit him in detention.