Cameroon's national Gendarmerie has just launched a vast clean-up campaign to put all drug traffickers in the country behind bars. Called "Operation Tentacles", this initiative aims to "fight against crime, drug cultivation and trafficking and other acts of banditry that are on the rise in secondary towns, peri-urban and rural areas."

Between May 30 and April 1, the army unit reported the arrest of "about forty suspects in Yaoundé, 30 of whom were released after investigations”. A cannabis plantation was discovered in Nkolndom and a large quantity of freshly harvested cannabis (about 100 kg) was also seized, we learned.

Between June 2 and 4, a similar operation in the Littoral region, in the locality of Loum, led to the arrest of 682 people, 148 of whom are under in-depth investigation by the Mbanga Gendarmerie Company. According to the Gendarmerie, 138 motorcycles were confiscated due to a lack of registration documents, along with a homemade automatic pistol, a significant amount of cannabis, and a truck.

“The National Gendarmerie intends to intensify these kinds of operations and extend them throughout the country, to flush out the criminals and other outlaws," says the security force.