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- Bakassi Nigerians promised safety
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The
territory was handed over after an International Court of Justice ruling, ending
years of border skirmishes.
The
five-year UN-backed transition period exempted residents in the area, many of
them Nigerian fishermen, from paying tax.
Now the
Nigerians must also apply for a residence permit or take up Cameroonian
citizenship if they wish to remain.
The BBC's
Randy Joe Sa'ah in the capital, Yaounde, says official figures put the number
of people living in the peninsula at 300,000, 90% of whom are Nigeria.
It is not
clear how many have decided to leave the region, but it is believed most have
decided to remain, he says.
Most of
those who have left Cameroon are living in camps in Nigeria's Cross River state,
where they have been critical of the authorities for not doing enough to
resettle them.
It was
agreed that the transitional phase would allow Cameroon to develop an
administrative presence in the 1,000sq km (386 sq mile) area, which juts into
the Gulf of Guinea.
For
Nigerians refusing to change nationality, a residence permit will cost 130,000
CFA ($260; £170) for two years or 250,000 CFA for 10 years, our reporter says.
However,
the main concern for Bakassi residents is the prospect of paying taxes, he
says.
In Nigeria,
small businesses and road-side stall holders do not have to pay tax, but this
is not the case in Cameroon, our reporter says.
Each area
is targeted once a year by officials working for the Ministry of Finance
accompanied by paramilitary police in order to recover taxes from all
businesses, no matter their size, he says.
Our
reporter says most Bakassi fishermen take the fish over the border to Nigeria,
but they will now be liable to pay some form of customs or export tax.
With the
area coming under full Cameroonian control, some residents have also said they
fear harassment from the paramilitary police, or gendarmes.
'Spirits
down'
One of the
traditional rulers of Bakassi, Etim Okon Edet, expressed his dismay over the
move.
"I
think the spirit of everybody is down. The people of Bakassi, apart from being
Nigerians, they are also citizens of the world, and they needed the protection
of the world, which they hadn't seen," he told the BBC's Newsday
programme.
He said
residents were fed up talking about the issue and as far as they could see, the
ceding of the territory was because "they were just interested in the
oil".
"We
have given them the oil, we have also given them the land, so we should be
allowed to have our peace."
According
to the AFP news agency, large sections of the area have been gazetted for
exploration, but energy firms have stayed clear of the region. Its offshore
waters are thought to contain substantial oil and gas reserves
In the last
five years, Cameroon was meant to have started developing the area, building
clinics, schools and roads in the peninsula.
But a
recent government inspection revealed that some of the projects had floundered,
revealing dry boreholes and half-completed buildings abandoned because of
mismanagement and poor contractors, our reporter says.
Residents
have also appealed for help from the government to build some sort of barrier
to stop rising flood waters in coastal areas, he says.
The two
countries nearly went to war over Bakassi in 1981 and bloody clashes claimed 34
lives in 1994.
That year,
Cameroon took Nigeria to the International Court of Justice in The Hague, which
ruled in favour of Yaounde in 2002.
Nigeria
rejected the ruling, but the UN intervened and the two countries set up a
UN-chaired joint commission to resolve the conflict.
The
peninsula was administered by Nigeria from independence in 1960. However,
Cameroon based its claim of sovereignty over the region on maps dating back to
the colonial era.
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