Macron to shine a light on dark side of Cameroon rule

PRESIDENT Emmanuel Macron yesterday pledged to throw open the archives on French colonial rule in Cameroon so that historians could shed “full” light on the period’s “painful moments”.

French colonial authorities brutally repressed armed nationalists before Cameroon independence in 1960.

Speaking in the capital Yaounde on his first trip to Africa since his re-election in April, Mr Macron, 44, said he wanted historians from both countries to work together to probe the past. Mr Macron, the first French president born after the colonial era, has repeatedly said he wants to shed light on dark episodes in the nation’s history.

Last year, France returned more than a dozen artefacts looted from nearby Benin by colonial forces, easing tensions between Paris and Yaounde.