Ambazonia Governing Council


The Ambazonia Governing Council is an Ambazonian political organization. The AGovC has been known as "hardline" compared to other major Ambazonian separatist movements, and unwilling to engage with federalists. Starting off with a complicated relationship with the larger Interim Government of Ambazonia, following the 2019 Ambazonian leadership crisis, the AGovC officially allied itself to the faction of the IG loyal to the first President of Ambazonia, Sisiku Julius Ayuk Tabe.

History

The AGovC was established in 2013 by the merger of several independence movements, including Southern Cameroons Youth League, Southern Cameroons National Council, the Southern Cameroons Restoration Movement and the Southern Cameroons Peoples Organization. It is led by former SCYL Secretary General Ayaba Cho Lucas.
The AGovC played a key role in initiating the separatist war currently raging between Ambazonian separatist militias and Cameroonian security forces. On September 9, 2017, the AGovC declared the deployment of the Ambazonia Defence Forces in Southern Cameroons and the launching of combat operations to achieve the independence of Ambazonia. Three weeks later, the Southern Cameroons Ambazonia Consortium United Front declared the independence of the country, but did not support the armed struggle that the AGovC had initiated, preferring civil disobedience and a diplomatic campaign. This stance would eventually change.
The AGovC remains outside the IG, with which it has had a complicated relationship. Nevertheless, the IG has supported the AGovCs armed wing, the ADF. In March 2019, the AGovC declined to participate in the All Southern Cameroons People's General Conference in Washington, D.C., and did thus not take part in the foundation of the Southern Cameroons Liberation Council. However, it participated in a workshop in Brussels in May 2019, which ended with all Ambazonian independence movements - including the AGovC - promising to set aside ideological differences and form a common front. In June, the AGovC sided with Ayuk Tabe when a leadership crisis broke out within the IG, and in August it formally allied itself with the Ayuk Tabe-led faction.