Daily Times

A Cameroonian tycoon was arrested on Monday in connection with the high-profile murder of a journalist, sources said. Radio journalist Martinez Zogo, who was kidnapped and brutally murdered last month, was outspoken against graft and financial sleaze and had often faced threats over his work. Jean-Pierre Amougou Belinga, owner of L’Anecdote media group, “was arrested… at dawn,” the company said. Denis Omgba Bomba, head of the National Media Observatory, a unit attached to the communications ministry, confirmed the arrest and said the tycoon had been “named a suspect in the killing of Martinez Zogo.” A senior official with the gendarmerie, a branch of the police that comes under the authority of the ministry of defence, said Amougou Belinga had been arrested at his home “in the middle of the night.” He “is currently in the State Defence Secretariat,” a unit of the gendarmerie, L’Anecdote said. Omgba Bomba told AFP two of the businessman’s associates were also arrested early Monday. He identified them as Bruno Bidjang, a journalist with Vision 4, a TV channel owned by Amougou Belinga, and Raymond Etoundi Nsoe, a retired colonel and ex-commander of Cameroon’s presidential guard and the tycoon’s father-in-law. Zogo, 50, was the manager of the privately-owned radio station Amplitude FM and host of a daily show called Embouteillage (Traffic Jam). He had frequently named Amougou Belinga in his corruption accusations.