Eric Tano Tataw, 38, a Cameroonian national, is accused of inciting murders in Cameroon through online calls for violent attacks against the civilian population of his country and for raising funds to supply AK-47s to separatist groups, according to a press release dated 25 April 2025 from the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland in the United States. Nicknamed the ‘Master of Mutilation’, Eric Tano Tataw is accused of conspiring to provide material support to armed separatist groups in Cameroon and making threats to injure or kidnap. If convicted, Eric Tano Tataw faces a maximum sentence of 15 years‘ imprisonment on the “material support” charge and five years’ imprisonment on each count.
Nicknamed the ‘master of mutilation’, Eric Tano Tataw, a 38-year-old Cameroonian living in the United States, is accused of inciting online calls for violent attacks against the civilian population of Cameroon and for raising funds to supply AK-47s to separatist groups, according to a press release from the Maryland US Attorney’s Office dated 25 April 2025. According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eric Tataw and his accomplices orchestrated and financed a Machiavellian plan to overthrow a foreign government. They allegedly used unimaginable violence while instilling fear in innocent victims to further their political goals.
‘Maître Garry, who acts like a guru from Maryland in the United States, should understand that asking for autonomy for himself or part of Cameroon is a universal right. But when he asks for human lives to be attacked, human rights to be trampled on, from foreign soil, American justice has the right to hunt him down and prosecute him.’
SADIO MOREL KANTÉ , Political analyst – Republic of Congo
Federal prosecutors said the suspect was living in Maryland when he posted online instructions for secessionists to cut off extremities, a practice he called ‘garri’. Eric Tataw used the term ‘petit garri’ to refer to the removal of fingers or other small appendages, and ‘grand garri’ to refer to the removal of large limbs or murder. According to federal prosecutors, Eric Tataw personally posted hundreds of messages on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter calling for ‘attacks on Cameroonian civilians’, seeking to raise funds to arm the Amba Boys and ‘threatening’ ‘persons suspected of working for or collaborating with the government’. These messages were regularly consulted by tens of thousands of people.
‘This will make many Internet users understand that just because you are on the networks from another country, or even from your own country, doesn’t mean that you can incite violence and hatred, whereas justice and the law are there to regulate things that can happen without this happening. There are countries that are secessionist, and there are many that are so without resorting to violence, murder or the severing of people’s limbs. I think that a little time in prison, because I think that he still has 20 years or more to serve, will do him good and will make many of our compatriots who are on foreign soil understand that activating networks to flout human rights does not protect us’.
SADIO MOREL KANTÉ , Political analyst – Republic of Congo
If convicted, Eric Tano Tataw faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison for the ‘material support’ count and five years in prison for each count of ‘threatening communication intended to injure or kidnap’. This decision by the American justice system highlights the murderous manipulation that led the Cameroonian diaspora to manipulate fellow citizens in order to create a fictitious state of Ambazonia at the end of a devastating civil guerrilla war in the south-west and north-west of the country. The tragedy claimed more than 5,000 lives and displaced thousands more.
