A Nation at Risk: A Personal Narrative of the Cameroonian Crisis

By Peter Wuteh Vakunta

A Nation at Risk: A Personal Narrative of the Cameroonian Crisis should be construed as a requiem for what used to be known as the Republic of Cameroon. The overriding objective of this book is to shine the searchlight on the dysfunctional government of Cameroon under President Paul Biya, a minuscule man and matching mind, endowed with a gargantuan ego. Those who wish to comprehend the apocalypse toward which the Cameroonian nation has been propelled by the rogue government of Mr. Biya would do well to study the minds of the men at the helm. Mr. Biya and his henchmen enjoy playing at and for power. The politics of power is for them an act of intellectual masturbation. Even the diabolism inherent in the phenomenon of power is something they relish.

In Nation at Risk, Peter Wuteh Vakunta, a prolific writer in his own right, has successfully pieced together a compelling narrative of the many facets of the crisis that has plagued Cameroon during the more than three-decade presidency of Mr. Paul Biya. Lucid and captivating, this landmark volume provides a seminal contribution to readers appreciation of the social, political, economic and cultural events that have shaped Cameroons history from the time of independence from colonial masters to date. Vakuntas penetrating analysis of the lackluster governmental modus operandi of President Biya is a must read for all Cameroonians and friends of Cameroon who feel deeply about the future of this often forgotten African nation.

Dr. Peter Ngwafu Ajongwa, Associate Professor

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Aug 2, 2012
• ISBN: 9781469799759

Peter Wuteh Vakunta

Dr. Peter Wuteh Vakunta is professor of Modern Languages at the United States Department of Defense Language Institute in Monterey-California. He holds three graduate degrees from American universities (MS, MA and Ph.D). He is novelist, poet and storyteller. His award-winning novel is titeld NO LOVE LOST. Peter has a passion for reading and writing fiction. He lives in Monterey with his wife and children.

Book preview

A NATION AT RISK

A PERSONAL NARRATIVE OF THE

CAMEROONIAN CRISIS

Copyright © 2012 by Peter Wuteh Vakunta

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ISBN: 978-1-4697-9974-2 (sc)

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgement

Eulogy from a reader

Foreword

1

A Nation at Risk

2

Toward A Cameroonian Renaissance

3

Autopsy of a Moribund Nation-State

4

Manufacturing the

Illusion of Freedom

5

De-identification of Cameroonians

at Home and in the Diaspora

6

The Big Banana: A Mind-boggling

Documentary on the Fleecing

of the People of the Mungo by a

Franco-American Multinational

7

S.O.S Bertrand Teyou!

8

Entertaining Resistance: Music and

Human Rights in the post-colony

9

Paul Biya’s Rogue Governance of

Cameroon: Open Sore of a Nation

10

Deceptive Habits of Cameroon’s

Despotic Regime: Socio-

Economic Implications

11

The Gargantuan Fraud Machine

of Mr. Paul Biya’s Embargoed Regime

12

Voting Rights for Cameroonians in

the Diaspora: An Exercise in Futility

13

Clarion Call to Bona Fide Opposition

Political Parties in Cameroon

14

The Cruel Death of a Taciturn

Zombie: Day of National

Abstinence in Cameroon

15

Implications of the October 2011

Presidential Elections in Cameroon

16

Post-electoral Dysphoria: Death Knell

or Rebirth of a Moribund Nation

17

Time for Armed Opposition

in Cameroon

18

Epilogue: Vendetta of an

Indefatigable Combatant

Notes

Select Bibliography

Discography

About the Author

Dedication

We dedicated this book to all the disenchanted Cameroonians at home and in the diaspora

Acknowledgement

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The contents of this volume came together as a series of essays published in traditional and online journals in the course of several years. I owe a debt of gratitude to the editors of these journals. In particular, I want to express profound gratitude to the editors of the Postnewsline, for publishing the bulk of the articles that make up this volume. Pambazuka deserves special thanks for publishing quite a few of the articles that have become chapters of this book. PalaPala Magazine and The Entrepreneur in Cameroon are other publications in which parts of this book have appeared. The author is grateful for permission to reprint all or parts of these essays. Nation at Risk: A Personal Narrative of the Cameroonian Crisis would never have seen the light of day without the encouragement of many people who seemed to believe in the weight of my pen long before I was confident enough to do so. Special thanks go to John S. Dinga whose eulogy appears below. Many thanks go to my childhood friend, Thomas Jing, who never stops elbowing me onto greater heights. I want to thank the anonymous readers of my opinion pieces who never had the opportunity to praise or take umbrage at the stance I took on burning issues in Cameroon. My debt to one and all is of an enormity difficult to acknowledge or repay. I am particularly indebted to my spouse and children for bearing those lonely hours when I could not be with them. Above all, I am grateful to God Almighty without whom man labors in vain.

Eulogy from a reader

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It is nice to have silent warriors who exert their own influence using the pen. You will be surprised how many mortals you influence with those powerful messages. Of course detractors will always rear their heads but the important thing is that people are able to share level-headed reflections with you and like-minded people. Sometimes what you say is so good and so true that one is simply overcome by joy and inner satisfaction— John S. Dinga, 2011.

Foreword

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I am obligated to concede that the overall tenor of my remarks in Nation at Risk: A Personal Narrative of the Cameroonian Crisis could easily be misconstrued as requiem for what we now know as the Republic of Cameroon. So, let me caution from the outset that this is not the intent of this book, the sole purpose of which is to shine the searchlight on the dysfunctional government of Cameroon under President Paul Biya, a minuscule man and matching mind, endowed with a gargantuan ego. Those who wish to comprehend the apocalypse toward which the Cameroonian nation is being propelled by the rogue governance of Mr. Biya will do well to study the mind of the man at the helm. Mr. Biya enjoys playing at and for power. The diabolism inherent in the phenomenon of power is something he relishes. Yet, the politics of power is for him, an intellec-tual challenge. Thus, manipulation, divisive tactics, cajolery, patronage, double-talk, exploitation of weaknesses, blackmail, backstabbing, occultism, cronyism, influence peddling, and the cultivation of apparent detachedness form the armory of this wily politician nicknamed L’homme Lion or Lion Man.

The thought behind the crafting of this book was nourished by the fervent belief that change is the offspring of audacity and strength of character necessary to break out of the mold of conventional reasoning, the temerity to pose intriguing questions that have never been asked before, the perspicacity to imagine things as they have never been fathomed before, the courage to challenge the status quo, the rebelliousness needed to express new thoughts at the risk of being pilloried, and the desire to be free from the shackles of mental servitude that confines people in perpetual paranoia of offending people at the helm.

I subscribe to the aphorism that a modicum of measured resistance, controlled defiance, and reasoned disobedience are recipes for positive change in the community of humans. The fear to offend the untouchables of our society inhibits our ability to engage in constructive criticism in which resides the capacity of a society to change and evolve. Our reluctance to hold our leaders accountable hinders our ability to rise up against abuse of power, injustice, corruption, and impunity. For thirty years, Cameroonians have been victims to one man’s Machiavellian dictatorship; they have seen how one man—Mr. Paul Biya—surrounded by a cabal of tribesmen has hijacked the entire governmental apparatus with the aid of the military and stayed in power anti-constitutionally. Like all global dictators, Mr. Biya has learned the ropes of despotic governance quickly: once in power, put people of your tribe in key positions: military generals, ministers, beef up your personal protection, that way, you cannot be overthrown by a coup d’état, bribe the military by means of disproportionately elevated salaries given that soldiers are the mainstay of a dictatorship. This is the dictatorial blueprint the tenets of which serve as Mr. Biya’s governmental modus operandi.

Armed with a mix of nihilistic contraptions, Mr. Biya has developed a callously thick skin; he no longer feels accountable to the people of Cameroon. Elections are rigged with impunity year in year out, opposition party leaders are cowed into submission through torture and blackmail, the nation’s wealth is brazenly misappropriated by Mr. Biya, his wife, Chantal Biya, and close circle of cronies, nicknamed ministers who live in opulence. In contradistinction, impoverished Cameroonian rank and file are left to their own devices in a land bereft of good roads, urban transportation system, hospital supplies, home industries, and schools. The youths are at daggers drawn with a leadership that has failed to acknowledge their existence. The average Cameroonian finds it hard to understand why their president has mortgaged the nation’s natural resources—crude oil, forest products, land, and minerals. Little wonder, a critic of Mr. Biya’s regime, George Ayittey, has painted the following portrait of him:

A suave bandit who has reportedly amassed a personal fortune of more than US$200million and the mansions to go with it, Biya has beaten the opposition into complete submission. Not that he’s worried about elections—he has rigged the term-limit laws twice to make sure the party doesn’t end any time soon (Ayittey, 2011:15).

The impotency of Cameroon is a reflection of Mr. Biya’s sense of failure as a statesman. Power has corrupted him absolutely, and all the more disastrously because he has come to identify Cameroon and her natural resources with his own personal wealth. Mr. Biya has no compunction about reducing Cameroon to a wasteland, as long as he survives to preside over a mere name. Totally lacking in vision and moral rectitude, he is like a mole trapped in a warren of tunnels.

Interestingly, Mr. Biya has no idea what country he is governing. Beyond the reality of a fiefdom that has dutifully nursed his insatiable thirst for power and transformed him into a tin-god, he has only superficial knowledge of Cameroon.Consequently, he is incapable of grasping what is being conveyed to him about the legitimate grievances of a marginalized constituent of the fragmented country he rules—Anglophones— these people who speak with the resolute voice of self-determination. In Mr. Biya’s mind, these people could not possibly be part of the Republic of Cameroon that he knows. It is only by eliminating Anglophones entirely that Cameroon can become the entity that Mr. Biya recognizes.

When the French pressured Cameroon’s first postcolonial Head of State, Mr. Ahmadou Ahidjo, to grant Mr. Biya occupancy of the presidential palace at Etoudi in 1982, I admonished that Mr. Biya would prove more ruthless than his predecessor. There were many who thought then that I was being overly alarmist. Now, of course, we know what stuff the man is made of, and the worst I am afraid, is yet to come. Mr. Biya will be satisfied only with the total annihilation of every aspect of Cameroon that he cannot mentally grasp. He will find peace and solace only in silencing the voices whose language he cannot comprehend.

In sum, Nation at Risk: A Personal Narrative of the Cameroonian Crisis is a compass intended to give Cameroonians a sense of direction as they grope around in search of light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. It behooves Cameroonians of all creeds to come to the realization that people deserve their leaders. Most importantly, they must rethink the sagacious words of Edmund Burke who once said: The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.¹ The didactic value of this book resides in its comprehensibility to people from all walks of life and social strata eager to know what makes Cameroon tick. The language is free of verbal sophistry. Casual readers and professionals with a genuine interest in the geopolitics of Cameroon would find this book a delight to read.

1

A Nation at Risk

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Introduction

You may remember Animal Farm, the 1945 classic written by George Orwell. Many in my generation were expected to do a succinct analysis of this novel in order to take the London General Certificate of Education (GCE) Ordinary Level Examination. Over the years with the benefit of hindsight, I have come to fully understand the relevance of the message contained in this classic as I ponder the Cameroonian Crisis. The plot of Orwell’s book is centered on the dissatisfaction of farm animals who felt they’re being mistreated by Farmer Jones. Led by the pigs, the animals revolted against their oppressive master, and after their victory, they decided to run the farm on egalitarian principles. However, the pigs became corrupted by power and a new tyranny took root. The famous line: All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others (92) still rings true to date.  In this essay, I contend that the socio-political impasse in Cameroon at present is a parody of Animal Farm. Indeed, the novel is a replica of what scholars of post-colonial Cameroon have labeled the Anglophone Problem.

The Anglophone Question

After fighting together with Anglophones to oust the colonialists from Cameroon, Francophone Cameroonians have now positioned themselves at the helm and view Anglophones as inferior pigs in the pigsty that Cameroon has become. They lord it over their Anglophone compatriots. There exists a generation of English-speaking Cameroonians who believe that they have come to a crossroads and would like to know in which direction to turn. Many Anglophone Cameroonians would like to know why they are condemned to play second fiddle in the land of their birth. The unfair treatment meted out to English-speaking Cameroonians by supercilious, condescending Francophones in positions of power appears to be a time bomb that will explode to do irreparable damage in the not too distant future. It is in the same vein that Matumamboh makes the following observation:

Anglophone Cameroonians still feel themselves a colonized people trapped in the clutches of horizontal colonization. Unfair discrimination sows seeds of discord regardless of where it originates. Prejudice, in all its shades and forms, is hurtful and does not bode well for national integration (Online article, 2010).

The cohabitation between Anglophone and Francophone Cameroonians has been likened to a marriage of convenience by scholars and students of post-colonial Cameroon. Existential antagonism between the two linguistic communities breeds prejudice and confuses Cameroonians. Celebrated American literati, Maya Angelou once said: Prejudice is a burden which confuses the past, threatens the future, and renders the present inaccessible (5). This is so true of the Cameroonian conundrum. Some critics have compared the frictional co-habitation between the two distinct linguistic communities in Cameroon to the attitude of two travelers who met by chance in a roadside shelter and are merely waiting for the rain to cease before they continue their separate journeys in different directions. This metaphor captures the mutual distrust and animosity that separates Anglophone Cameroonians from their Francophone compatriots. All too often, the perpetrators of this malicious game of divide and conquer are the political leaders on the French-speaking side of the national divide who take delight in fishing in troubled waters. Francophone politicians love to stoke the flames of animosity, thereby whipping up sentiments of mutual hatred on both sides of the Mungo River² at the expense of national integration. Many Francophones make statements intended either to cow Anglophones into submission or incite them into open rebellion. At the same time, these provocative individuals would mount the podium to tell the rest of the world that the so-called Anglophone Problem in Cameroon is the figment of the imagination of a few radical Cameroonians of English expression. This type of prevarication, it seems to me, harbors seeds of self-annihilation, the moreso because nemesis has uncanny ways of catching up with culprits.

The Anglophone Question is not the figment of anyone’s imagination. It is the outcry of a disenchanted people condemned to live on the national periphery. The truth of the matter is that there is a palpable feeling of malaise amongst Anglophones in Cameroon. Questions that remain unanswered by the powers-that -be are legion but here are a few that have remained unanswered to date: are Anglophone Cameroonians