Independence or Nothing: Theology of Self-Determination and the British Southern Cameroons

By Jerry Jumbam

The intended audience is all the people of the world who are concerned about the oppressed and suffering people deprived of justice and struggling under colonial oppression. The context of the book is the aggression and tyranny the British Southern Cameroonians are undergoing as a result of an artificial union that has subjugated the British Southern Cameroonians to the oppression of the successive La Republique du Cameroun governments (prompted by some Western imperialists) for fifty-seven years now. The book underscores the fact that the principle of self-determination in non-violent ways can solve the legitimate problems many world constituted regions are facing today. Moreover, it is a book that demonstrates in Christian theological ways how the oppressed and marginalized in society can rise up against tyranny and subjugation. The book is about the theology of self-determination. The author of the book (a theologian), inspired by his profound knowledge of Christian theology, believes that, through this theological vision of self-determination, the church must be engaged in the political and economic liberation of Africa and anywhere in the world where people are tyrannized.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Mar 15, 2018
• ISBN: 9781546289180

Jerry Jumbam

Jerry Jumbam (Gerald Jumbam NYUYKONGMO) is a catholic priest whose independence of mind allows him to speak without fear on challenging subjects. His first book Why Bernard Fonlon Matters (a bestseller in Cameroon) makes a case for the beatification of one of the greatest saints to have come out of the continent of Africa. He is the author of challenging and thought-provoking articles published in some of Cameroons Christian famous newspapers like LEffort Camerounais, and Cameroon Panorama. He did research and wrote many articles on witchcraft in Cameroon. He has also written extensively on the importance of technical education especially when he was principal of a technical college in Cameroon. He is in Rome for studies and has recently availed himself of this opportunity to do research and contributed in Facebook, blog and twitter on religious, historical and political matters concerning Africa, and especially on the ongoing Southern Cameroons Problem in his homeland. His contributions on this issue (the burden of this book) has been incomparable. He holds a licentiate in Moral Theology from the Pontifical Urban University Rome and holds a Doctorate in Sacred Theology from the Lateran Pontifical University of Rome.

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© 2018 Jerry Jumbam. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 02/22/2018

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8919-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8920-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-8918-0 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018902299

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CONTENTS

Dedication

Acknowledgement

Foreword

Preface

Chapter 1   Independence Is Nonnegotiable

Chapter 2   Never Again!

Chapter 3   Clerical Power in Cameroon

Chapter 4   The Committed Writer

Chapter 5   The Murder Machine

Chapter 6   The Coffin Revolution

Chapter 7   The Witches’ Soup of Genocide

Chapter 8   An Ambazonia with a Lofty Vision

DEDICATION

To my beloved dad,

Vincent Wirngo Jumbam

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The author would like to acknowledge using material from the following online bible texts:

The (New) Jerusalem Bible, Bible Gateway (New International Version), King James Bible

And New American Standard Bible. He also acknowledges using material from John Michael Talbot’s poem, Be not Afraid.

FOREWORD

For the past four decades, the brutal regime of the government of La Republique du Cameroun has been the architect of the most horrific evils: genocide, systematic murder, brutal torture, and savage killing of the Southern Cameroonians. Both local authorities and the international community have remained silent in the face of all the reported carnage perpetuated by this regime, and they watch as the death tolls keep rising daily, doing nothing. In their absence, however, students, journalists, lawyers, human rights activists, and even clergymen have all risen in the fight for human rights and democracy. This perilous situation in the Southern Cameroons, I am convinced, is what inspired the ethically conscious Jerry Jumbam to pick up his pen, in order to fight back against this bloodsucking government before it causes more mayhem. Undoubtedly, this book is the upshot of such motivation.

Jumbam’s no-nonsense solution to Southern Cameroons’ tribulations is clear-cut: the total liberation and restoration of the sovereignty of the British Southern Cameroons. He is of the conviction that if there is a stridency in what he writes, it is because Cameroon is sitting on a time bomb and it needs courageous men and women to awaken its citizens to face up to their obligation before it is too late.

Jumbam was born in 1978 in the town of Kumbo in the north-west of the country. He is a priest of the diocese of Kumbo. Since Jumbam’s ordination. the bishop who ordained him has trusted him and even given him very strategic appointments of responsibility at his young age, areas of responsibility such as bishop’s secretary, chancellor of the diocese, and principal of the lone technical college in the diocese. Jumbam is eternally grateful for the confidence his boss has given him. Jumbam cherishes his priesthood and maintains that he owes a great deal to his bishop. Nevertheless, he believes that some clergy in Cameroon have been shamelessly standing on the side of corruption and oppression lately, and he has spoken out against this in his writings. To this effect, his bishop, who is also the vice president of the National Episcopal Conference of Cameroon (NECC), maybe because of the structures beyond his control has not recently appreciated Jumbam’s position in speaking out for the poor masses or for his part in reprimanding some clerical authorities who are seemingly sympathetic to the brutal regime of Paul Biya.

In this work of profound theological implications, Jumbam, an erstwhile seeming Conservative, has not only come to sympathize with the Catholic Church’s liberation theology but also has fashioned his own, African-like theology and baptized it the theology of self-determination. At the core of this theology is the good news—the radicalism of the gospel message, especially that of the beatitudes, which is famous for its denunciation of all political and social structures that dehumanize the human person. Here, Jumbam is not afraid of standing for what looks like a theological theory which uses faith as an instrument of revolution. Instead he believes the theology of self-determination should be used by people of faith to bring oppressed and marginalized human beings to the knowledge of a just and benevolent God, the God who is the refuge of the poor and afflicted. With the election of Pope Francis in 2013, and his firmness on avowing that the church is for the poor and his no-nonsense discourses against hypercapitalism and consumerism, Jumbam feels that his theology of self-determination is on the right side of church history, and therefore should be incorporated within the church. He believes that his theology is the theology of the people, of the suffering, and of those treated unfairly by unjust political structures. It is a métier for those who opt for the poor, those who know the poor, those whose hearts have dug into the root cause of poverty, those who meet the poor in everyday life.

Just a few months before the restoration of the Southern Cameroons’ independence in 1 October 2017, Jumbam embarked on writing the series of essays that are the chapters of this book. It would become an attempt that would be sometimes demanding, crushing, and shocking, but he would move on. It got to the extent of his priesthood suffering constant attacks from detractors. It would be so shattering at one moment in the USA that he would attempt to seek asylum because of the persecution he was undergoing from the church hierarchy in Cameroun and from the tyrannical Cameroon state.

I am convinced that Jumbam’s writings have a message for humanity. His writings are supported by history. They exude moral and ethical principles learnt from moral theology classes and backed by a lived experience. His writings preach nonviolence at all times, and have no space for brutality and oppression. The independence of the Southern Cameroons he espouses in his writings is something historical, legal, and God-sent. He has never sought for any political post or been a member of any of the pressure groups. He is independent of mind, and this gives him a unique poise to write like one who is morally responsible. He sympathizes with humanity and people’s sufferings. The chapters that we have before us therefore are works written within a context. These writings have touched a great many Southern Cameroonian lives, and that is why the political authorities went after Jumbam’s life. These writings all appeared in social and printed media, and sent tidal waves of remorse into the hearts of the oppressor in Yaoundé. Each chapter came at a particular moment of the affliction of Jumbam’s people, and thus each address a particular problem and is addressed to a particular person or people.

The first chapter, Independence Is Nonnegotiable, was originally an essay entitled The Problem of the British Southern Cameroons: Independence or Federation? that came out on 30 August 2017. It was in this essay that Jumbam defined the struggle for the liberation of the Southern Cameroons as self-determination in its purest form. He therefore wrote about the restoration of the independence of the Southern Cameroons in the context of the theology of self-determination. Here he presents the history of his people and how it is God, history supreme judge of history, who has the key to the sovereignty of the Southern Cameroons.

The second chapter, Never Again!, written on 27 February 2017, was originally entitled An Open Letter to Boh Herbert on the Plight of the People of the Southern Cameroons: Homecoming or Homegoing? This was an open letter to Boh Herbert, one of those who, at the very moment of the letter’s writing, articulated best the problem of the people of the Southern Cameroons in relation to the Cameroon problem. Boh Herbert is a renowned veteran Cameroonian journalist living in the United States of America. Jumbam used that open letter as a rostrum to spell out the root cause of the political and ethical problem in the Southern Cameroons, and gave some consolation to the suffering people of his homeland to stay together and to put God first in their struggle to win back their lost dignity.

The third chapter, Clerical Power in Cameroon, was originally issued online on 30 April 2017. In Jumbam’s desperation in the face of the insensitivity of Archbishop Samuel Kleda, he wrote an open letter to Kleda, the president of the NECC. This letter must be understood as the most controversial writing Jumbam did during this political crisis period. He pondered and contemplated before he published it. It is one of the greatest decisions, he says, he has ever taken in life. He understood what it could mean outside Cameroon, but he also understood how it would serve poor and oppressed people’s lives. It was the voice of the voiceless in that writing because of the circumstance and context. The letter was hailed within and beyond Cameroon. So, it was a conscious decision to write the highest church authority in Cameroon, and to do so publicly. But let that letter be always read in its context. To do otherwise is to commit an injustice against the author. For details of the context of this important open letter, it is essential to read carefully the next, fourth chapter of this book, The Committed Writer. The open letter to Msgr Kleda was a welcome relief to a cross section of objective well-meaning Catholics, we must not forget.

The fourth chapter of the work, The Committed Writer, came out online in June 2017. Originally it was entitled Breaking the Silence: Before My Dead Body Is Found under the River Sanaga, an essay Jumbam wrote on the brutal assassination of Bishop Jean Marie Bala of Edea. In this article he speaks of the mission of a writer (especially a priest-writer) in times of tyranny and oppression. Here he is alluding to himself (a writer) and to Msgr Jean Marie Bala (a witness of truth). He had received a couple of anonymous telephone calls from Cameroon threatening him with harm if he continued to write. So, the article was in open defiance of such people, and to let them know that if it came to his having to die for what is right, then it was his duty as a priest to do so. Even as we speak now, Jumbam remains in exile in Europe. His parents fled Cameroon for Congo to stay awhile with his senior sister. Jumbam will suffer in exile for challenging such strongmen as Paul Biya and Samuel Kleda in Cameroon. But his present exile would offer him a fitting rostrum to pierce further into the Cameroonian problem with even more enthusiasm, thirst, and poise.

The fifth chapter, The Murder Machine, was originally entitled The Problem of School Attendance in the British Southern Cameroons. It was issued online on 10 August 2017. This article speaks about the depravity of the Southern Cameroonian school system as a result of the destruction of the curriculum of education by the existing French Cameroon government’s system of education. This is done with the intent to carefully assimilate the Southern Cameroonian and is therefore an educational tool to colonize the people. This essay decries the depletion of moral and spiritual values from Southern Cameroonian schools and calls on Southern Cameroonians to rise up and take over the education of their children.

The sixth chapter, The Coffin Revolution, was originally entitled At the Eleventh Hour of Our Restoration: Time for Prayerful Courage. It was issued online on 31 September 2017.