Unholy Expectations

Dear lovely people,

This is one of the most confusing and saddest story I will ever have to share.  I love those early days in my life when I used to be with her. And I’m trying to forget those days which still get me dying every moment and for which I can’t get myself back, it’s just like getting a one way ticket to a heart break town. Remember I said it will be confusing? Read on…

La Republique is her name and I am Southern Cameroon, we came into a relation on 11^th February 1961 when I as a former British colony, decided through a United Nations Plebiscite to gain ‘Independence’ by joining with her as a French colonial territory. Before we were together, I was one tough guy to look at girls, as I thought that “Man! These girls are useless”, this is how I use to be. But this thought wasn’t going to last for long. Sooner than later, I got myself into her arms. She had a crush on me, but hadn’t a way to speak with this tough guy. Somehow by chance, she pinged me thinking it was a friend of hers. But I got it that she was unaware of whom she was texting with, I explained that she was texting the wrong person. At first, she didn’t believe me but later, she came to know it was me.

Trust me, she was excited and started telling her friends about our conversation. Those girls were jealous of her, because they wished to make friends with me but La Republic got into their way. That is how our story started, a beautiful beginning. I saw changes in me during those early days and thought that “Hey! There is a girl who can make me fall for her”. Our days went routinely well such as early meetings in the mornings, late meetings before going back home, cute texting, sharing love with chocolates, lone walk in empty roads, I mean they were one wonderful bunch of days in my life.

Days passed in the same way, our union got modeled in the form of a Federal structure in October 1^st 1961 in which I assumed the statehood of West Cameroon and La Republique assumed that of East Cameroon.  It was indeed a merger of equal states as stipulated in the 1961 constitution. We soon found ourselves in a situation wherein our parents and our larger families, didn’t accept us and to resolved this, on 20^th May 1972 we all resolved to abolish the existing federal structure through (I would today say) a misleading Referendum in which the numerical majority from the East Cameroon family imposed a unitary structure over the numerical minority of my West Cameroon family. That’s where the seeds of division were sown.

She was forced by such a dispensation to leave me. After some days, we got together again which was unexpected. I never thought we will continue again. I was in her arms once again just the way I did earlier. We were together just like in those days. However it wasn’t delightful for both of us, because as much as I wanted her, it wasn’t same with her wanting me. Yes, I was crazy about her and always being mad at her. Whenever I asked her “don’t you have any feelings for me just the way I have for you?” every time she replied “I do, but I don’t express it”. This was really hurting to me each time she said that and to make it worst, in February 1984, her family decided without consultation to change our family name from United Republic of Cameroon to just ‘Republic of Cameroon’- a name that they had before the 1961 Plebiscite.

Since then, my family has continued to articulate our direct and indirect discrimination on the basis of the colonial language (English) and have been undergoing a process of forced assimilation. Knowing each others state that we are never going to be together harmoniously again. My family and I took a decision to leave her as soon as possible… though a reasonable number of my family members are still in the state of fear for me to leave her forever. It’s true I love her much as I have never loved anyone else. She has always been special to me, I have always tried to express it to her and to show her how special she is to me. But it has always been one sided, she is not expressive, even though she loves me much.

The way forward is difficult to decipher right now partly because of a lack of unanimity especially within my family. I am confused whether they are advocating an exit option in order to assert and reclaim their statehood or clamoring for a more inclusive architecture that would address and redress their minorityhood. I have been like this till now. Just like starving for a lasting solution...

Ministerial Betrayals

Dear lovely people,

Cameroon is home to some of the leading lip-service, hand-clapping and buffoonery Ministers who in every shameful respect display blatant willingness to sell out their own very people and family for perceived personal gain? They spend a greater part of their mandates betraying their home towns by engaging in outrageous lies and supporting fake national policies designed to accelerate impoverishment and misery of the masses such that they can then use their ill-gotten wealth to keep them permanently in bondage. If left unchecked, this brand of merciless Ministers will eventually put much of the country into total jeopardy.

Is it conceivable that a Minister in this country will on national television deny the existence of an Anglophone problem? You see, I’ve often said that crime has a subtle destructive power than meets the eye. It has a way of getting into your brains and turning you into a play-thing to those who hold the four Aces. African dictatorial regimes have a track record of identifying hardened criminals, putting them in positions of power and then using them to achieve their diabolic agendas.

Once you are hooked to a spot within the regime, you start behaving like Lapiro de Mbanga’s ‘Johny-4-Foot’. You become visionless, can’t see beyond your nose and can only eat at the spot where you’ve been tied up. In the current universe of the Anglophone Ministers in this country, the time honored Anglophone problem is not a pressing concern or should be dismissed. Ephemeral power has made them to forget that on 20th May 1972, Cameroon’s federal structure was abolished through a Referendum in which the numerical majority from East Cameroon foisted a unitary structure over the numerical minority of West Cameroon and that in February 1984, the name of the country was changed from United Republic of Cameroon to just ‘Republic of Cameroon - a name that the Francophone Cameroon had before the 1961 Plebiscite.

How unfortunate for Anglophone Ministers to profess that by including Anglophone elite within power circles as it has been the case recently where state corporations that used to be headed solely by Francophones and even decorative Ministries are being headed now by Anglophones. This however, limits its impact only to the family and client survival strategy much against the holistic and constitutional grievances of a marginalized group.

On state media channels, come see Anglophone Ministers boasts of “fighting for all Anglophones” and in that vein, offer suggestions on how to cope with marginalization. Once more, they have betrayed the entire Anglophone community. Their agenda consists chiefly of enforcing dissonance, blocking emergence routes and growing psychopathic roots that will keep the Anglophone community enslaved and emasculated. But in the big picture, they have forsaken their people.

Filled with trepidation, their compatriots have already begun to barricade their communities against the ominous advances of La Republic’s tidal surges. I dare warn that failure to heed to the general and authentic call to revert to a federation as the only solution will only lead to increased intensity of recurrent civil strives and the catastrophic damage that frequently ensues.

With a cool calculating North and Southwest regions figuratively and literally in “the eye of La Republic”, you would think no politician would be more likely to tackle the Federation agenda than the bunch of sell-outs called Ministers hailing from these Regions. But many in the Anglophone community defy logic. In the case of these lip-service Anglophones, their dereliction raises another nagging question. If they are prepared to gamble with the future of all who support them among Anglophones in order to achieve personal short term political advantage, what could we expect from them being in Government?

Finally, these octogenarians boasts they are agents of change with new, forward-looking policies. When it comes to the Anglophone problem, however, they displays no recognition of the altered Anglophone dynamics that require a transition to federation. Instead, they espouses the discredited old nostrums that perpetuate the cosmic dilemma bedeviling Anglophones in this country.

The solution is therefore about facing rather than ignoring the fact that Anglophones in this country have unfinished business that needs settling and settling them right now.

Hard Target

Dear lovely people,

Once upon a time in the celebrated State of Sangbroon, the people were revolted by their government’s bedeviled governance system. Every aspect of the communities therein where down, the population was poverty stricken, joblessness was on an all-time high, failing educational standards, an emasculating judicial system and the list continued.  As a matter of fact, the state had so disintegrated to the extent that its citizens collectively decided to stage a march against the obstinate regime. It was clear that everybody needed a change and so from a simple act of civil disobedience, things escalated to a dangerous civil strife.

Months and months into the struggle, there were no perceptible signs of victory, everybody was so buried in the fight that nobody realized they had been fighting from antagonistic camps. A thoughtful leader popularly called Boas of the largest factions decided to change strategy by aiming first to reunite his own very frictional faction before extending to the other factions and so he brought his belligerent team together in a gigantic room.

On the wall of the room was a big target he had prepared, and on a nearby table were hundreds of darts. Boas, told his team members to each draw a picture of someone that they disliked or someone who had made them really angry, and he would allow them to throw darts at the person's picture. The Team members were not word discretely.

The next in command – Titus, drew a picture of a notable man within their community who he considered to be a sell-out, a traitor to their cause, putting a great deal of detail into his drawing, even drawing pimples on the face. Another team member drew a picture of his team mate’s father and finally the entire team had pictures drawn and placed on the wall and all of them were pleased with the overall effect they had achieved.

In sets, the team members lined up and began throwing darts. Some of the members threw their darts with such force that their targets were ripping apart. Titus looked forward to his turn, and was filled with disappointment when his superior Boas, because of time limits, asked the entire team to return to their seats. As Titus sat thinking about how angry he was because he didn't have a chance to throw any darts at his target, Boas began removing the target from the wall.

Underneath the target was a huge poster on which was written Failure Mechanism. A hush fell over the room as each team member viewed the poster of Failure; holes and jagged marks covered the wordings. Boas again removed the poster to reveal the picture of Jesus and behold, the same holes and jagged marks covered His face, and His eyes were pierced. Even without words, each of them realized how much they had been working and aiming for nothing but failure. It downed on them that they had been focused on the enmity within them than with the common enemy. Most of the pictures on the wall were those of their own team members, members of the other warring factions and the community at large than those of the common enemy they had - the government of the state of Sangbroon.

This happens in everyday life. We take a formidable decision to change our situation or that in which we find ourselves and before long, we miss the target completely and start fighting a lost battle, we start fighting our own very selves than the common enemy. Focus, diligence, hindsight, determination, informed decision making and strategic thinking are the weapons to use when you hope to change your situation and when you need others to listen to your story.

Boas in his concluding statement said "In as much as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me" Matthew 25:40. No other words were necessary; the tears filled eyes of the team members focused only on the picture of Christ.