HRH Fon Kum Gilbert Condemns Prostitution of Titles, Sales of Land

By Fai Cassian Ndi

HRH Fon Kum Gilbert of Kung

HRH Fon Kum Gilbert of Kung village in Fungom Sub Division of Menchum Division in the North West Region of Cameroon has decried the manner at which some traditional rulers have been reduced to nothing by CPDM bigwigs and government. Fon Kum Gilbert who has been very bitter over the non-functioning of GTC Kung which was created since 2011 condemned the way some politicians and administrators have transformed traditional rulers to toys given that his community has been deprived from education which is a Human Rights. He also frowned at the prostitution of titles to underserved persons and the way some of his peers have engaged in the illicit sales of land to the detriment of their subjects’.

When we asked the Fon what he thinks as with regards to the way traditional rulers in Cameroon are being used like common boys by incompetent and lazy CPDM politicians in the North West and South West Regions, he vehemently called on Northwest and Southwest Traditional rulers to shun away from being forerunners for and behind corrupt and doubtful politicians and administrative authorities. “We ought to serve the political, traditional and cultural roles in constructing a democratic and developed Cameroon”. According to HRH Fon Gilbert Kum, “Fons need to serve as custodians of their various traditions and cultures other than what is qualified as “Auxiliaries” to the administration, as coined in the 1977 Presidential Decree”. “The term auxiliary” he added is a term he qualifies to be “politically and administratively overloaded, which implies that traditional rulers are forceful collaborators to the administrative authorities and the CPDM regime as a whole political entity. Implicitly, “they must forcefully cooperate with the administrative authorities and the regime in place even on maladministration and malgovernance projects and or activities. Traditional rulers, he emphasized, need to serve as a democratic, political and societal “institutional recall” mechanisms that aim at redressing societal and malgovernance behaviors that are orchestrated by the corrupt and incompetent lazy politicians. He lamented that on the contrary traditional rulers nowadays have turned to play obnoxious roles which he qualifies as a “traditional power burden” towards their subjects and the society. Harping on this traditional power burden, Fon Kum Gilbert cited pathetic cases whereby some of his peers have engaged in prostituting traditional titles (for money to illegal persons) and have sold almost all the land to the detriment of their subjects.

Fons and Chiefs he noted “should be natural aristocrats who respect the principles of “noblesse oblige” other than a self aggrandizement objective in the destruction of their communities and their subjects’ interests. To him, traditional rulers need to accommodate the most of the ingredients and political attributes that are found in a royal personality even if they are not affluent financially. He urged fons and chiefs to think traditionally, culturally, politically and democratically why is it that CPDM ministers who have been in government business for more than thirty years are still interested in anchoring a royal stool and most of the times justifiably and illegitimately.

On the controversy surrounding the non functioning of Government Technical School Kung, created since 2011, Fon Kum Gilbert and the ensemble of his subjects strongly opine that some personalities are behind the unpatriotic and malgovernance behaviours preventing it from going effective.

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