THE SECRETARIAT
ARCHBISHOP’S HOUSE
P.O. BOX 82, BAMENDA
NORTH WEST REGION
C A M E R O O N
BAPEC/PRES/2016/30
22 December 2016
*MEMORANDUM PRESENTED TO THE HEAD OF STATE, HIS EXCELLENCY PRESIDENT PAUL BIYA, BY THE BISHOPS OF THE ECCLESIASTICAL PROVINCE OF BAMENDA ON THE CURRENT SITUATION OF UNREST IN THE NORTHWEST AND SOUTHWEST REGIONS OF CAMEROON*
When News Breaks Out, We Break In. (The 2014 Bloggies Finalist)
ARCHBISHOP’S HOUSE
P.O. BOX 82, BAMENDA
NORTH WEST REGION
C A M E R O O N
BAPEC/PRES/2016/30
22 December 2016
*MEMORANDUM PRESENTED TO THE HEAD OF STATE, HIS EXCELLENCY PRESIDENT PAUL BIYA, BY THE BISHOPS OF THE ECCLESIASTICAL PROVINCE OF BAMENDA ON THE CURRENT SITUATION OF UNREST IN THE NORTHWEST AND SOUTHWEST REGIONS OF CAMEROON*
Your Excellency,
For almost one month now
there has been a series of unrests and violence in some towns of the
Northwest and Southwest Regions(1) of Cameroon occasioned by the strike
of the Anglophone Lawyers and of the Teachers’ Trade Unions of the
English Sub-system of Education. These have led to the loss of human
life andto the destruction of property of some of our citizens. There
have been flagrant abuses of human rights, as demonstrated by credible
eyewitness accounts and by pictures on local television channels and
social media. This has led to a premature end to the first term of the
school year and paralysed the court system in these regions to the
detriment of school children, students, parents and the administration
of justice. At the moment, it seems that the government and the striking
groups have reached an impasse and it is not likely that the schools
are going to open even when the second term begins for the rest of the
country. These unrests are symptomatic of a deeper unease among the
inhabitants of this geographical circumscription of our nation.
We, the Bishops of the Ecclesiastical Province of Bamenda, which is
coterminous with the Northwest and Southwest Regions, where we hold
responsibility as Shepherds, cannot remain indifferent to this
situation. The Church,in this season, celebrates the birth of Jesus
Christ, the Prince of Peace. She has as mandate to proclaim the message
of peace (Luke 10:5; Matthew 5:9), and has always stood for justice and
peace, and worked for the attainment of the common good of
society.Because of her role and competence, the Church is not identified
in any way with the political community nor bound to any political
system(2). This places her in a uniquely privileged position to provide a
balanced perspective on the current problem between the government of
Cameroon and the population of significant segments of the Northwest and
Southwest Regions of Cameroon. It is for this reason that we have
presumed to seize the moment and to make the following submission, with a
view to assisting the government to seek a lasting solution to this
problem and enable its citizens to live in peace and harmony.
*Historical Background of the Problem*
Most of the territory known today as the Republic of Cameroon was a
German protectorate from 1884. However, German Kamerun also included
British Northern Cameroons, which elected to become part of Nigeria in
the plebiscite of 1961. This protectorate was divided into British and
French Cameroons in 1916 and confirmed, with some slight modifications,
by the Milner-Simon Agreement of 10 July 1919. British Cameroons, which
was comprised of Northern and Southern Cameroons, was one fifth and
French Cameroun was four-fifths of the entire territory. They were Class
B Mandated Territories of the League of Nationsuntil 1946 when they
became United Nations Trust Territories.
British Cameroons and
French Cameroun were separate legal and political entities and
historians have postulated that although this partition was said to be
temporary Britain and France instituted two different administrative
styles and systems which were to impact on any subsequent movement
towards eradicating the provisional nature of the partition and
facilitating reunification.(3) After the Second World War, the United
Nations (Article 76, b) explicitly called on the British and French to
administer their respective spheres of Cameroon towards self-government.
It called on the Administering Authorities to “promote the political,
economic, social and educational advancement of the inhabitants of the
Trust Territories, and theirprogressive development towards
self-government or independence as may be appropriate to the particular
circumstances of each territory and its peoples…”
Before the
London Constitutional Conferences of 1957 and 1958, three political
options had emerged in British Southern Cameroons, namely independence
as a separate political entity, independence in association with
Nigeria, and independence by reuniting with French Cameroun. The Mamfe
Conference of August 1959, which was called to hammer out consensus
among Southern Cameroonians on one of the options, did not succeed to
arrive at a consensus. The three political options persisted, with the
most popular being independence as a separate political entity, the next
being association with Nigeria and the least popular being
reunification with French Cameroun.
Paradoxically, the UN General
Assembly Resolution 1352 (xiv) on the British Cameroons’ Plebiscite of
1961, clearly ruled out the separate independence of Southern
Cameroons(4), the most popular of the three options. This was thanks to
the British who tactfully blocked every chance of the Southern
Cameroonians voting for independence as a separate entity, convincing
the United Nations that Southern Cameroon was not economically viable
and could only survive by leaning on Nigeria or the Republic of
Cameroon, and recklessly steering the Mamfe All Party Conference of
August 1959 to ensure that the parties did not achieve consensus(5). In
fact, the British wanted Southern Cameroons to gain independence in
association with Nigeria. Consequently, the two questions adopted for
the plebiscite were:
1. Do you wish to achieve independence by joining the independent Federation of Nigeria?
OR
2. Do you wish to achieve independence by joining the independent Republic of Cameroun?
Southern Cameroonians were apprehensive of this move and put pressure
on John Ngu Foncha to lead a delegation to London in November 1960 to
include the option of independence as a separate political entity. The
request was rejected. Nevertheless, according to United Nations
Resolution 1541(XV) Principles VII and VIII, Southern Cameroons was
qualified to achieve independence either through association or
integration which “should be on the basis of complete equality between
the peoples of the erstwhile Non-Self-Governing Territory and those of
the independent country with which it is integrated. The peoples of both
territories should have equal status and rights”. It was with this
understanding that on the 11th of February 1961 British Southern
Cameroons voted to join French Cameroun while British Northern Cameroons
voted to join the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
The Foumban
Conference of 17th- 21st July 1961 agreed broadly what the “marriage”
between the two Cameroons was going to look like. The Yaoundé Tripartite
Conference of 2nd-7th August 1961 put this agreement in legal form.
Worthy of note here is the fact that the draft 1961 Constitution was
never presented to the Southern Cameroons House of Chiefs (SCHC) and the
Southern Cameroons House of Assembly(SCHA) for deliberation and
approval as should have been the case. Further, it was signed by
President Ahidjo on the 1stof September 1961 as President of the
Republic of Cameroon when the Federal Republic of Cameroon had not yet
come into existence. Be it as it may, the two territories came together
in this union as a Federation of East Cameroon and West Cameroon (1961
Constitution, Article 1-1).(6)
In September 1966, all the
political parties went into dissolution to form one party in the Federal
Republic of Cameroon (the Cameroon National Union), giving birth to one
party rule. In 1968, Honourable Solomon Tandeng Muna was appointed to
replace Honourable Augustine Ngom Jua without the required Parliamentary
endorsement and in contravention of the law which did not permit Muna
to handle the posts of Federal Vice President and Prime Minister of the
State of West Cameroon concomitantly. Southern Cameroonians saw these
moves as dictatorial and undemocratic. They had come from a multi-party
democratic society where free debate, alliances, consensus, and respect
for the Constitution were the accepted modus operandi.
*Referendum of 20th May 1972*
While West Cameroonians were still bracing themselves for life in a
political dispensation which they regarded as imposed on them by
circumstances beyond their control and struggling to cope with the
manoeuvres of President Ahmadou Ahidjo, he proposed a Constitution that
would make the Federal Republic a unitary state, the United Republic of
Cameroon. As we all know, in those days it was politically unwise and
even unsafe to hold and express views different from those of the
President on any issue, and so there was no public debate on the
constitution. This constitution was voted on in a national referendum
organized and conducted by the Cameroon National Union (CNU), by now the
sole political party in the Republic. The results show that the
overwhelming majority of the electors in East and West Cameroon voted in
favour of a unitary state. Looking back at what happened, many
Anglophone Cameroonians now believe that this was the high-water mark of
Ahidjo’s deceit and manipulation of West Cameroonians, and some have
linked the birth of separatist movements in Anglophone Cameroon to this
referendum.
*Subsequent Constitutional Amendments*
Three
years later, the Constitution was amended to include the post of Prime
Minister, appointed by the President. Following another amendment in
1979 the Prime Minister would be the constitutional successor of the
President of the Republic.In 1984, a constitutional amendment changed
the country’s name from the United Republic of Cameroon to the Republic
of Cameroon. In the eyes of West Cameroonians, Law No 84-1 of 4 February
1984, was incontrovertible evidence that the original intentions of our
Francophone brothers and sisters were to absorb Southern Cameroon and
not to treat with it as equals. After thirty-threeyears of union, we had
all ended up as citizens of the Republic of Cameroon or East Cameroon.
*The Anglophone Problem*
It should be clear, from the brief historical sketch presented above,
what the crux of the so-called Anglophone Problem is. No matter what
some self-appointed elite and spokespersons for Anglophone Cameroonians
as well as government Ministers say in public, the participation of
various strata of the population and the growing popularity of
separatist movements among young and older members of the Anglophone
community demonstrates that there is an Anglophone Problem. There is a
consciousness among Anglophone Cameroonians that all is not well and
something needs to be done about their plight.
_What it is_
The Anglophone Problem is:
i. The failure of successive governments of Cameroon, since 1961, to
respect and implement the articles of the Constitution that uphold and
safeguard what British Southern Cameroons brought along to the Union in
1961.
ii. The flagrant disregard for the Constitution, demonstrated
by the dissolution of political parties and the formation of one
political party in 1966, the sacking of Jua and the appointment of Muna
in 1968 as the Prime Minister of West Cameroon, and other such acts
judged by West Cameroonians to be unconstitutional and undemocratic
iii. The cavalier management of the 1972 Referendum which took out the
foundational element (Federalism) of the 1961 Constitution.
iv. The
1984 Law amending the Constitution, which gave the country the original
East Cameroon name (The Republic of Cameroon) and thereby erased the
identity of the West Cameroonians from the original union. West
Cameroon, which had entered the union as an equal partner, effectively
ceased to exist.
v. The deliberate and systematic erosion of the
West Cameroon cultural identity which the 1961 Constitution sought to
preserve and protect by providing for a bi-cultural federation.
*The Management of the Anglophone Problem*
It is our conviction that the Anglophone Problem would have been
solved, or at least mitigated, if it had been well managed by those
concerned. A lack of proper management seems to be what has aggravated
the problem.
_The Government and Government Ministers_
It is
unfortunate to note that the government of Cameroon seems to have made
every attempt to downplay or even deny the existence of an Anglophone
Problem. Government Ministers (even those of former West Cameroon
extraction) have denied the existence of any such problem in the media
and in public speeches. Furthermore, it is widely believed in Anglophone
Cameroon that government has consciously created divisions among the
English-speaking elite, remunerating some allies with prestigious
positions in the state apparatus previously reserved for Francophones
only, and repressing all actions designed to improve on the status of
Anglophone Cameroonians in the union. This seems to have been proven
true in the recent unrests by the utterances of government Ministers in
the Press Conference on CRTV, in the dispatch of an Anglophone Elite
delegation to the Northwest Region, and in the brutal suppression of
protests by certain professional groups and sections of the Northwest
and Southwest Regions.
_Secessionist Groups_
In the face of
this denial of the existence of an Anglophone Problem by government and
the consequent deafening silence from the government to the cries and
protests of Anglophone Cameroonians, certain groups have emerged in
Anglophone Cameroon that call for the secession of Anglophone from
Francophone Cameroon. The Southern Cameroons Youth League, the Southern
Cameroons National Council, and the Ambazonia Movement are some of the
most strident of these groups and are currently members of the
Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation (UNPO) in The Hague.
_Federalists_
There are different forms of federalism, and federalists in Anglophone
Cameroon will differ as to the specific nature of the federal state they
would want. However, they are all agreed that they do require a
federation which recognises and preserves the region’s peculiarity, as
did the 1961 Federal Constitution.
_Unitarists_
Successive
amendments to the Constitution up to and including the Amendments of
1996 insist on the fact that Cameroon is one and indivisible (Article
1-2, 1996). Cameroon is described as a decentralised unitary state.
Unitarists believe that everything must be done to avoid federalism or
secession. However, even the decentralisation announced by the 1996
Constitution has not been implemented, and government and administration
have been highly centralised.
*Symptoms of Discontent*
What
some people mistake for the Anglophone Problem are just symptoms
pointing to the fact that an overwhelming majority of Anglophone
Cameroonians are not happy in the union which they entered with East
Cameroon in 1961. They have complained against widespread and systematic
marginalisation in various areas of public life which point to the
existence of a huge problem. Some of these symptoms include the
following:
_Marginalisation in Human Resource Development and Deployment_
i. Anglophone Cameroonians have complained about the fact that National
Entrance Examinations into Schools that develop the human resources of
this country are set per the French Subsystem of Education which makes
it very difficult for Anglophones and Francophones to compete on a level
playing field. Majority of the membership of these Examination Boards
are Francophone so that the interests of Anglophone candidates are
hardly, if ever, protected.
ii. Out of the five Ministries
concerned with Education, which is the means of the transmission of
culture, none of the Minsters is Anglophone and none even qualifies to
be a deputy or Secretary of State. This gives the impression of a
calculated attempt to kill Anglophone culture.
iii. In human
resource deployment, there is a gaping inequality in the distribution of
posts of responsibility between Anglophones and Francophones. Of the 36
Ministers who defended the budgets for the Ministries last month, only
one was Anglophone. In addition, there seem to be key ministries that
have been reserved for Francophone Ministers only and Anglophones do not
even qualify to be Secretaries of State under them. These include, but
are not limited to, Defence, Finance, Territorial Administration, and
Economy.
iv. In the 1961 Constitution, the Vice President was the
second most important personality in state protocol. Today, the Prime
Minister (appointed Anglophone) is the fourth most important person in
State Protocol, after the President of the Senate and the President of
the National Assembly. Even so, Anglophone Cameroonians believe that he
wields no real authority and, like was the case with J.N. Foncha as
First National Vice President of the CPDM, finds it “impossible to use
[his] exalted position to help in any way shape or influence the
policies of the party and nation.”(7) There are clearly Francophone
ministers who wield more power than he does. This seems to have been
proven true in the last Teachers’ strike. When the Prime Minister was in
Bamenda negotiating with the Teachers’ Union Leaders, a group of
Francophone Ministers were giving a Press Conference in Yaoundé on the
same issue, giving the impression that the negotiations of the PM in
Bamenda were of no consequence.
_The Treatment of the English Language_
There have been widespread protests about the way the English Language has been treated in the public life of the nation.
i. State institutions produce documents and public notices in French,
with no English translation, and expect English speaking Cameroonians to
read and understand them.
ii. National Entrance Examinations into
some professional schools are set in French only and Anglophone
candidates are expected to answer them. Sometimes this happens even in
the English-speaking regions.
iii. Visitors and clients to
government offices are expected to express themselves in French, even in
the English-speaking regions, since most of the bosses in the offices
speak French and make no effort to speak English.
iv. Most Senior
Administrators and members of the Forces of Law and Order in the
Northwest and Southwest Regions are French-speaking and make no effort
to understand the cultures and customs of the people they are appointed
to govern.
v. Members of Inspection Teams, Missions and
Facilitators for Seminars sent from the Ministries in Yaoundé to the
English-speaking Regions are generally predominantly French speaking,
and expect to be understood by audiences which are predominantly English
speaking.
vi. The Military Tribunals in the Northwest and Southwest Regions are basically French courts.
vii. Basic Finance documents which businesses and other institutions
are expected to work with are all in French. Examples include the COBAC
Code, the CIMA Code and the OHADA Code.
_The Flooding of Anglophone Cameroon with Francophone Administrators and Workers_
Apart from the fact that Ministers, Directors General, Heads of
Parastatals, Senior Divisional Officers, Heads of Law Enforcement
Institutions, etc. are disproportionately Francophone, there seems to
have been a conscious effort made to flood the Northwest and Southwest
Regions with Francophone Heads of Service.
i. The Magistrates in
these Regions are disproportionately Francophone. So are the Senior
Divisional Officers, the Divisional Officers, Commissioners, and
Commandants. In the educational sectors, there are increasingly
Francophone principals posted to Anglophone schools. Personnel in
Hospitals, Banks and Mobile Telephone Companies (even those which
originate from Anglophone countries), are predominantly Francophone. And
this extends to even non-expert workers in petrol stations.
ii.
The situation is aggravated by the fact that these Francophone
administrators are often overbearing, very arrogant and treat people as
if they were second-class citizens, and have no iota of respect for the
dignity of the human person.
_Mismanagement of ‘West Cameroon’ Patrimony_
Apart from neglect of infrastructure in the Northwest and Southwest
Regions of Cameroon and the mismanagement and ruin of buoyant companies
like Cameroon Bank, West Cameroon Marketing Board, WADA in Wum, West
Cameroon Cooperative Movement, etc., oil revenues are alleged to be used
by those in power to feed ‘the bellies’ of their allies, and to
stimulate the economy in other regions. In addition, there is also great
anxiety in Anglophone Cameroon that its major agro-industrial
enterprises, especially the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC) and
Plantations Pamol du Cameroun Ltd (Pamol), are sold or their
headquarters moved elsewhere.
_The ‘Francophonisation’ of the English Educational Subsystem and the Common-Law System_
The flooding of state Anglophone educational and legal institutions
with French-trained and French speaking Cameroonians who understand
neither our educational subsystem nor the English Common Law undermines
Anglophone education and legal heritage and subverts the original
intentions of the founders of the nation to build a bi-cultural nation,
respecting the specificity of each region. This is the cause of the
current strikes by common law lawyers and teachers.
_Admissions into State Professional Schools_
The exclusion of qualified Anglophones in admissions into state
professional schools (especially Schools of Administration, Medicine and
Medical Sciences and Higher Teacher Training) even in the Anglophone
Regions is a glaring example of marginalisation which the Teachers
Unions cited.
These, and many others, have led to the unease and
discomfort of the people of the Northwest and Southwest Regions. They
perceived this marginalisation as institutionalised as they have been
labelled “Biafrans”, “enemies in the house” and “traitors” by highly
placed government officials and ministers who were never reprimanded for
doing so.
*Gradual Erosion of Anglophone Identity*
There has
been a misleading argument from some quarters where some have argued
that an Anglophone is anyone who can speak English, as a way of
countering Anglophone Cameroonians who protest the issues we have
enumerated above. It might be helpful, for the purposes of our
presentation and future discourse, to note here that ‘Anglophonism’ goes
beyond the mere ability to speak or understand the English language. It
speaks to a core of values, beliefs, customs, and ways of relating to
the other inherited from the British who ruled this region from 1916 to
1961. ‘Anglophonism’ is a culture, a way of being which cannot be
transmitted by merely learning a language. In fact, as Dr. Anthony Ndi
intimates, Southern Cameroonians had “a distinctive outlook and way of
life that went further than the mere fact that the educated ones among
them spoke the English Language or a version of it. So, therefore,
language could not even be the qualifying factor”.(8) This Anglophone
identity is the reason most Southern Cameroonians who voted to join the
Republic of Cameroon in 1961 did so. It was to preserve their cultural
identity as a distinct people.
Anglophone Cameroonians are slowly
being asphyxiated as every element of their culture is systematically
targeted and absorbed into the Francophone Cameroon culture and way of
doing things. These include the language, the educational system, the
system of administration and governance (where appointed leaders are
sent to lord it over people who cherish elected leaders), the legal
system, and a transparent democratic process where elected leaders are
answerable to the electorate who put them there in the first place.
Anglophone Cameroonians have seen through this and are raising their
voices in protest. The two All Anglophone Conferences (AAC I and II) of
the early 1990s, the rise and popularity of the SCNC and other
secessionist voices are born of the frustration of Anglophone
Cameroonians of being ignored and ridiculed for asking for what they
deem to be theirs by right, namely the preservation of their culture.
You would remember that, in his resignation letter from the post of
first Vice President of the CPDM on the 9th of June 1990, J.N. Foncha
cited in point 9 of the letter, as a reason for resigning, the fact that
the constitution was “in many respects being ignored and manipulated”.
*A Natural Reaction*
The reaction of Anglophone Cameroonians to preserve their culture can
only be described as ‘natural’. Is it any surprise that the first
Opposition party that forced the door open for multi-partyism in
Cameroon, the Social Democratic Front (SDF), came from Anglophone
Cameroon? Following the formation of the party, the architect who
brought Southern Cameroonians into the union with the Republic of
Cameroon, John Ngu Foncha, resigned in disillusionment as the First
Vice-President of the CPDM. He explained:
The Anglophone
Cameroonians whom I brought into the union have been ridiculed and
referred to as ‘les Biafrians’, ‘les ennemies dans la maison’, ‘les
traitres’ etc., and the constitutional provisions which protected this
Anglophone minority have been suppressed, their voice drowned while the
rule of the gun replaced the dialogue which the Anglophones cherish very
much.(9)
This is not to say that we do not see the other side of
the argument. In any polity formed bytwo or more ethnic, cultural,
religious, or linguistic groups, there is bound to be a majority versus
minority problem. In any such situation, the wise thing to do would be
to make constitutional provisions which would protect and safeguard the
existence and rights of the minority, rather than trample on them. The
Church teaches that “not even the majority of a social body may violate
these rights, by going against the minority, by isolating, oppressing,
or exploiting it, or by attempting to annihilate it.”(10) Cameroon
prides itself as a state of law. In this area, she is at one with the
Church which teaches that society should be organised on the principle
of the “rule of law”. This is the principle “in which the law is
sovereign, and not the arbitrary will of individuals”(11) So, apart from
the plethora of issues which enhance Anglophone disaffection with the
union, there is the additional problem that they are a minority in that
union.
*Proposed Way Forward*
It is not for us to dictate to
the Cameroonian people what form the government of this countryshould
take or what solutions should be provided for the problems we have
highlighted. The Church respects the legitimate autonomy of the
democratic order and is not entitled to express preferences for this or
that institutional or constitutional solution. Her contribution to the
political order is precisely her vision of the dignity of the person
revealed in all its fullness in the mystery of the Incarnate Word(12).
That notwithstanding, we feel obliged in conscience as the religious and
moral leaders in this part of the country, who exercise care over a
people who are hurting, to propose the following lines of action which,
hopefully, should lead to peace and harmony among our people.
_Honesty in the face of the Anglophone Problem_
One of the most disingenuous things any enlightened Cameroonian, talk
less of educated Cameroonian of Anglophone upbringing, can do is to deny
that there is an Anglophone Problem. If former French President,
Jacques Chirac, the Commonwealth, the European Union, and many others
have recognised that there is an Anglophone Problem and advised that the
government of Cameroon and the discontented Anglophones engage in
dialogue, how can Cameroonians deny that there is a problem? To play the
ostrich and bury our heads in the sand is to sow disaster for the
future of the nation we all love. It is to give way to extremist
tendencies in the Anglophone community born of frustration at not being
listened to or understood. Is it possible that the government has not
heard the cries of distress of the All Anglophone Conferences which
represented a broad base of Anglophone Cameroonians? Is it possible that
the government has not heard the Parent-Teacher Associations (PTA), the
Common-Law Lawyers, the Teachers’ Trade Unions, Students, and others
who are not only uncomfortable but are choking under the present
dispensation?
Is it possible for us to look this beast in the
eye, confront it together and overcome it for the sake of peace and
unity in our country? The government’s continued denial of any
Anglophone Problem, and its determination to defend the unitary state by
all available means, including repression, could lead to an escalation
of Anglophone demands past a point of no return, and this is not
something any responsible citizen would wish for their country.
_The All Anglophone Conferences (AAC) of 1993 and 1994_
In May1993, the 65-member Anglophone Standing Committee established by
the AAC submitted a draft constitution which would provide for major
political, financial, and fiscal autonomy for the two federated states,
for the provinces inside both, and for the communities inside each
province. Theyproposed the usual separation of powers between the
executive, legislative, and judiciary, and a senate and national
assembly for each federated state, as well as a rotating presidency for
the Federal Republic, whereby after at most two consecutive mandates of
five years an Anglophone would succeed a Francophone (or vice versa).
This proposal was even reiterated for each of the federated states to
ensure alternation between the provinces. This would be for us a lasting
solution to the irksome Anglophone Problem, and would be acceptable to
the majority of Anglophone and Francophone Cameroonians.
_The Implementation of the 1996 Constitution_
We know there is never a perfect constitution and that is the reason
why constitutions are amended to make them responsive to changes in time
and situation. The 1996 Constitution, even though some have had issues
with sections of it, is good enough as an immediate remedy for the
‘woes’ Anglophones are listing and which make life together in this
nation burdensome to them. As the second-best option, we recommend an
urgent and immediate implementation of the 1996 Constitution. We
recommend that all the institutions created by that constitution be put
in place, and that those put in place be empowered with persons charged
with rendering them functional. This would include the Regions, the
Senate and, by extension, the constitutional council, administrative
courts, the minor courts of accounting/auditing. It is important for
Cameroonians, especially those who seek protection under the ‘rule of
law’ and of the Constitution, to know that the constitution has really
been deployed as a means of regulating the political process in
Cameroon. It is our firm belief that if this is done immediately, it
would satisfy the majority of Anglophone Cameroonians and silence the
calls for secession which have characterized this period of unrest.
_Constructive Dialogue and the Establishment of a Roadmap_
In the short term and, because the Lawyers and Teachers Strikes have
paralysed our legal and school systems, it is imperative for the
government to dialogue with the Lawyers and Teachers as soon as possible
and agree a possible roadmap regarding their legitimate and genuine
demands. We cannot solve a problem if we are unwilling to talk to each
other. In the spirit of the African family, we would expect the father
of the family to find out from a hurting (even if errant) child what the
problem is and what they can do to alleviate their pain and suffering.
There are a good number of the problems raised by our lawyers and
teachers which can be solved now and there are others which can be
solved later, but we need to agree a roadmap and respect it. This will
enable the Teachers’ Unions to call off the strike and permit our
children, who have already lost four weeks of schooling, to return to
school. Indeed, openness to dialogue and to cooperation is required of
all people of good will, and in particular of individuals and groups
with specific responsibilities in the areas of politics, economics and
social life, at both the national and international levels(13).
_Respect for Human Rights_
While it is the duty of administrative and law enforcement officers to
maintain peace and order in their areas of jurisdiction, many of them
have been unnecessarily overbearing and arrogant. Issuing orders and
threats for teachers to return to school, for instance, is not the way
to solve their problem. Further, the current unrests have shown up a
very ugly and embarrassing side of our administrators and the forces of
law and order. Without any provocation from the lawyers or students at
the University of Buea (who carried placards saying ‘No to Violence’ and
raised their hands in the air), the forces of law and order brutalized
some of them so badly and so inhumanely that seeing the pictures one
would have thought they came from the Stone Age. It was shameful to see
law enforcement officers drag female students in the mud, spray
students’ rooms with tear-gas and contaminated water, and then lock some
up for days just for exercising a basic human right to make their
voices heard in a peaceful manner.
The Church teaches that
“A
just society can become a reality only when it is based on the respect
of the transcendent dignity of the human person... Every political,
economic, social, scientific, and cultural programme must be inspired by
the awareness of the primacy of each human being over society... For
this reason, neither his life nor the development of his thought, nor
his good, nor those who are part of his personal and social activities
can be subjected to unjust restrictions in the exercise of their rights
and freedom.”(14)
Our administrators and the forces of law and order
need to be called to order. In the exercise of their duties for the
common good of all citizens, they must never trample on the rights of
those citizens and deal out subhuman treatment to them. Such behaviour
contravenes the law and provides a seedbed for deep resentment which
later manifests itself in very ugly ways.
It is in light of this
that we propose that the government should immediately withdraw the
forces of law and order from the streets of the Anglophone towns to
which they have been deployed, open proper investigations into any
abuses of human rights by the forces of law and order, and release or
charge those who have been locked up as a result of the recent unrests.
In this way, we would have a better climate for the negotiations which
have been proposed between the government and the teachers and lawyers.
_Justice for All_
Every Anglophone group that has raised its voice in protest has
chronicled a number of perceived injustices which either the group or
the Anglophone community in general suffers. Again, if the government
gives them a listening ear, it would become clear to all whether these
perceived injustices are founded or just imaginary. As long as these
people, rightly or wrongly, continue to feel that they are the victims
of injustice, we cannot build ‘the Island of Peace’ in Central and West
Africa we have been proclaiming that we are, and we cannot develop our
country without this peace either. We do not believe, in conscience,
that locking up people who speak up against injustice (real or imagined)
will kill dissent and bring peace. Maybe some examples will help
clarify the point we are making.
On the 14th of December 1967,
Martin Luther King, Jr. made a statement outside a California prison
where Vietnam war protesters were being held. He said: There can be no
justice without peace and there can be no peace without justice.On the
World Day for Peace, 1st January 1972, Pope Paul VI had as theme for his
Message: if you want peace, work for justice. These great crusaders for
social justice teach us that without justice, peace will be an elusive
goal.
Of course, you would remember the Apostolic Visit of Pope
St. John Paul II to Cameroon in August 1985. In his Address to the
President, Constituted Bodies, and the Members of the Diplomatic Corps,
he said:
« Devant les conflits qui demeurent ou renaissent, tout le
monde doit se poser honnêtement la question de leurs causes. Les
injustices commises par certains régimes, concernant les droits de
l’homme en général ou les revendications légitimes d’une partie de la
population qui se voit refuser la participation aux responsabilités
communes, déclenchent des soulèvements d’une violence regrettable, mais
qui ne pourront être apaisés qu’avec le rétablissement de la justice. »
These examples show that we need to examine, in a dispassionate manner,
the root causes of the unease and unrest in the Anglophone Region of
Cameroon and, if these causes are connected to injustice in any form, do
all we can to root out those injustices.
*Conclusion*
Your Excellency,
We stated at the beginning of this Memorandum that it is our bounden
duty as Shepherds of the people in the Northwest and Southwest Regions
of Cameroon where there are unrests and dissatisfaction, to make a
contribution to the solution of the problems that have been posed. We
hope that you will find our contribution helpful as you try to navigate
this very sensitive and delicate period in our nation’s history. We are
aware of the gravity of your responsibility before the people of
Cameroon and before History, and that is why we tried to do all we could
to help. In addition, we commend you and the people of Cameroon to God
in prayer, in the belief that He will give you the wisdom you need to
carry out this task. We can only add that in this case, time is of the
essence as some of our children have already missed school for a month.
A certain religious leader is credited to have said: There really can
be no peace without justice. There can be no justice without truth. And
there can be no truth, unless someone rises up to tell you the
truth.What we have set forth here is what we believe to be the truth,
told as part of our prophetic mission, in the hope that it will bring
justice, peace, and harmony to this country which we all hold dear to
our hearts.
May Mary, Queen of Peace, and Patroness of Cameroon, intercede for us and for our country.
+George Nkuo,
Bishop of Kumbo and President of BAPEC
+Cornelius Fontem Esua,
Archbishop of Bamenda
+Immanuel Bushu,
Bishop of Buea
+Andrew Nkea,
Bishop of Mamfe
+Agapitus Nfon,
Bishop of Kumba
_________
ENDNOTES
1. The territory which covers the Northwest and Southwest Regions has
been called various names in the History of Cameroon: British Southern
Cameroons, West Cameroon, Anglophone (English-speaking) Cameroon. These
names will be used in this document as appropriate to the historical
period in question.
2. Gaudium et Spes, No. 76
3. Ngoh, J. V., (2011:4), The Untold Story of Cameroon Reunification: 1955-1961, Limbe, Presprint Plc.
4. Mukete, V. E., 2013:419, My Odyssey: The Story of Cameroon
Reunification With Authentic Letters of Key Players, Yaounde, Sopecam.
5. Ndi, A., (2013:6) Southern West Cameroon Revisited (1950-1972):
Unveiling Inescapable Traps, Volume 1, Bamenda, Paul’s Press.
6.
Constitution reproduced in: Ndi, A. (2013), Southern West Cameroon
Revisited (1950-1972): Unveiling Inescapable Traps, Volume 1, Bamenda,
Paul’s Press. See Appendix IV
7. J.N. Foncha, 9th June 1990: Letter of Resignation from the CPDM
8. Ndi, A., (2005:249-50), Mill Hill Missionaries in Southern West
Cameroon (1922-1972): Prime Partners in Nation Building, Paulines
Publications Africa, Nairobi.
9. J.N. Foncha, 9th June 1990: Letter of Resignation from the CPDM
10. John Paul II, Centissimus Annus, No. 45.
11. John Paul II, Centissimus Annus, No. 44.
12. John Paul II, Centissimus Annus, No. 47.
13. John Paul II, Centissimus Annus, No. 60
14. Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Compendium of the Social Teaching of the Church, Nos 128, 133
When News Breaks Out, We Break In. (The 2014 Bloggies Finalist)
