BAMENDA PROVINCIAL EPISCOPAL CONFERENCE [BAPEC]
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
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 and to 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 Nations until
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 their
progressive 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 1st of 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-three years 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 by two
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 country should
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 May 1993, 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. They proposed 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 +Cornelius
Fontem Esua
Bishop of Kumbo and
Archbishop of Bamenda
President of BAPEC
+Immanuel Bushu +Andrew
Nkea
Bishop of Buea Bishop
of Mamfe
+Agapitus Nfon
Bishop of Kumba
[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
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