ANGLOPHONE PROBLEM (IN CAMEROUN) TAKES DRAMATIC TWISTS

We often ignore warning signs of an earthquake for various reasonS and when it happens we do not blame ourselves but blame the insensitive nature. Others blame God. I have read the story of The Soutnern Cameroons-Ambazonia polical cuase in sundry forms from various quarters and cannot ignore this summary of Dr. A. Yongbang. Readers of my column will one day ask me why I never alluded to it. Dr. Yongbang the writer is a God-fearing man and will not tarnish his hands by telling lies or dabbling on a topic he is not well versed in or misleading. I hope my readers will read it between the lines and draw their conclusions. I do fervently believe that they would ponder upon it and ask democratic leaders wherever they are in the world to ask for a solution to this interminable Southern Cameroons or the former British Cameroons debacle in toto. The solution is facile: The inhabitants of this region in Western Africa are asking the UNO to allow them have their political independence as has happened to any other UN trust territory in any part of the world.
Dr. Viban Ngo.


Anglophone problem takes dramatic twists - Part 1
THE ANGLOPHONE PROBLEM IN THE CAMEROONS TAKES A DRAMATIC TWIST.

By Dr. Arnold B. Yongbang



Introduction:


This paper was prepared in 2006 at the request of Rev. Father Eric AKUE-GOEH, a Jesuit missionary from the Republic of Benin, and assistant parish priest of the Our Lady of the Annunciation Parish, Bonamoussadi, Douala, who was fascinated by the Anglophone problem, and invited me to make a presentation of the problem to the Anglophone Community in the parish, but had to be aborted because of strong objections from some of the Anglophone parishioners who felt that the presentation would be introducing politics into the Church. This is another dimension of the Anglophone Problem – the Anglophone up against himself / herself !

1. So what is the Anglophone Problem?

1.1 L’EFFORT Camerounais No. 315 of October 15 to October 28, 2003, pages 10 and 11, carried an interview by the paper’s then Editor-in-Chief, Rev. Fr. Antoine de Padoue Chonang, with our own outspoken and uncompromising moral authority, His Eminence Christian Wiyghan Cardinal TUMI, on the ‘ANGLOPHONE PROBLEM’. Here are some excerpts of the interview:

Fr. Antoine:

“In your opinion, is there an Anglophone problem in Cameroon?”

His Eminence:

“In Cameroon, yes. There is a real malaise, like I said in my open letter and elsewhere. Accumulated frustrations from the unilateral cancellation of the federation, to Fru Ndi’s victory in the 1992 elections as affirmed by ambassadors but which was not recognized, harassment of Anglophones and ill-treatment of all sorts, restriction of their legitimate political aspirations, etc..., create a real malaise. It is even said that there are posts that can never be occupied by an Anglophone, for example, an Anglophone has never been the Secretary-General of the Presidency…”.

1.2 That, in a nutshell is the ‘Anglophone Problem’ in the Cameroons. But it is not quite that simple: it is much more ramifying and complex. There is the very disturbing rider to the problem: the fact that so-called Anglophone intellectuals who, for purely selfish interests, allow themselves to be used by neo-colonisers to confuse the populations who look up to these same intellectuals for enlightenment and guidance in their struggle for their inherent and inalienable right of Self-determination and Independence. Some intellectuals claiming to be knowledgeable about international law have indeed misled, and still continue to mislead, the rank and file of the struggle to be masters of their own destiny by their ignorance of international law. This ignorance caused the struggle to spend nearly 43 years chasing the wrong shadow, namely, the independence of the Southern Cameroons, with various misleading names like AMBAZONIA or AMBAZANIA, instead of the independence of the former UN Trust Territory of the Cameroons under United Kingdom Administration in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and the Trusteeship Agreement signed between the United Nations and His Majesty’s Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland on 13 December 1946 “to administer the Territory in such a manner as to achieve the basic objectives of the international trusteeship system laid down in Article 76 of the United Nations Charter”.




1.3 History has it that when Germany lost the First Word War in 1916 it also lost sovereignty over its African colonies. In 1919 Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles giving up all claims to her colonies including Kamerun. In 1922 under the League of Nations Mandates System, German kamerun was divided between Britain and France, the victorious allies; the larger eastern part of the country went to France and became known as French Cameroun while the smaller truncated western part went to Britain. Britain further divided its portion into North and South ostensibly for administrative convenience with its colony and protectorate of Nigeria. The British Northern Cameroons was administered as part of the Northern Region of Nigeria; while the British Southern Cameroons was administered as part of the Eastern Region of Nigeria.



1.4 With the creation of the united Nations Organisation in 1945, the Mandated Territories transmuted to TRUST TERRITORIES under its International Trusteeship System one of the basic objectives of which was:


"…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 trust territory and its peoples and the freely expressed wishes of the people concerned”.

1.5 The 1922 boundary established between the two mandated territories is along the Simon / Milner Line traced in 1916 by Britain and France, delimited in 1919, and confirmed in 1922, literally making the two mandated territories two separate countries.

1.6 With the founding of the United Nations Organisation in 1945, territories that were placed under the Mandates System of the League of Nations were transmuted into the Trusteeship System of the United Nations Organisation and approved by the General Assembly on December 13, 1946.




2. Regional Autonomy for the Southern Cameroons was a cruel illusion:

2.1 With the introduction of internal self-government to the three regions of Nigeria in 1951 under the Macpherson Constitution, the British Government recognised that there were some profound ethnic differences between the peoples of the Southern Cameroons and those of the rest of the Eastern Region of Nigeria giving rise to a profound desire on the part of the peoples of the Southern Cameroons to develop an existence as a separate entity. For this reason the British Government agreed at the London Conference in 1953 that the Southern Cameroons should separate from the Eastern Region of Nigeria and become a quasi-federal territory within the Federation of Nigeria. It was under the 1953 Constitution that the Southern Cameroons had its own government, with Dr. E. M. L. Endeley as Leader of Government Business, and a legislature with prerogatives of legislation in all areas except those that were specifically on the exclusive legislative list of the government of the Federation of Nigeria.




2.2 At the Lagos Constitutional Conference of 1957, the Southern Cameroons requested and was granted a full Regional Self-Governing Status within the Federation of Nigeria; and so a cabinet system of government was introduced in the territory on May 15, 1958. To all intents and purposes, from 1st October 1960, when Nigeria became independent, the British Southern Cameroons had the standing of a de jure self-governing Territory. After attaining a full self-governing status, the next logical step was full independence. Regrettably, Britain and France and the United States of America, the cold war allies, all permanent members of the Security Council, conspired to deny the territory independence contrary to the expressed wishes of the inhabitants of the territory, the Charter of the United Nations and the Trusteeship Agreement.

2.4 In 1959, in anticipation of independence, France signed Co-operation Agreements with her African and Caribbean colonies, including French Cameroun, literally making these countries contractual colonies of France; and bringing their economies under the direct control of France. This was indeed neo-colonialism and the United Nations turned a blind eye to it. France, of course, is a permanent member of the UN Security Council.




3. The Bungled Termination of UN Trusteeship over the Cameroons under United Kingdom Administration:

3.1 France granted “independance avec la France” to its trust-territory of Cameroun under French administration on January 1, 1960, and the country took on the name of la Republique du Cameroun. And despite the fact that there was a communist-backed insurrection ravaging the territory, no plebiscite nor referendum was held to ascertain whether the peoples of that territory wanted independence then or at some future date, or whether they would like to associate with any of its contiguous neighbours.



3.2 By contrast, on February 11 and 12, 1961, the United Nations imposed separate plebiscites in the Northern and Southern British Cameroons “to achieve independence by joining” either the Federation of Nigeria, with a population then of over 80 million inhabitants, or la Republique du Cameroun, with a population then of about 3.2 million people. Faced with this dilemma of two equally unacceptable alternatives, the peoples of the British Southern Cameroons, with a population of about 800.000 inhabitants, voted to join la Republique du Cameroun under a con-federal union, the broad outlines of which had been negotiated and agreed upon at meetings between Premier John Ngu Foncha’s Government of the Southern Cameroons and the Ahmadou Ahidjo Government of French Cameroun and incorporated into the United Nations manifesto, ‘THE TWO ALTERNATIVES’, that was widely used for the plebiscite-enlightenment campaigns. The Northern Cameroons on its part voted to join the Federation of Nigeria



3.3 After the plebiscite, the Fourth Committee of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) at its 15th Session, while endorsing the results of the plebiscite, had recommended to the General Assembly for adoption Draft Resolution A/C.4/L/685:

- Operative paragraph 5 reads:-

“… Invites the Administering Authority, the Governments of the Southern Cameroons and the Republic of Cameroun to initiate urgent discussions with a view to finalising, before 1 October 1961, the arrangements by which the agreed and declared policies of the concerned parties for a Union of the Southern Cameroons with the Republic of Cameroun into a Federal United Kamerun Republic will be implemented. ‘’

-Operative paragraph 6 reads:-

“…Appoints a Commission of three constitutional and administrative experts to be nominated one each from three member states designated by the General Assembly to assist at the request of the parties concerned in the discussions referred to in paragraph 5 above”

3.4 Instead the United Nations General Assembly, at its 994th plenary meeting on

21 April 1961, passed Resolution 1608 (XV), and operative paragraph 5 reads:




“… Invites the administering authority, the governments of the Southern Cameroons and the Republic of Cameroun to initiate urgent discussions with a view to finalising, before 1st October, 1961, the arrangements by which the agreed policies of the concerned parties will be implemented’’.

3.5 The Plenary of the General Assembly, which normally approved without amendment draft resolutions submitted to it by the Fourth Committee, decided to amend the Committee’s draft to delete any reference to the ‘Commission of Experts’ or to the ‘Federal character of the Union’ between the British administered Southern Cameroons and la Republique du Cameroun. These happened following strong objections raised by the Foreign Minister of la Republique du Cameroun, Mr. Charles Okala. This action of the General Assembly represented a grave injustice to the peoples of the British Southern Cameroons and a betrayal of the Plebiscite Covenant by which the people had already decided their future believing that they were doing so in a Federal Union of equal partners with la Republique du Cameroun under United Nations guarantees.


3.6 Bluntly put, this was a fundamental breach of trust not only by the United Nations and the United Kingdom as administering authority, but also by the government of la Republique du Cameroun who had reneged on its assurances to the General Assembly and the union accords signed by Premier John Ngu Foncha and President Ahmadou Ahidjo in Yaoundé on October 14, 1960, and incorporated in the United Nations White Paper, “THE TWO ALTERNATIVES” referred to above.



4. The Post-Plebiscite Conference was a classical deception, Machiavellian style:

4.1 The weak and vulnerable position of the Southern Cameroons delegation at the Post-Plebiscite Conference, that held in the town of Foumban in la Republique du Cameroun, from July 17-21, 1961, has been adequately summed up by Pierre Mesmer, one time Haut Commissaire of French-administered Cameroun, who later became France’s Minister of the Armed Forces, and, still later, French Prime Minister, in his book titled ‘LES BLANCS S’EN VONT’. Récits de décolonisation. Edition Albin Michel, S.A., 1998, chapter V. pp. 114-135. Incidentally, the book is banned in the Cameroons. He concludes that chapter with the following very revealing statement:

“…….. En Exécution du référendum, une conférence constitutionnelle réunit les gouvernements à Foumban, en pays bamoun familier aux deux délégations, le 17 juillet. Le Président Ahidjo, an position de force, présenta un projet de constitution faussement fédérale soigneusement préparé par ses juristes français. Ngu Foncha n’avait aucun contreprojet. En position de faiblesse puisque la population qu’il représentait ne dépassait pas le quart de celle du Cameroun français et moins encore en termes économiques, il accepta sans discuter ce qui était, sauf en apparence, une annexion. La nouvelle Constitution entra en vigueur le 1er octobre 1961. Une plaisanterie circulait alors à Douala et à Yaoundé: ‘Le Cameroun réunifié est un pays bilingue francophone’”.


(Our Translation: ‘To implement the results of the plebiscite, the Governments (of the Southern Cameroons and of la Republique du Cameroun) met in a constitutional conference in Foumban, in Bamoun country, familiar to the two delegations, on July 17 (1961). President Ahidjo, from a position of strength, submitted for debate a fake federal draft constitution which had been carefully crafted by his French jurists. Ngu Foncha had no counter project. From a weak position, since the population which he represents does not exceed a quarter of that of French Cameroun even in economic terms, Ngu Foncha accepted without discussion what was in fact an annexation. The new constitution came into force on 1 October 1961. A joke became rife in Douala and Yaoundé that the reunified Cameroon was a bilingual francophone country’.)


4.2 What other revelation could be more stunning and compelling! If Mr. Mesmer, a frontline French policy maker at the time, contends that Foncha had no counter proposal to table at the Foumban talks, then what must have happened to the Constitutional Proposals adopted at the All Party Conference in Bamenda from June 26 – 30, 1961, barely two weeks before the Foumban Conference?


4.3 The answer is provided for in the eye-witness account of the Foumban Conference given by Mr. Samuel Njoya, who was the sub-prefect of Foumban at the time, as reported by journalist Xavier Deutchoua in Les Cahiers de Mutations, Vol 018, January 2004, a monthly French language newspaper, under the banner headline, “LA DUPERIE DU FOUMBAN”.. And so the post-plebiscite conference turned out to be an exercise in total deception and betrayal of the good will and trust of the peoples of the Southern Cameroons.




4.4 The co-conspirators, Britain, France and the United States of America, took advantage of the vacuum created by the death in September 1961 in a plane crash in Africa of His Excellency Dag Hammarskjold, the United Nations Secretary-General, who should have ensured the that UNO Resolution 1608 (XV) Para. 5 of 21/04/1961 were executed. His successor, His Excellency U Thant, was appointed Acting Secretary-General in November 1961. So in September 1961 and October 1961 there was no full Secretary-General of the United Nations Organisation who could have ensured the full and legal execution of the UNO Resolution 1608 (XV) paragraph 5 of 21/04/1961 on Southern Cameroons future. It is said that the plane crash was not unrelated to the UN scribe’s opposition to the programmed annexation of the British Cameroons to its contiguous neighbours.


5. From Self-Government back to a colony.

5.1 The unilateral abrogation of the Union Accords and the insidious annexation of the Peoples and Territory of the Southern Cameroons.