On December 24, 2013, 10 native Southern Cameroonian members of the Camerounian National Assembly (both in the Ruling Party and in the opposition) addressed a strongly worded petition to the Prime Minister of the Republique du Cameroun, the Rt. Hon. Philemon Yang, on a commingling of cultural and structural violence[1] as practiced by the majoritarian francophone dominated government of Cameroun in the education subsector with Southern Cameroonians once again at the victim end of the practice.
It was about the very first time in history that Southern Cameroonian representatives in the Cameroonese National Assembly had taken a stand on behalf of all Southern Cameroonians.
The Petitioners drew the attention of the Rt. Hon. Prime Minister, the Minister of Higher Education and the Minister of Secondary Education to the colonial domination with the attendant over-simplification, anomalies, injustices and the outright subversion of the legal provisios in education as practiced by, especially by the Ministry of Secondary Education and the Ministry of Higher Education.
Fanon (Fanon, 1959) it was who first drew attention to the tendency of every colonizer state to expropriate the cultures of the peoples they occupy. Fanon wrote, “Colonial domination, because it is total and tends to over-simplify, very soon manages to disrupt in spectacular fashion the cultural life of a conquered people. This cultural obliteration is made possible by the negation of national reality, by new legal relations introduced by the occupying power, by the banishment of the natives and their customs to outlying districts by colonial society, by expropriation, and by the systematic enslaving of men and women.” [2]
For example, whereas a Prime Ministerial Committee recommendation of September 1992 stated "that Cameroon's dual – English and French – inherited systems of education be helped to develop its distinctive characteristics";
- Whereas the proceedings of the 1995 Forum on Education, whose final report submitted in Yaoundé 27 May 1995, prepared the groundwork for the Education Law in Cameroon;
- Whereas the Law of Education, No 98/004 of 14 April 1998, governs education in Cameroon and, as per its paragraphs 4, 5, 11, 15, 16, 17, 20 and 25, defines the orientation of Cameroun’s educational system;
- Whereas Section 15 sub-one highlights the existence of two Cameroonian sub-systems thus laying emphasis on the bicultural heritage and the same Section 15 sub-two of the same law, asserts that both subsystems shall coexist, "each preserving its specific method of evaluation and award of certificates";
The accused ministries – Secondary (MINESEC) and Higher Education (MINHE)– were engaged in practices that could anly be seen as blatant attempts to undermine, subjugate, acculturate and subsume Southern Cameroonians into the Napoleonic-Jacobin francophone system.
The Petitioners went on to compute the instances of colonial domination:
- The astounding anomaly that the Cameroon GCE Board, which was created to handle all Southern Cameroonian examinations, continues to manage only the GCE Technical examination, an infinitesimally small part of what is the Southern Cameroonian technical examination heritage;
- The scandalous fact that the same Cameroon GCE Board only receives and is expected to administer without moderating, technical examinations prepared by MINESEC, with untold negative consequences like the case of the 2013 Probatoire examination in which the Biology question paper was served to candidates with its marking guide behind;
- The outrageous abnormality that these examinations - CAP, Probatoire and BAC – are, from all indications, set in French over the years and poorly translated, with wanton errors and inexcusable presentation flaws, and with the inevitable outcome of injustice done to the English-speaking candidates of these examinations;
- The immoral fact that English-speaking learners in technical colleges continue to be subjected to the injustice of having to sit for CAP, Probatoire and Baccalaureat, French-oriented examinations, in a global context where Anglo-Saxon technical examinations like the City and Guilds, the LCCI, the different RSAs, etc are vogue, and contrary to the provisions of the 1998 Law of Education cited above;
- The shocking fact that the newly introduced BEPC Bilingue, was written for the first time in 2013 in the fourth year (instead of the fifth year where it should have been written concomitantly with the GCE O/L) in violation of the Section 16, sub article 2 of the new law synchronising the cycles of study for the secondary, a clear indication that this newly introduced examination purposes to continue along the lines of the old dispensation with its obsolete Probatoire in place that should have been scrapped (the 7th year of Southern Cameroonian Primary Education was dropped on the understanding that the Probatoire would also be scrapped, so that the BEPC be sent to 5th Year, for a proper synchronisation of the systems);
- The disgraceful fact that the said BEPC Bilingue, in its maiden edition, was shoddy and sub-standard from many perspectives, apparently having been set in haste and marred by outright mistranslations of what had clearly been initially prepared in French, together with howling errors, and inconsistent and unrealistic timing of the different disciplines;
- The portentous fact that snap and ill-timed MINESEC reforms that almost had a keg of gunpowder effect on the nation last year are still being carried out in secretive manner during this 2013/2014 Academic Year, with surreptitious, multiply-deferred programmes for a validation seminar planned for Mbalmayo;
- Yes, the alarming fact that MINESEC authorities appear determined to sneak in the controversial "integrated sciences" programme for Forms One and Two, this time with a controverted nomenclature, "notional sciences", which discipline was seen as an adulteration with insidious designs and consequently roundly deplored in a tripartite meeting with Southern Cameroonian teacher trade unions on 17/10/2012;
- The fact that in the said tripartite meeting that brought together the Minister of Secondary Education with his close collaborators on the one hand and Southern Cameroonian Teacher Trade Unions on the other, aspects of the reform were debated and compromise positions adopted, especially that the sciences should be taught as separate disciplines in Southern Cameroonian schools and that reforms would henceforth be collegial;
- The added fact that after the said tripartite, when public authorities started disseminating wrong messages about what had transpired, one of the teacher unions forwarded a memory aid reminding the Minister about the positions adopted on these burning issues and deploring the display of bad faith, reminder which appeared to have gone unnoticed;
[1] Structural violence is a term commonly ascribed to Johan Galtung, which he introduced in the article "Violence, Peace, and Peace Research" in 1969.[1] It refers to a form of violence where some social structure or social institution may harm people by preventing them from meeting their basic needs. 'Cultural violence' refers to aspects of culture that can be used to justify or legitimize direct or structural violence, and may be exemplified by religion and ideology, language and art, empirical science and formal science.[3]
Cultural violence makes direct and structural violence look or feel "right," or at least not wrong, according to Galtung.[4]
[2] See Reciprocal Bases of National Culture and the Fight for Freedom. Speech by Frantz Fanon at the Congress of Black African Writers, 1959. Source: Reproduced from Wretched of the Earth (1959) publ. Pelican. Speech to Congress of Black African Writers Wretched of the Earth
The late Bernard Fonlon cold not have been more a propos when he pointed out that the francophone created education system in Cameroun would always reject Southern Cameroonians.
Fonlon fine stroke in the academic journal Abbia was:
« In this federation, these two cultures must be placed on equal footing because, it is the cultural difference, let us not forget, which justifies the existence of these two separated states ( .. ). But, even after independence in the former French colonies, one always notices the very determination to maintain French hegemony. For that which concerns the bilingual University of Cameroon, one could be assured it shall simply be a French university if the Cameroon authorities do not get a good control over this institution. .. Consequently, I do not expect the French to be motivated with a cultural integration in Cameroon. They shall instead consider the English and the Southern Cameroonians as intruders... »[1]
On Mon, May 26, 2014 at 5:22 PM, NDI MANJONG ngahndi@yahoo.com [cameroon_politics] <cameroon_politics@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Dear Dr. Ngwanyam,Reading through your analysis, one sees by how it is crowded with much of "blame the victim". One must get past the cherry-picking of statistics if one is really interested in understanding the problem and contributing to its solution. Going by your selective reference to MTN Cameroun and the US Embassy in Cameroun, one is tempted to think that MTN Nigeria and the US Embassy in Nigeria are majority staffed by Francophones for reasons of their better technical know-how. "Peugeot" and ELF are primarily French establishments. How much of the manpower in Peugeot Nigeria and ELF Nigeria came from Francophone Cameroun?It may interest you to know that the students in Anglophone Cameroun used to begin learning Biology, Chemistry, Maths and Physics in the beginning class of general secondary education; while their Francophone counterpart in the beginning class of general secondary education were only taught Maths and Natural Science until the third class (things may now be different). The question has never been asked how the Anglophone students who in the course of their secondary education added Additional Maths and Further Maths never made it to the then "National Polytechnic" in Yaounde. It never was asked how the Anglophone students acknowledged by the University of London to have best performed in the sciences at the GCE found it hard to go to "CUSS" but held their own in medical schools in places like Nigeria and Britain.The Government Technical College, Ombe initially admitted the best performed students in the Government Common Entrance Exam (in the West Cameroon days). It initial products held their own even against their counterparts of the same educational level returning from France. You may want to ask what became of the Ombe vision. The "defunct ENS" (your reference) to which Anglophone students flock rather than come to St. Louis, is a Francophone institution. There must be something as to why its teachers produce caliber difference between Anglophone and Francophone students.Sitting there in Bamenda, you have not said why the Sacred Heart College that produced a Dr. Ngwanyam cannot today produce Anglophone students for St. Louis. One wonders why you see the Francophones flocking to St. Louis but take no interest in those crowding out the Anglophones from your Alma Mater (Sacred Heart College). Could the Francophones now flocking to Sacred Heart, Lourds, St Bedes, etc be searching for an inferior Cameroun education? The English Primary School in Yaounde was initially intended to serve Anglophone needs but soon after, had Francophone needs crowd out Anglophone needs.Is there something you know that others do not know; and which thing makes you consider Bamenda to be 'hostile' territory to the Bamilekes? You can not be a success businessman in Bamenda and not know the preponderance of successful Bamileke business in Bamenda. Those who know of this preponderance can not point same of Bamenda business in say Bafoussam. One needs more than mere conjecture to conclude that Bafoussam by this measure is 'hostile' to Bamenda people.The problem partly hitches on how St. Louis as an institution selectively sees it. As a great institution, 35 of its 36 students are success but its focused regret is that its only failed candidate is characteristically an Anglophone student from Ndop. St. Louis seems to bear no blame for admitting an unqualified student from Mamfe with only Chemistry and Religious Knowledge, and presented him for the HND knowing full well that he will be disqualified. If of the 36 students, one was unqualified to write, then one of 35 not 36 failed; however regrettable that the lone failure was an Anglophone and all 34 passes were Francophones. Are the two dental surgeons who studied in Nigeria and prepared the students Francophones? If not, were they the products of Francophone education before their dental studies in Nigeria? St. Louis as a higher education institution could invest in the the better understanding of the reasons for these discrepancies rather that employing what looks like a tactic of shaming Anglophones to come to it.With which Anglophones have you shared without success, the knowledge of your repeat participation in the Bush-Obama opportunities forums you attended in the USA? One wonders the minority Anglophones are by their laziness the reason why Cameroun does not future high up with Ghana, Nigeria and Ivory Coast in taking advantage of the Bush-Obama legislated opportunities. How did you come about the conclusion that textiles are better by those opportunities than are 'garri' and 'eru'?Look deeper and you will find why the Anglophone in Cameroun is more than the victim of his laziness. It must be more than laziness that the Francophone flock to take advantage of the Anglophone's education opportunities while the Anglophone living in those opportunities, cannot rise to St. Louis' expectations by those opportunities. It may interest you to know that Mr. Musonge, the one time Prime Minister of Cameroun was a product of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). What educational institution in the world could be a much better embodiment of technological studies? Educational policies are shaped by the Musonges as Prime Ministers and not the high school students St. Louis looks forward to admit. If nothing is greater than 'imagination', questions move imagination to answers. Instead of a hurried conclusion, a questioning of the depth of the Anglophone dilemma will produce better reasons than laziness for their seeming hopelessness. The laziness excuse is an in-house apology for their victimization.NDI MANJONG.On Monday, May 26, 2014 8:16 AM, "Henrymuluh henrymuluh@yahoo.co.uk [boba-list]" <boba-list@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Great analysis big Ngwanyam. I think we need to take this very seriously and also train teachers of technical schools and high schools. The reason for bambili and now kumba.
Sent from my iPhone
On 26 May 2014, at 11:31, "Nick Ngwanyam stlouisclinicbamenda@yahoo.co.uk [boba-list]" <boba-list@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
ANGLOPHONES BADLY NEED TO SHIFT FROM GENERAL TO TECHNICAL EDUCATION IN ORDER TO FULLY CONTRIBUTE TO VISION 2035MTN is an ‘Anglophone’ company. They come from South Africa and down there they communicate in English and not French. The US Embassy in Yaoundé is also ‘Anglophone’. The local staff that work in these places are more of FRANCOPHONES than ANGLOPHONES. Go and check the statistics for yourself. Would you say the US Embassy and the MTN Company hate Anglophones? No! When employing staff, they look for technical know-how, skills, and the capacity to solve specific problems, team work, good attitudes and experience.Most jobs are computer based and also have more than 70 percent of technological input. Check out all the major companies in Cameroon that are into production and you will get this picture. Let me tell you what is happening under our roof here at St Louis University Institute of Health in Bamenda.
Last year, the department of Dental Therapy had 36 graduating students who sat the Higher Professional Diploma Examination (HPD) set by the Ministry of Higher Education in Yaoundé. Of the 36 students only TWO were Anglophones. One boy from Mamfe had only Chemistry and Religion and was disqualified. He should have repeated his GCE while studying at St Louis. He did not. Of the 35 students who sat for the examination, only one failed and he happens to be an Anglophone from Ndop.To understand the background very well, let me say that the two dental surgeons who teach them were trained in Nigeria and have had some experience over the years elsewhere. They lecture in English. The exams are set and written in English. The advertisements for the Dentistry unit as well as the other six departments in our school, take place on radio, TV, news papers and brochures. The information is carried out in English and it is stated clearly that lectures are delivered in English. Here is the problem. 34 Bamilekes are able to see the ‘star’ just like the three wise men from the East. They leave their comfort zones and come to ‘hostile’ Bamenda to study in English. 34 can see and understand while only 2 Anglophones get it.Go to the University of Bamenda and see for yourself. In a computer class, or is it Physics with 45 students, only 5 are Anglos. The trouble is not that they are not admitted. They do not just show up at all. When it is the season to write the entrance examination into the traditional teaching field of the defunct ‘ENS Bambili’, there are no taxis in town and there is a traffic jam in Bambili. When it comes to technology and related science fields, you can drive a car through the classes. The teachers can carry on lectures in French because all the students that apply and come in are Bamilekes who know the importance of science, technology, Mathematics and engineering.If you think I am making up my own stories, please go to the Catholic University of Bamenda and it would be the same. If we continue at that rate, the country shall emerge with Anglophones riding on the back seat as observers. A nation and wealth are built with science, Maths, engineering and technology. If we keep on shying away as we are carrying on right now, it shall not be well with us.While Anglophones may not be particular about science and technology, Cameroonians as a whole have a serious problem with time management. We never know when something is serious and important. We spend time doing the routine things and letting real opportunities to go unattended to. Then of course down the road we become time barred from getting on with the real stuff. A good example is AGOA (Africa Growth and Opportunity Act). I might also want to mention the other opportunities we have from America like OPIC and EXIM Bank of America. I am aware of these opportunities because I traveled on the American Business trip , organized by the US Embassy in Yaoundé, to Washington in 2006 and a repeat trip to Chicago in 2008. These are mechanisms that the American Government has put in place to help Africa to grow. Other countries like Kenya, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Nigeria take advantage of them.In Cameroon, we sleep. AGOA was put in place by President Bush and renewed by President Obama. With this facility that would last 15 years, African countries could produce goods to American standards and load them unto ships or planes and sell them in America without paying any custom duties. Paper work was set at a minimal. This has been going on for 14 years and the doors would close in one year. I understand some Cameroonians have been selling a few items under AGOA which include, Guinness, 33 export, garri and eru. This is not good enough. Start with textiles and grow from there. OPIC and EXIM Bank mechanisms are there to promote development, trade and growth in partnership with American companies. We can create thousands of jobs in Cameroon if and only if we wake up and take the bull by the horns.
God bless Cameroon.DR NICK NGWANYAM, MDCEO ST LOUIS GROUPPOB 661 BAMENDANORTH WEST REGION
REP OF CAMEROONTEL( CELL) 237- 7776 46 74
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