The Camerounese bi-jural uni-jural imbroglio.
Col 3:4 When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. Christ appears in your life right here, right now: one nanosecond after you believe and confess that Jesus is Lord.
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On Thursday, October 1, 2015 12:12 PM, Ofege Ntemfac <ntemfacofege@yahoo.com> wrote:
ADDITIONAL READING
SECURITY OF "COMMON LAW" SYSTEM IN THE REPUBLIC OF "CAMEROUN"
Presented by Harmony Bobga-Mbuton (Esq.)
at
The Cameroon Common Law Lawyers' Inaugural Conference on May 9, 2015
1. Introduction:
The constitutional history of what passes for the Republic of "Cameroun" today betrays an international conspiracy inherited by the national government of "La Republique du Cameroun" and steadily pursued to almost completion, involving the destruction of the compromised United Nations Trust Territory of Southern Cameroons that gained her independence on October 1, 1961, following that of "La Republique du Cameroun" on January 1, 1960. The worse sector hit in these state institutions, national identity, and cultural genocide has been the justice sector of Southern latter called West Cameroon State.
In this briefing paper, it is intended to present the contemptuous removal of common law legislation, common law courts, judicial customs and traditions, common law curriculum, and the ultimate lowering of the integrity of justice for a people who were destined to attain the highest possible internationally acceptable standard of justice and legally supported democracy on the African continent as of date.
The absence of a judicial system that would have assured the security of the cultural and political identity of Southern (West) Cameroonians will be highlighted as the misfortune that has facilitated the making of the Lesser Africans of Southern Cameroonians in their land now occupied by "La Republique du Cameroun".
The problematic of the unconstitutionality, illegality and gross violation of the cultural and political rights of the Peoples of Southern Cameroons shall then in a civilized style be presented to the government of "La Republique du Cameroun" represented by its President, Mr. Paul Biya, who amongst others, cumulatively heads the executive arm and the Judiciary of his country's government, just as he exercises directive influence on the legislature of that country, for a peaceful reversal or correction of the cultural and political ills, particularly the destruction of the common law and its justice system so dear to Southern Cameroonians.
2. Background Facts:
i.) The British Southern Cameroons which is the historical common jurisdiction in today's Cameroon was denied the rightful option of accession to unconditional independent Statehood through subjection to the infamous "Two Alternatives" paths to accession to independence by joining either, the already independent Nigeria (since 1st October 1960) or independent La Republique du Cameroun (since 1st January 1960). These manipulations had come into play because the British government had failed in its bid to absorb Southern Cameroons that it had held in trust for the United Nations, into its larger former colony and post independent sphere of influence, the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Curiously, the primary beneficiary of a vote against British interest to absorb Southern Cameroons into its Nigerian Sphere of influence, i.e. "La Republique du Cameroun", accompanied by her colonial master –"La Republique Française", along with her nominally "freed into independence" African colonies turn neo-colonial spheres of influence, excepting the Republic of Mali, voted against Southern Cameroons' accession to independence by joining "La Republique du Cameroun". See in this respect the Vote Tally of the United Nation on the subject attached hereto and marked Attachment "I".
ii.) Immediately following the accession to independence with British contemptuous advice in conspiracy with "La Republique Française", the baby African nation –"La Republique du Cameroun" was employed as a tool for neo-colonial compromise of the newly independent sister African State –The State of Southern Cameroons' to compromise the latter's independence.
The first act of manipulation and compromise were the so called "Foumban Talks", occasionally misnamed Foumban Constitutional Conference. It is worth noting that no constitutional debate(s) or pretentions of a constituent Assembly for the purpose of creating a new nation out of British Southern Cameroon and "La Republic du Cameroun" ever took place. The outcome of the now glorified nonevent of a Foumban Safari and the mischievous and grossly unconstitutional manipulations, and thus illegal extension of the applicability of the independence Constitution of "La Republique du Cameroun" over the territory of the Southern Cameroons, thereby setting aside the Southern Cameroons "Constitution Order in Council", which like a constitutional act of theft robbed Southern Cameroons of her Fundamental law and the legal foundation of that State. See in this respect the independence Constitution of "La Republique du Cameroun" bearing slight amendments to extend its operation into Southern Cameroons territory and the Southern Cameroons "Constitution Order in Council", both of which are attached hereto and marked Attachments "II" and "III".
iii.) The dissolution of the West Cameroon House of Assembly (Legislature) and the nullification of its government (Executive Arm of Government), did not only follow the destruction of the Southern/West Cameroon constitutional substratum, but robbed Southern/West Cameroonians of the opportunity and machinery for continual review, renewal and adaptation of its laws through Law reform. See in these respects the Neo-colonial Master's illegal acts that decapitated the referred arms of West Cameroon government in a progressive execution of the conspired agenda to annihilate Southern Cameroons (West Cameroon) attached hereto and marked Attachments "IV" and "V".
iv.) The Judiciary and the common law cultural sources of law and the system for its administration could be described as the most delicate venture in the destruction of the key elements of Southern Cameroons cultural and socio-political identity. This explains why the process of wiping off common law of the Southern Cameroons State has been slow and nearly imperceptible as if the entire peoples of Southern Cameroons have been given some socio-political anesthesia that it is with the reaction of Lawyers over issues like introduction of French or "Francophone"-type Notaries into the Common Law Jurisdiction(s) of "La Republique du Cameroun's" i.e. -South West, and North West Regions; the fictive harmonization by exclusion of Southern Cameroons or West Cameroon statutes and other sources of laws such as, criminal laws, criminal procedure Ordinance, contract and commercial laws, Banking Laws, Insurance Laws, Land Legislation, and more; that the cognizance of the fact that the security of Common Law and its system of Administration has been compromised almost to the point of complete annihilation.
v.) The awakening of the Southern Cameroonians to the urgent and imperative need to stand up against such flagrant mischief and its accompanying injustices is one that to be delayed any further will impute suicide on the part of Common Law Lawyers who are best placed to know and understand the evil that the acts and continuing plans against the common law, constitute for all the peoples within the territorial jurisdiction wherein this brand of law has historically existed and been used with proven standing as opposed to the civil law that is attuned to lower levels of judicial performance and integrity.
The foregoing backdrop evidences a silent but corrosively active underlying policy of legal development and law and development in what passes for The Republic of Cameroon, that whether it be integration or harmonization or uniformization of laws, what the powers that be intend and have actually been achieving is a new construct of the expression "harmonization" which in the specific context equates unconditionally with uncritical replacement of common law statutes, precedents, customs and Traditions and indeed every conceivable value of the "common law" system with civil law tradition without due regard to the comparative potential of the respective systems to generate higher levels of performance and integrity of justice.
The above backdrop raises issues of grave and urgent concerns to the primary loosers of what can readily be characterized as a negative Law formation Policy in Cameroon whose objectives and results so far, have culminated in the ridicule of the Common Law System without its replacement with anything better.
Such negative discriminatory policy of law formation, review and reform is exactly what has prompted the rejection by Common Law Lawyers of Cameroon government's law formation policy, procedures and resultant disconnect of much of its laws from reality. The said rejection underpins the call to recognition that the Common Law System has become an endangered species of law in Cameroon requiring the following urgent actions:-.
That the above-described endangered species of law is in dire need of protective restoration and securization
That as one of the most critical identity elements of Cameroon Common Law Lawyers' cultural heritage, and as such it behooves on these Lawyers assume the duty they owe to history, the present, and the future, to stand up as one person and give the limbless common law the protection it deserves so it may continue to serve those that are accustomed to it and even those who genuinely recognize its superiority in regard to judicial performance and integrity.
3. Issues for Consideration/Debate/Analysis:
The inexhaustive list of concerns placed hereinbefore raises critical and urgent issues for debate within the Cameroonian context. It is not simply hoped but surely, the outcome of the debate of these issues would be sharpened and highlighted hereunder. This exercise which will be accompanied by critical analysis of the several issues, will include but will not necessarily be limited to the following:
a.) Whether or not the legality of post-independence legislation whose application is extended to the common law jurisdiction is not questionable?
The answer to this issue lies in a review of the history of the "constitution of Cameroon and Cameroon Constitutions."
The creation of the state commonly referred to today, simply as Republic of Cameroon, following the 1984 "amendment" of the constitution "La Republique du Cameroun", dates back to the accession to independence from the colonial dispensation referred to as the United Nations Trusteeship over two territorial entities formerly referred to as "La République du Cameroun" and what was called Southern Cameroons and later came to be known as "West Cameroon".
In effect these two territories were carved out of what constituted an emerging German sphere of colonial influence as at the close of the First World War I, and placed under a British and French Mandate System of the League of Nation. This arrangement was maintained after the Second World War, but this time under a Trusteeship Agreement between the United Nations Organization, and Britain and France respectively, on the other hand.
The unequivocal intent and objective of the Two Trusteeship Agreements between the United Nations Organization and initially the British Cameroons on the one hand, and the French La République" on the other hand, was to nurture these clearly identified territories into independent statehood. Another factor that needs to be taken cognition of is that the Trusteeship Agreements gave the Trustee-Nations some latitude in the execution of the task of administration of each of the Trust Territory. This policy foundation-cum- term of Trusteeship eventually justified the separation of the British Cameroons Trust Territory of Northern Cameroons and Southern Cameroons.
b.) Whether or not there is justification for progressive and sustained assimilation of the Sources of Laws of the Common Law System in Cameroon?
· The Constitutionality of post -1972 Legislations on Substantive laws, Practice and Procedure.
It is trite knowledge and law that the foundation and thus the legality of laws within a nation derive from the national Constitution or fundamental law of that land. In the case of Cameroun there has been an unending debate as to the legality of its post 1972 national constitution and its subsequent versions particularly that which emerged after the 1984 amendment which finally removed all indices of the hitherto political construct that Cameroon was constituted from two separate Nations into first a Federal State followed by a Unitary.
The emergence in 1996 of a blank national Constitution in Cameroon devoid of any further history or law as to federalism or unitarism essentially sought to map out a stable constitutional platform for annihilation of one brand of law, the common law, in favour of the civil law that "La République du Cameroun" inherited from France on January 1, 1960 upon accession to independence. In effect, the new constitutional dispensation speaks loudly to the rejection of the common law that the British Southern Cameroon brought and lived with into the Federated Nation "claimed to have been born out of the union of two States" up to 1972.
It is the humble considered opinion of this writer that the constitution of Cameroon as it is today is the result of political manipulation absent a constitutional foundation therefor. There existed for each of the two states that are now said to have come into a union after their respective accessions to independence, a national Constitution to wit The Constitution of "La République du Cameroun of 1960; and the Southern Cameroons Constitution Order in Council that was the fundamental Law of the pre-independence and post independence self governments of Southern Cameroons and thereafter West Cameroon up to 1972. With a full internal government right up to the Federal Republic of Cameroon, the Statutes, Precedents, Customs and Traditions of the Common law culture were anchored on the Constitutional Order-in-Council. With a Southern Cameroons and thereafter West Cameroon Legislature enjoyed a steady adaptive growth until this growth was truncated by the 1972 constitutional coup d'Etat that began the annihilation of the Common Law.
The infamous 1972 constitutional act destroyed the Legislature that hitherto was assuring the continuing development of the common law in Cameroon. The executive arm of the Government of West Cameroon was the next victim of constitutional amputation. The judiciary with its limited but surely important common law making power through precedent was adjudged sensitive and therefore has been engineered into slow death even though at this time of writing the body of common law is still comatose and not yet totally dead, given that it benefits from a life support machine which is the brains and minds of common law Lawyers of Cameroon who are ready to jolt the dying specie of law back into life.
After removal of the constitutional foundation of the common law as described in the immediately preceding paragraphs, the government of the reinstated immediate post independent "La République du Cameroun", adopted a blindfolding policy of placing temporary saving provisions in every civil law type piece of legislation for the common law but which progressively and assuredly are regularly being dropped in favour of the puritization of laws in Cameroon with none other than civil law legislation whether brought in directly by a rubber-stamping Camerounese legislature or through partnership with the international conspirators against the survival of common law in Cameroon.
The above dismal predicament of the Common Law in Cameroon calls for urgent remedial action. It is therefore recommended that the government should urgently review its law and policy towards the common law by revisiting not just the constitution of the nation but more importantly the national Constitution as the only assured foundation that its two peoples could be kept together within a legal continuum.
c.) Whether or not there exist any reason for the abrogation of Common Law Inspired Rules of Procedure and Evidence within the "Cameroon Legal System", other than contempt of those rules.
Some of the key distinguishing elements of the common law system from its civil law counterpart particularly in Cameroon are the rules of procedure and rules of evidence that respectively canalize and lubricate the application of substantive law with radar-like guidance towards attainment of the highest possible levels of judicial performance and integrity of justice.
The strictures of Common Law Rules of Procedure, from modes and forms of commencement of actions through to judgments at final appeals guarantee relatively higher security of judicial transparency and accountability. It goes the same for the type of rules of evidence obtainable in the common law system which in calibrated details assures not just sieving of truth from parties' (litigants') testimonies, but effective titration of hard opposing masses of facts to obtain sublime truth upon which sustainable decisions of the courts and tribunals may safely be anchored.
For close to 15 years as of date, we the Common Law lawyers have not simply lived but have been subjugated to an accelerated engineered depletion of common law rules of procedure and evidence through near imperceptible abrogation of our statutory rules of procedure and evidence with sanctification of such legislative sins with Supreme Court of Cameroon's decision which completely ignore those rules.
The sad part of this dismal legislative assimilation is that nothing better has been brought to replace our cherished internationally recognized system. To cite just a few examples,
i.) the New Cameroon Criminal Procedure Code falsely propagated as 90% Anglo-Saxon, abrogates the application of the Evidence Ordinance of ___Sections and replaces it with very general provisions of just 30 Sections;
ii.) The Insurance Law of Cameroon that is applied within the common law jurisdiction is the "CODE CIMA" which is a French text and by all standards protects the Insurance companies which sponsored it and the properties of the few rich and powerful as opposed to the FATAL ACCIDENTS ACT that was being applied in the common law jurisdiction of Cameroon before The "CODE CIMA" was illegally imposed in the jurisdiction with constructive abrogation of the FATAL ACCIDENTS ACT;
iii.) Cameroons current Land Legislation completely ignores the legislation of West Cameroon and has robbed the peoples of the common law jurisdiction of certainty of laws relating to land and replaced them with a very unstable and unreliable body of legislation that lends itself too readily to insecurity of land rights compounded by it's vulnerability to corrupt practices in the processes for securing land rights whether they be administrative or judicial channels.
iv.) The Nationality Code makes no pretenc e of Southern/West, Cameroonians being "a no people".
Another problematic with the civil laws that have been used to contemptuously abrogate common law legislation is that by introduction of inhibiting court fees and charges access to justice has been gravely reduced for the poor. In fact justice has been reduced to an expensive commodity which can only be afforded by the rich and powerful. To circumvent the high court fees and charges barriers to justice, corruption in the administration of justice has thriven very highly with the consequential lowering of integrity of justice.
From the foregoing tip of the iceberg of characteristic contempt of common law and it's legislation that were inherited in Southern Cameroons and later West Cameroon, the unavoidable conclusion is that the government of "La Republique du Cameroun" whether through their legislature or the judiciary is blandly contemptuous of the common law system.
Curiously, this contemptuous attitude which is propagated with a new meaning of "Harmonization" to the effect that Common Law is bad and Civil law is good so to harmonize between Common Law and civil Law, the best thing is replacement of Common law with civil laws.
d.) Whether or not subtle subjugation of Legal Practitioners and litigants within the common law jurisdiction(s) of Cameroon has any legal or legitimate basis?
It is trite knowledge that the legality and legitimacy of laws depend not on policy speeches of politicians but on the fundamental law or better still, the Constitution of the land. Given that there has never been any legal act of state(s) succession or union between "La Republique du Cameroon" and Southern Cameroons later called West Cameroon, any legislation by a legislature other than West Cameroon Parliament or otherwise inherited under the Southern Cameroons Constitutional Order-in-Council is a nullity, for want of legal foundation upon which to anchor.
The State terrorism by use of force to intimidate and subjugate the peoples of Southern Cameroons followed by introduction of laws of "La Republique du Cameroun's" civil law system within the common law jurisdiction does not per se and simplicita clothe those laws with legality or legitimacy.
Consequent on the foregoing reasoning, the issue under review cannot be answered other than in the negative. It is therefore urged upon the government of "La Republique du Cameroun" to follow very strictly the advice of the African Commission for Human and Peoples' Rights in the decision on Communication 266/2003 Dr. Ngwang Gumne & Others versus "La Repblique du Cameroun" over which "La Republique du Cameroun has been playing a mixture of ostrich and unproductive game of the arrogance of a conqueror.
Let the principles of legality, state succession, anti-colonization, and abhorrence of use of force, in both international relations and law that governs the United Nations and the African Union both of which international organizations "La Republique du Cameroun" belongs to, be respected by "La Republique du Cameroon particularly as concerns Law formation, Law Review and Reform vis-à-vis the Common Law in Cameroon.
e.) Whether or not financing of the Judiciary in Cameroon discriminates against the common law jurisdiction?
One of the eyesores of the constructed dilapidation of Common Law in Cameroon is the underfinancing of the infrastructures and personnel of the Judiciary in the Common Law jurisdiction of Cameroon.
As concerns infrastructure, most of the court houses in the common law jurisdiction are either colonial buildings that have lost their capacity to accommodate the realities of today. The offices of Judges and Magistrates are not very different from slightly improved prison cells. The material conditions of work in general are to put it generously are merely proximate.
Even though the running budget of courts are not matters of public consumption, the practice of "illegal court charges" like Locus Fees and more betray the obvious fact that there is not sufficient money allocated for the running of the courts like in other parts of the country.
The worst sector is the remuneration of Judges and Magistrates. From the lowest courts right up to the Supreme Court the Common Law Magistrates are by all standards the wretched of the judicial corps except they lend themselves as tools for demeaning of their folks.
The above deliberately constructed poverty of justice for a particular sector of Cameroon betrays unacceptable assimilation and recruitment into the corruption culture that thrives under the Civil Law System as opposed to the pride and dignity fueled common law system.
The above picture calls for very urgent corrective legislative surgery advised by recognition of the better system that the Common Law offers. Of course, the easier way out would be to restore the Southern Cameroons judicial system so that it may function and provide a nursery for improvements of other judicial systems in the Central African Economic Region and thus create an enabling environment for sustainable human development with capacity for acceleration rather than waiting for 2035!
f.) Whether or not the undermining of the liberal character of the private legal profession is unhealthy for the justice system?
The cleansing organ of a performing judiciary is a vibrantly liberal Bar. In Cameroon the Bar is gravely hamstrung with a very constricted mandate worsen by encouraged competition from multinational consulting firms. It is also notable that the over specialization of legal professions for the sole reasons of keeping Bailiffs and Notaries under the direct day to day control of the government, robs the public particularly those of the Common Law Jurisdiction of the benefits of a competitive liberal Bar
g.) Whether or not judicial organization is not designed to produce more injustice than justice?
The administration of justice can be likened to storage by bottling of wine. If the bottle is broken the storage is not air-tight and thus quality is not assured over time. It is equally true that if the bottle is not clean the wine no matter how well it was brewed may easily become toxic.
The structure of judicial organization in Cameroon is more like a broken bottle with constant leaks from the cracks. It lacks a permanent erect spine so the Common Law Concept of "Court of First Instance which puts the High Court and what used to be called Magistrates Courts on the same pedestal with merely basic jurisdictional differentials. The matter is even compounded by the fluidity of movement of "Magistrates" between these two courts and even the Court of Appeal. Green horn Magistrates of less five years post-oath standing are known to have become "Juge" in High Courts
h.) Whether or the needs of the community of peoples within the common law jurisdiction are better served by a state-sponsored specialization of the practice of advocacy and notarial work?
4. The Position of Common Law Lawyers on the critically burning issues discussed hereabove:
5. Conclusion and Recommendation:
6. Prayer for the fulfillment of Obligation of the Government "La Republique du "Cameroun":
Col 3:4 When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. Christ appears in your life right here, right now: one nanosecond after you believe and confess that Jesus is Lord.
https://www.facebook.com/CAYMCameroon
https://www.facebook.com/CAYMCameroon
On Thursday, October 1, 2015 10:11 AM, Tazoacha Asonganyi <asontaz4919@gmail.com> wrote:
Unification and the future of Cameroon
A"ProfesseurAggregé" who seems to have an axe to grind with Maurice Kamto,has declared in an article published in some local newspapers that (my translation) "the arrest of persons who hold undeclared meetings is not a retrogressive act because in France…" He goes on to indicate that in 2013, 73 persons were arrested in Paris for protesting against gay marriage.
In the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen adopted as the preamble of the Constitution of 1791 that consecrated the success of the French Revolution, article 2 made freedom one of four natural rights; article 4 defined freedom as the right to do anything which does not harm the other. Article 5 stated that the law would define "harm", indicating that the law has the right to forbid only actions harmful to society. Our "Professeur Aggregé" obviously will not clarify that those demonstrating in Paris were blocking the public highway and committing other acts that were harmful to others. His using such arrests to justify the barbarism of administrative authorities in Cameroon, especially the recent brutalization, arrest and incarceration of Jean-Marc Bikoko and others in a rented hall is nothing short of intellectual dishonesty! The Polish intellectual LeszekKolakowski would describe such intellectuals as "priests" who are guardians of the absolute and the retrograde.
I argue hereunder that theunification project adopted in Foumban in 1961 was derailed by this blind belief in France and the borrowing from France of forms void of substance, and of the letters of texts void of the spirit behind them. The spirit is the guiding idea and modes of behaviour that the people supposed to implement a project, a text, or constitution are imbued with. As the life of the second republic in Cameroon that has caused so much harm to the unification project comes to its inevitable end, this effort is to contribute to the discussion on why we are where we are, and what is to be done.
Over 50 year after unification, the evidence before us is that Foumban had to be institutionalized to allow for the constant evaluation of the unification project over time, so as to validate it over and over again. Failure to do so caused frustrations to build up and create what have become metaphors for the failure – AAC, SCNC, and others. Institutionalization of Foumban would have allowed the unification project to labour on itself - to use the words of Gordon Wood. With time, it would have generated only centripetal thought patterns and actions; its absence has left the field wide-open for centrifugal thoughts and actions that are alive today.
Foumban was marred by several factors: 1) the feeling of "brotherhood" of Foncha's side and their belief in the "democracy" they wanted to bring to their brothers; 2) the Anglo-Saxon mindset of the good society inhabited by good people who should run society with only helpful guidance from the state; 3) Foncha's side felt closer to their "brothers" than to Nigeria and Britain; 4) delegates on Foncha's side were the main actors in the unification struggle; 5) Ahidjo's side had the Continental mindset of a corrupted society which should be guided by a French-style Jacobin centralized state; 6) Ahidjo's side felt closer to France than to their "brothers"; 7)members of Ahidjo's side were not the main actors in the struggle for unification; 8) Ahidjo's side viewed Foumban as a contract carved on stone; as the end of history; 9) the two sides had not struggled together to develop the sort of "commonsense" – the solidarity, the shared sense - Thomas Paine described for Americans, that would have provided the guiding/binding spirit of the "constitution" they adopted; 10) language (French/English).
This clash of visions, outlook and actors led to the confusion that followed. The constitution that finally came up after Foumban borrowed heavily from the French Constitution.
Article 16 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man which was adopted as the preamble of the constitution that the French Revolution gave birth to, states that a society in which the guarantee of rights is not assured or the separation of powers determined does not have a constitution; the separation of powers insures against the usurpation of arbitrary powers in the name of the nation. The spirit of the French Constitution was derived from the experience and struggle that helped to remove the King and create the Constitution; it was the spirit of the revolution that founded the Republic which was said to be the incarnation of triumphant freedom. The constitution was therefore said to be the social reign of victorious freedom; it ensured the continuous prosecution of the war of freedom against its enemies to maintain freedom's victorious reign.
We borrowed from the French Constitution the letters, not the spirit; it was impossible to borrow a spirit we had not lived and shared. Because of what Hannah Arendt describes as the people's freedom to begin, Immanuel Kant warned that there should be no contract made to shut off any further enlightenment; that any such contract is null and void even if confirmed by the supreme power, by parliament and by the most ceremonial of peace treaties. This was like speaking for and to human nature. The actors in Foumban, and the generations they would leave behind were no exception to this rule. Yet Ahidjo's side behaved throughout as if Founban decreed the end of history; as if Foumban shut off further enlightenment! This has resulted in periodic violence against human nature – "as if national unity" is carved on stone –with regular arrest of SCNC members, and others. Laws and the execution of laws became void of the spirit of reunification, mainly because government itself was not led by those who had led the reunification struggle.
The French revolution had deposed the sovereign that incarnated popular will and replaced it with a plural people with a sovereignty that could not be incarnated by any interest, group or institution. We copied this into our own Constitution, but established institutions in the constitution that incarnate the popular will – the "President", and "parliament" that is under the control of …the "president." In other words, the deposed French sovereign was replaced by "The President" in our own case. This created a tyranny of one man who exercised a monopoly of power exactly as had the despot of the Old French Regime! Since the French had replaced their organic society with the Republic, separation of powers implied checks and balances; we copied separation of powers, but the implied checks and balances were absent.
The agreement adopted in Foumban sought to attain a goal which was the birth of a new nation. The new nation had to keep reflecting on itself, questioning itself continually, debating on itself as it progressed so that the result it would produce over time – national unity, national unanimity or whatever - would be the shared responsibility of all concerned, not a decreed and imposed concept. Unfortunately, the Jacobin centralized state managed by strangers to the reunification project used force to create an inert reunified society and sought to impose a politics that had no consideration for the social foundation of the reunited society. In the end, the spirit of "brotherhood" of Foncha's side was killed. The "democracy"Foncha's side wanted to bring to their brothers fell on barren soil. In the absence of the space for self-expression, private passions burst out in identity furors because of the fears conjured by the new masters.
The rhetoric of national unity can end only at the altar of rhetoric because it offers nothing to the future. Transcending the Federal framework was a ridiculous betrayal of a collective project. No human effort can put an end to history! History is the march of humans towards their freedom. Human nature is universal; the people's freedom of Hannah Arendt "to begin" is also universal.It is time to listen to the voices that strangers to the unification project caused to be raised.
TazoachaAsonganyi
Yaounde.
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