'When Injustice Becomes Law, Resistance Becomes A Duty ...

TO speak English fluently in a world where the language is the lingua franca of trade and diplomacy is usually a big win in the lottery of life except in Cameroon where English as a mother tongue has become a curse, thanks to a colonial conundrum that made Anglophone underdogs in a union with overwhelmingly French-speaking Cameroon.

Paul Biya

For four months in 2016, the two English-speaking regions of western Cameroon rose against decades-long assault by the Francophone elite on their ways of life, staging a campaign of general strikes, demonstrations and the occasional riot.

There was a ruthless response by the government in forms of killings of protesters and a two-month internet shutdown in English-speaking regions, throwing the country into a serious crisis and raising questions about its continued unity.

In the midst of the growing secessionist’s mutterings, Britain became active in attempting to defuse the confrontation. Brian Olley, the British High Commissioner to Cameroon, met Paul Biya, the country’s then 84-year-old president and called on him to end the use of force against protesters.

Colonial traditions

“We have raised our concerns with the government of Cameroon and will continue to raise these issues, including allowing access to the internet,” a Foreign Office spokeswoman said

But British quiet diplomacy did not make many impressions on some Anglophone activists, who accuse Britain of abandoning its responsibilities in the former British Southern Cameroons, which united with the much larger French Cameroons in 1961.

“Britain made us what we are and now most people in Britain don’t even know we exist,” an activist involved in the demonstrations said.

Despite the anger, Anglophone Cameroonians, who make up less than a fifth of the county’s 23 million people, remain fiercely loyal to their colonial traditions. To the amusement of French speakers, they insist on forming orderly queues, referring to bars as “off-licences” and dressing up their judges and lawyers in powdered wigs.

The authorities assumed that the protests would thin out. Instead, the movement grew, drawing in Anglophone teachers, angered by state attempts to replace them with French speakers with knowledge of neither English nor the GCE syllabus. Students joined in too, only to see their halls of residence raided and female students were beaten and sexually abused by the police.

One unapologetic voice that has risen from West Cameroon is Joseph Wirba who interrupted the Speaker of the Cameroon Parliament in 2016 to deliver a powerful address which is currently trending in Nigeria because it was as if he was speaking to our situation here.

He declared unequivocally “a slave has risen in the master’s house”.

His voice was heard – and is still ringing loud – in a speech which spoke the minds of every bitter Southern Cameroonian citizen, in the presence of Cavayé Yéguié Djibril, president of the National Assembly of Cameroon and other members.

He kicked against the molestation and violence the armed force of La Republique meted on unarmed civilians of Buea and Bamenda who were making their voices heard in a peaceful protest which turned out to a bloodbath. Peaceful protest and demonstration is the people’s legitimate right, he stated.