Dibussi Tande: Scribbles from the Den

Doing Business 2007: Yet Another Annual Survey, Still the Same Old Story for Africa

A delegation of about 100 business executives from francophone Africa (about 70% of them from Cameroon), are in Chicago for the secondannual food and technology business forum which begins tomorrow. Jointly organized by The United States Embassy, Cameroon, the U.S. Regional commercial service in Dakar/Abidjan and ChicagoMidwest Corporation, the business forum is an opportunity for African business executives to meet with American companies and organs of the U.S. government that support international trade.

Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2006: Africa a Mixed Bag

Reporters without Boarders has released its Worldwide Press Freedom Index for 2006. Find below parts of the report that focus on the state of press freedom in Africa:

Press freedom is genuine is Benin (23rd), Namibia (26th), Mauritius (32nd), Ghana (34th), Mali (35th), South Africa (44th) and Cape Verde (45th) and comparable to that in Western democracies.

It does not exist or is constantly under attack in Eritrea (166th), Gambia (149th), Somalia (144th), Democratic Republic of Congo (142nd), Zimbabwe (140th) and Equatorial Guinea (137th). The same African countries have featured at the top and bottom of the Index for several years.

"Before the Sunrise": When Nollywood Comes to Cameroon

Before the Sunrise, the first major collaboration between Nollywood and Cameroon’s budding English language film industry is now available online. The movie can be viewed or purchased from the inollywood or izognmovies websites. Filmed in Buea and Limbe, in Cameroon, Before Sunrise was launched amidst great fanfare at the Yaounde Hilton in July 2005.

The movie's cast that includes prominent Nigerian film stars such as Zach Orji, Dakoré Egboson, Jacobs Olu, Fred Amata. The Cameroonian actors include Ivan Namme, Queenta Eyong, Magdalene Agbor, Goretti Folefack, and Makossa star Jean Pierre Essome.

Article Review: Political Assassination as a Strategy Against Liberation Movements

The feature story in today's issue of Pambazuka Newsis an abridged version of Victoria Brittain's earlier article on the assassination of nationalist leaders in Africa and the Middle East which initially appeared in Race & class, and which I cited at the beginning of the series on Felix Moumie.

Brittain’s article complement's the Felix Moumie story by placing it in a broader context of "current power relations between the Third World in general, and the dominant Western and imperialist powers"; relations which, Brittain argues, are the "product of the war of attrition which the West has waged, particularly by political assassinations, which have robbed Africa and the Middle East of some of their great leaders, and weakened their important political organisations."

France’s Dirty War in Cameroon (II): The Assassination of Félix-Roland Moumié

By Dibussi Tande

So who exactly ordered the hit on Moumie and how high up in the French government did the crime and cover-up go? For years, French authorities strongly refuted any French government involvement in the Moumie assassination.

 
Jacques Foccart, "Mr. Francafrique", with President De Gaulle

Initially they even denied that Bechtel was a member of the French intelligence service, even though all the evidence pointed to the contrary.It wasn’t until after Bechtel’s death that tongues began to loosen. And it became apparent that the plot against Moumie directly involved the Matignon and even the Palais de l'Élysée.

France’s Dirty War in Cameroon: The Assassination of Félix-Roland Moumié (I)

By Dibussi Tande

The use of political assassinations against key leaders of liberation movements has had a major impact on the course of history in Africa and the Middle East. Not only have some of the greatest of Third World leaders been killed but so, too, has the hope for political change they embodied - Victoria Brittain [Race & Class, Vol. 48, No. 1, 60-74 (2006)]

Early in October 1960, Dr. Félix-Roland Moumié, the exiled leader of the Camerounian nationalist movement, the Union des Populations du Cameroun (UPC), traveled to Geneva, Switzerland, on a mission. On the eve of his return to Conakry (Guinea) where the UPC had set up its headquarters in exile, he was invited to dinner by an individual whom he had met earlier in July in Accra, Ghana. The individual, 66-year old William Bechtel, claimed to be a journalist interested in the UPC’s armed struggle against the French-backed regime of Ahmadou Ahidjo.

Richard Bona: The Maestro in Concert

Richard Bona performing his hit tune, Ekwa Mwato, at the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam, Holland.

Click here for my review of Bona's last album, Tiki.

Bona is featured on the cover of the September issue of Bass Player Magazine, which also has a full-page article on him.

Listen to Bona on PRI.

Lamentations

By Lloney E. Monono (Author of Beyond the Promise)

With tears I remember -
Yes I remember
How you wooed me
You cooed to me
I was your apple
So young and supple
I was beautiful
Intelligent and resourceful – you said
Remember – you said
You love me
You needed me
You were in flames
When you called my name
Your need
Was my need

A Taste of Cameroon ... At the Museum of London

Remembering October 1, 1961: Ben Muna in his Own Words

It now seems that the English-speaking Cameroonians enjoyed more freedom of expression under the colonial government than they do today after gaining their freedom and independence.

October 1, 1961 met me in London as a student of Law in Lincoln's Inn. This date is important to me because after that day, I was summoned to the British Council Offices in London. I was received by the then Director, Colonel Cook. In spite of his military background he was a very polite and friendly person, who went out of his way to make sure that overseas students in London did not confront too many problems.

The Road to (Re)unification in Pictures

In 1960, Primen Minister John Ngu Foncha (in suit on stairway) and Hon. S. T. Muna (carrying traditional bag) wave to wellwishers as they board a plane of the West African Airways Corporation (WAAC) for a journey to London to discuss the future of Southern Cameroons with British Colonial authorities.

Broken Dreams

Dibussi Tande (Buea, February 1993)
 
By the demon's spell they seemed possessed
By their mythical idea they were obsessed.
Theirs was to be the envy of the world
A nation with the best of two worlds.
This hazy concept was seen as "the" solution
And towards it they tolerated no contradiction.

The Post's Focus on Reunification

The Post Newspaper today published a special issue to commemorate the 45th anniversary of the union between the British Southern Cameroons and the French Cameroun. It includes interviews, recollections, commentaries on the state of the union, vox pop. Some of these articles are available online at the newspaper's website.

Click here to read the articles from The Post

The State of the Union 45 Years After: Symbols of Reunification in Decay

The Mungo Bridge

Constructed in 1969, the "reunification bridge" over the River Mungo was meant to give concrete meaning the the unification of British Southern Cameroons and French Cameroons by establishing a physical link between the two territories. On July 1, 2004, the bridge collapsed after a fuel tanker hit the railings and exploded. More than two years later, the historic Mungo bridge is still down and a new bridge is still awaited - a most symbolic representation of the current state of the union between the two territories.

The Reunification Question in Cameroon History: Was the Bride an Enthusiastic or a Reluctant One?

By Nicodemus Fru Awasom (Africa Today Volume 47, Number 2, 2000) 

The 1961 reunification of the British Southern Cameroons and the former French Cameroons was an extraordinary event, as peoples of different colonial backgrounds decided to form a single state. It presented a countercurrent in postcolonial Africa to the prevailing trend of the balkanization of old political unions or blocs.1 The British and French Cameroons had been administered separately by Britain and France since 1916 and reunified against the expectations and maneuvers of the metropolitan powers in 1961.