Dibussi Tande: Scribbles from the Den

NCAA Final Four: And They Meet Again!!!!

Richard Mba A'Moute, Alfred Aboya and Joachim Noah

They met during the 2006 NCAA basketball title game that pitted the Florida Gators against the UCLA Bruins. This year both teams are in the final four and the "Cameroon Crazies" will be facing each other in tomorrow's semi final game, in a year when a record 25 Cameroonians participated in the March Madness.

Once Upon a Time… Osende Afana (I)

By Dibussi Tande

'the majority of them... when they returned to Africa shamefully betrayed the noble ideals which they defended... in Paris'. They joined the ranks of the bourgeoisie and adopted the motto FVVA (Femmes, Villas, Voitures, Argent). Only a few militants like Osende Afana practised what they had preached and died for the causes in which they believed: that of revolution." Gonidec, African Politics. p. 73

On March 15, 1966 Osende Afana, one of the last of the “intellectual revolutionaries” died in Ndélélé subdivision deep in the dreaded Djoum forest in what is today Kadey division in the East Province of Cameroon. The circumstances of his death are still unclear to this day but what is known is that he was tracked down by Ahmadou Ahidjo’s security forces, ambushed, killed and then beheaded. While his headless body was buried in an unmarked grave, legend has it that his head was taken to Yaounde and put on display for some members of the Ahidjo regime as a “war trophy”.

A Baobab Fell in the Forest But Did They Notice? Bate Besong or the Symbol of the Cameroon Divide

By Dibussi Tande

“And yet, there was a time when people had faith, implicit faith - in this Union – without making any investigations. But I ask you, where is that faith now? It has vanished. So utterly! The bonds have snapped. We carry the scars of ‘brotherhood’ in a country so unaccustomed to candour.” Bate Besong - 1993

A common (in fact the most prevalent) theme in Bate Besong's writings (fiction and non-fiction) is the fate of Cameroon's English-speaking minority whom he referred to in his famous Beasts of No Nation as 'nightsoilmen" locked up in the antechamber of the bilingual republic; a people whose culture, history and even existence was an afterthought to the French-speaking majority of the bilingual Cameroon Republic.

Kingsley's Crossing: A Documentary of One Man's Journey In Search of Greener Pastures

By Olivier Jobard

"Kingsley's Crossing is the story of one man's willingness to abandon everything—his family, his country, and his friends—in the hopes of finding a better life abroad. Award-winning French photojournalist Olivier Jobard documents the passage."

[Click on the image above to view the documentary of Kingsley's "excruciating six-month journey across half of Africa".]

Click here for a report on Kingsley's journey published in The Independent (UK)

"A Baobab Has Fallen": Bate Besong is no More!!!

Bate Besong, the revered lecturer of literature at the University of Buea, fiery social critic, and unarguably
"Anglophone Cameroon's most versatile and charismatic playwright and poet", died today, March 8, 2007 in a ghastly car accident on the Douala - Yaounde highway. This was barely a few hours after the successful launching of his latest book, Disgrace. BB, as he was fondly called, was on his way to the US embassy to obtain a visa to attend this year's American Literature Association (ALA) annual conference taking place in Morgantown, West Virginia.

In Memoriam: Bate Besong: The Man

By George Ngwane (Culled from Bate Besong (Or the Symbol of Anglophone Hope). Limbe: Noomerac Press, 1993.)

Bate Besong is Bate Besong. If you call him Besong Bate, it will be somebody else. His name refuses to obey the law of choice. Born on 8th May 1954 at Ikot-Ansa Calabar, former Eastern-Nigeria, of Cameroonian parents from Ndekwai-Mamfe, Bate Besong (BB) began his secondary education at St. Bedes College, Ashing Kom. While in Kom, his passion for Art was nursed and nurtured as he developedan interest for music, playing in the school orchestra with mates like Kenneth Komtaghi of the "Do Good" fame and earning the show business tag of James Brown (JB).

Cameroon Country Report on Human Rights Practices for 2006

Released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (US State Department)

Excerpt:

The government's human rights record remained poor, and it continued to commit numerous human rights abuses. Security forces committed numerous unlawful killings; they regularly engaged in torture, beatings, and other abuses, particularly of detainees and prisoners. Impunity was a problem in the security forces. Prison conditions were harsh and life-threatening. Authorities arbitrarily arrested and detained anglophone citizens advocating secession, local human rights monitors and activists, and other citizens. The law provides for the arrest of homosexuals and persons not carrying identification cards. There were reports of prolonged and sometimes incommunicado pretrial detention and infringement on citizens' privacy rights.

University of Buea: What is the Cost of Quality Education?

Dibussi Tande

Students attending state-owned universities in Cameroon do not pay tuition. Instead they pay an annual registration fee of 50,000 FCFA [98 US Dollars]. This fee was instituted in the wake of the 1993 university reforms which decentralized the University of Yaounde (then the country's lone university) and created five new universities across the country.

Mounting Calls for Release of Jailed Egyptian Blogger

"The Egyptian authorities must repeal legislation that, in violation of international standards, stipulates prison sentences for acts which constitute nothing more than the peaceful exercise of the rights of freedom of expression, thought, conscience and religion." Amnesty International.

On February 22, 2007, Egyptian blogger Abdelkareem Soliman was sentenced to four years in prison for spreading information disruptive of public order and damaging to the country's reputation", "incitement to hate Islam" and "defaming the president of the republic".