By Nantang Jua et Piet Konings (Culled from "Occupation of Public Space Anglophone Nationalism in Cameroon", Cahiers d'études africaines, 175, 2004)
The regime and organic scholars (Ahidjo 1968; Forje 1981; Fogui 1990) have often attempted to historicise Cameroon only in terms of its present mobilisation needs, in particular the construction of a national consciousness as part of the nation-building project. They are, therefore, engaged in an impressive dose of historical amnesia–willed acts of selective remembrance of the past so as to erase Anglophone identity and heritage from national history.
Continue reading "Four Myths About the Unification of British and French Cameroons" »










In an article on Cameroon literature in English published in 2004 in the French language literary journal Africultures, Pierre Fandio of the University of Buea noted that while Francophone Cameroon literature has been generally militant in nature, with many of its first generation writers having faced exile or imprisonment, Anglophone Cameroon literature, until very recently, largely focused on romance (“A few nights and days”, “Because of women”, “Taboo love”, etc.) and on “omnibus themes” which “interest everyone but don’t discuss anything of substance” (Sov Mbang the Soothsayer, Lukong and the Leopard, The Good Foot, etc.).
When Paul Biya became president on November 6, 1982, he seemed determined to break away from, and put an end to the clientelist policies of the Ahidjo era; to establish a more humane nationalist agenda that respected ethnic and linguistic diversity but frowned on tribalism; encourage state decentralization; and introduce grassroots democracy within the single party. These ideas formed the bedrock of Paul Biya's "New Deal" philosophy which he articulated during the first five years of his rule, and whose basic principles were later published in a 1987 political manifesto titled Communal Liberalism.
Douala - When the wedding bells rang for French and British Cameroon in 1961, it seemed to be an unlikely match. For almost half a century, the two central African territories had gone separate ways under totally different colonial administrations.
nationalist leader, Felix Moumié. In this posting, we relive that tragic event through the eyes of Franz Fanon (picture), the famous Caribbean essayist, psychoanalyst, and revolutionary who fought alongside the FLN in the Algerian war of independence, and whose writings inspired African anti-colonial liberation movements in the 1950s and 60s:


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