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 Monument (Yaounde)

Designed by Gédéon Mpando and completed in 1974, the Reunification Monument was meant to be a major tourist attraction like the Eiffel tower, and the most visible symbol of the unification of the two Cameroons. Some three decades later, the once majestic edifice has become a dilapidated hideout for criminals and the homeless. According to an article in Cameroon Tribune, the main gate is no longer in place, unhinged and thrown onto the lawn. The monument grounds and the once colorful gardens have been taken over by wild shrubs. The erstwhile white stairs leading to the top of the monument are now blackened and dotted with with pools of stagnant water. An opening at the bottom of the monument now serves as a refuse dump. The grandiose banquet hall at the monument's basement is now filled with grass and mud, ocasionally used by local DJs to organize teen parties.

In its early years, the reunification monument represented the hopes and dreams of a bilingual Cameroon that would serve as a beacon and example for the rest of Africa. Today, its decay and neglect undoubtedly mirrors a union that has lost its bearings.

Independence Monumemt, Mamfe

This is probably the least known monument constructed during the years of giddy euphoria to commemorate the birth of the bilingual Cameroon republic. Nonetheless, in terms of symbolism, the mamfe monument is as important as the one in Yaounde. And like the yaounde monument, it is a victim of neglect, indiffence, and even scorn from the people of Mamfe - a once vibrant town which began its downward spiral immediately after reunification. Today, the monument is in dire need of a new coat of paint, and surroundings that are worthy of the once lofty aspirations that initially led to its construction - Another telling indication of the state of the union...

End Game Cameroon?

Ahmadou Ahidjo, October 1961:

Reuniting today people of both French and English Expressions, Cameroon will be a veritable laboratory for an African Union which will unite people who speak these two languages. She will be a bridge btween thse two Africas, and her role can only be increased in forthcoming African assemblies.

Bernard Fonlon, 1964:

There is disillusionment; discontent and frustration are sinking and spreading. There is nothing so calculated to wring and crush the human spirit, before a lofty enterprise, as to know what should be done and yet to have to stand by impotent and see the opposite taking place. This desperation has become explosive.

John Ngu Foncha, December 1993:

...the Good Lord who, in his infinite wisdom determines the affairs of each man and of each people, has preserved me long enough to have the opportunity of pleading before the Cameroon Nation for the correction of the wrongs which have been done, over the past three decades and more, against an unsuspecting and trusting people that I, acting in good faith and as a Cameroonian patriot, led into what I was assured would be a union of equal partners, but which has since turned out to be an arrangement for the annexation, subjugation and domination of one of the partners by the other...

Pictures of the Independence Monument in Mamfe obtained from the Ambazonia website

Comments

[Ma Mary]

First off, those so called reunification monuments are very ugly, and really repulsive in their state of decay. Their ugliness is indicative of the malformed being created by the unnatural union of Southern Cameroons and la republique du Cameroun. Their state of neglect is very telling. La republique francais du Cameroun under its present plunderer in chief was in such a hurry to obliterate the identity of the Southern Cameroons that one of its spiritual acts was to neglect the symbols and monuments that indicate that two countries came together. The destruction of the Mungo bridge between Tiko and Douala is a sign that the union has already ended in spirit and it will only be a matter of time for the rupture to manifest concretely.

[Roland Ngong]

I submit, subject to debate in a calm and sober-minded atmosphere, that the current experiment in nation-building has failed. I further submit that the pain of frustration, anger, poverty and deprivation is not only felt by those now officially known as north-westerners and south-westerners of Cameroon. The overwhelming majority of Cameroonians now yearn for change - actually for a comprehensive overhaul - of those laws and other provisions that govern our existence as a people and as a nation.
We are proud of our country and the blessings that the Lord has showered on it in terms of physical and natural resources. However, we are now held hostage by a corrupt few sustained by military force and by a foreign government or governments which clearly do not have the interest of cameroonians and their country at heart despite their pronouncements to the contrary.Our people, most of them unarmed, have been slaughtered in their quest for a better life. Our desire to be masters of our own destiny has been thwarted by a yaounde-based clique, aided by a self-seeking coterie of sycophants in the rest of the country whose unavowed aim is not only to serve the interests of their foreign masters but also to maintain the masses in a permanent state of bondage and subjugation. Time must come as it inevitably will when these shackles will be untied. My prayer is that the Good Lord will spare me a few more years to be witness to the liberation of our people.

[Dyna Ngoy]

Did you know that the fuel tanker was transporting fuel from the Littoral Province to the South West Province? Fuel refined in Victoria, South West, transported and stored in SCDP in Douala and later on re-transported to the South West across the re-unification bridge; and there was this divine intervention on July 1, 2004, “the reunification bridge collapsed after the fuel tanker hit the railings and exploded”

[Adolph]

Cameroon: Reunification monument under rehabilitation

Cameroon Tribune (Yaoundé)

5 October 2007

Veronika Tamfu

The Yaounde City Council wants to restore the dignity of the Reunification Monument.

The Reunification Monument which is located in the Ngoa-Ekelle neighbourhood reminds many Cameroonians of the 1st October 1961, when both the erstwhile French and British Cameroons came together to become one country. But a lot exists in this monument that can build a library for future generations to come, reason why the Yaounde City Council, under the supervision of the Government Delegate, Tsimi Evouna has embarked on a series of work to give the monument a new facelift.

According to Dieudonne Manga, chief of works at the construction site, there will be a massive planting of flowers to make the surroundings of the monument agreeable. Some of the flowers will be planted following arithmetical shapes. The flower beds will take star, circle, oval and triangular forms. That's not all. Sixteen public benches have already been put in place to receive visitors at the site.

Among the eight poles existing at the reunification premises, only two of them carry the Cameroonian national Flag. Consequently after rehabilitation, all poles will carry the Cameroon flag. The monument will be adorned with lights around it. The fence will also witness some rehabilitation work. At the exterior of the monument, a rectangle of 16 metres by 1.40 metres and the word "Reunification" written on the lawn with the use of flowers.

The rehabilitation work, which will cost the Yaounde City Council a sum of CFA 15 million. According to Arnauld Phillipe Ndzana, Director of Technical Services at the Yaounde City Council, the rehabilitation work is destined to end in two months. In his objective of rendering the city of Yaounde more beautiful, the Government Delegate, Tsimi Evouna, took up the initiative to give the monument which has been long abandoned, a new facelift that will draw in Cameroonians as well as tourists to the rich historical monument.

[Asonganyi]

It is a sharm to the south west CPDM politicians who are in goverment smiling while south west riot with untared roads.anglophones are lost push to the ground and their identity completely wipeout when Biya called cameroon le republique removing the United republic which sealed and attest two states.sharm to the CPDM south west politicians.History will judge the following people;chief tambe tondo,Hon rose makia,inoni,mafana and the entire south west chiefs conference.south west has been ceased by the francophones while the our chiefs preached the CPDM doctrine sharmlessly