Cameroon’s Internal Bassa Diaspora: Ethnic or National Citizens

Obliterate the Outdated Tribal Concept of Land Possession Forever!

By Emmanuel Konde

Political discrimination is a cancer that is eating deep into the fabric of many African societies.  This form of discrimination is exacerbated by the political irrationality of tribal ancestral lands within the modern state structures of Africa.  In this brief “exegesis,” I use the Bassa of Limbe in the South West region of Cameroon as entry point into a discourse that seeks to illuminate the social problem inherent in the application of an untenable concept that denies a huge segment of society the right to full political participation and the enjoyment of citizenship rights in the communities in which they were born.     

The Bassa in Cameroon’s South West region detest the political discrimination that they have been made to suffer in English-speaking Cameroon since the 1950s.  Few people know that Bassa, Bamileke, Duala, Beti, and other Cameroonian settlers in British Southern Cameroons were disfranchised during the 1961 Plebiscite. They were denied the vote by the political leaders of Southern Cameroons.  That was wrong.  It should never happen again, especially to “Bassa ba Limbe” who, as first inhabitants of sections of contemporary Limbe, began transforming that town in pre-colonial times with their cutlasses by felling huge forest trees and opening up much of the town for human habitation.

Dating from the nationalist era of British Southern Cameroons, the story of Bassa Anglophone as a whole, and ‘Bassa ba Limbe’ in particular, has been a cruel narrative of political discrimination.  Very few ‘Anglophone’ Bassa have been appointed to high political office in the South West region.  No Bassa Anglophone has been appointed prime minister or minister.  Only one, the late Hon. Charles Betow, served in the National Assembly after long years of administrative service to that same institution. Yet some of the brightest Anglophones are counted among the Bassa.  But this sad and tearful narrative of political discrimination came to pass principally because the valiant, adventurous Bassa who settled pre-Victoria Limbe were largely uneducated and unorganized. Any disorganized people are as good as useless, politically.  That was the predicament of the early ‘Bassa ba Limbe,’ my forebears.  We have to unravel this quandary, which defined their existence, and rendered them pariahs and non-political actors in a town in which they ought to have been the God Fathers.

 Bassa Antiquity in Contemporary Limbe is specifically designed to highlight the travails of "Bassa ba Limbe” who must be made aware of their political marginalization, a status imposed on them in a town they helped build from forest to metropolis. It is from this perspective that Bassa Antiquity can best be understood.  "Bassa ba Limbe" can only become a potent force when organized as a pressure group with a well-defined agenda, dynamic mission, and a winning strategy for attaining specific goals. 

Other groups that have been subjected to similar political deprivations should do the same.  As a point of fact, all the so-called “eleventh provincials” in Cameroon must unite and work to dismantle this non-existent province number eleven in a country that has only ten official provinces.  It is a given certainty that all Cameroonians of goodwill will join the politically-discriminated eleventh provincials in this noble civil rights and human rights struggle.

My book, long before it was read, drew a lot of criticism from some Bakweri who are not of Limbe and from other Anglophones who think I am bent on claiming Limbe, my hometown, for the Bassa.  Nothing could be far removed from the truth than this cheap nonsense.  Granted, Bassa people everywhere in Cameroon originated from "Ngog Lituba" (Sanaga Maritime, as the French named it). But, as with other indigenous groups, there exists an internal Bassa Diaspora in Cameroon, which occasioned the migration of the Bassa to many parts of the country where they founded and established communities that should be legally recognized as Bassa communities with all the political rights and privileges appertaining to their status as citizens.

There can be no two categories of citizens in any single country, namely national citizen and ethnic citizen. Only one category must prevail: national citizen. I stand by this assertion as I have stood opposed to those who advocate democracy at the center while embracing autocracy in the periphery. The same rights and privileges I advocate for the Bassa of Limbe and Bassa Anglophone, I equally extend to all other Cameroonian groups that happen to have made home in regions other than the mystical ancestral lands conjured up by some.  The children they gave birth to, who know of no other ancestral lands but the city, town, or village in which they were born, are bona-fide citizens of their places of birth.  In this twenty-first century world, the concept of ancestral land is outdated, outmoded, anachronistic, an untenable nothing but a misnomer for political discrimination. We must open up the backward hinterlands for habitation by Cameroonians from all walks of life, and kill and bury discrimination once and for all time.

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Comments

[Sammy]

Konde has a point but wonder why he did not make any allusion to the economic, political and social discrimination suffered by Anglophone Cameroonians all over Cameroon in terms of distribution of opportunities.The right to a healthy life is a human right for all and should not be limited by a certain group who dominate, annihilate and dehumanise others. Such is the stark reality in today's Cameroon and makes it increasingly difficult for Anglophones to leave the little they have to settlers. "Eleventh provincials" should fight from political emancipation from the top.

[Ashu Felix]

Good article.
Please visit this site www,mybuea.com and encourgage Landlords to register and place information about houses for Rents.
A little gift to help my Cameroonian people especially students who move from other province to school in another.
Ashu Felix