The Entrepreneur - Cameroon's Premier Economic & Business Journal

Dr. Ernest Molua: a CPDM Apostle and Intellectual Strategist

By Christopher Ambe Shu

People join the ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (CPDM) for various reasons-some even covert. Ambitious as youth are, some come on board in a bid to position themselves and get jobs. But once in and they can’t find the jobs or get their hidden motives satisfied, they quickly jump out and join the barking opposition in bashing the ruling party. Those who join the CPDM not out of conviction hardly argue cogently in defense of the party.Some of them even feel ashamed when dressed in the CPDM party attire and don’t hesitate to give you flimsy excuses for belonging to it. Others - especially those above the middle age believe whole-heartedly in the CPDM and are vocal in the defence of its ideals.It is in this category that Dr. Ernest Molua falls.

The New Partnership for Africa's Development is 10 years old

NEPAD at the Crossroads

Adopted in Lusaka in July 2001 during the 37th Summit of Heads of State and Government of the OAU, the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD); created from the merger of the Millennium Action Plan and the Omega Plan, will be 10 years old in July 2011. An Anniversary that coincides with its integration into the African Union process will be placed under the banner of reflection. In February 2010, the 14th Assembly of the AU decided to establish the NEPAD Planning and Coordination Agency (NEPAD Agency) as the technical organ of the AU, to replace the NEPAD Secretariat.

Cameroon Business Reporter of the Year

Pierre-Alexis Kaptchouang, la plume d’or du business reporting 2009

Par Ben Nakomo et Bright Lokenge

Il compte désormais parmi les géants du plus beau métier du monde. En une dizaine d’année de carrière, le jeune Pierre-Alexis Kaptchouang a su s’inspirer des réalités de l’actualité quotidienne pour bâtir une carrière qui aujourd’hui témoigne de ses talents. Une carrière de journaliste qu’il embrasse à l’age de 19 ans, encore sur les bancs du lycée. Ses premiers papiers paraissent dans le périodique « L’Ouest Républicain » dirigé par le journaliste chevronné Michel Mombio. Même les conditions précaires et les conditions peu évidentes de la profession ne l’empêcheront pas à braver ce terrain rocailleux qu’il embrasse sur le tas.

Sylvester John: Connecting African Entrepreneurs to Global Business

The average university students in Africa will wait to graduate before they seek to exercise the power of knowledge to impact their communities. Not so for Sierra Leon born Sylvester John, who as an undergraduate at the University of North Florida (U.S.A) in May 2000 helped establish a Center for Education, Free Enterprise and International Trade in Ghana. He eventually brought the Students In Free Enterprise (SIFE) initiative to Africa.Sylvester spent more than 10 years in Ghana and Togo. He officially established SIFE in Africa (specifically in Ghanaian universities) in 2000

Nkhensani Nkosi - South Africa's Multi-talented Entrepreneur

Entrepreneur, television personality, and internationally-lauded actress, Nkhensani Nkosi is part of a new wave of activism aimed at creating a post-Apartheid identity for South Africans that is neither white nor black, but South African. She is the Founder and CEO of StonedCherrie. By mixing modern style with images of iconic moments in South Africa’s history, political icons, and symbols banned during Apartheid, Stoned Cherrie’s Afro-centric casual and formal wear has become a pioneer of AFRO-URBAN culture, an explorer of what it means to be African in the 21st Century. Launched at the 2000 South African Fashion Week to great reviews, Nkhensani’s line has been featured on BBC, CNN and Australian Television.

Remembering Claude Levi-Strauss

Some Anthropology Lesssons 

By Snowsel Ano-Ebie

The entire world mourns! The world of culture and the Social Sciences pays tribute! A giant Anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss is dead at the age of 101! The French Social Scientist born in 1908 died on Tuesday, November 3, 2009. The man whose age sounds like the Code of a basic Course in any university discipline will most be remembered in academic circles. Any scholar with a firm grounding in Anthropological Theory, or anybody who has explored the Main Currents of Anthropological Thinking will clearly remember Claude Lévi-Strauss and his enormous contributions to the Social Sciences. A rigorous study of Sociological Theory, notably the works of Professor George Ritzer grouped under “Contemporary Sociological Theory” and “Classical Sociological Theory” will vividly bring out the influence of Claude Lévi-Strauss.

Revisiting Anglophone Marginalization

The Anglophone camp in Cameroon politics has been in disarray since 1959 and will continue to be so until kingdom come. That has been the discernible trajectory, and those of sharp minds know this to be true. Strange, however, was the audacity of some Anglophone architects of the so called “marginalization thesis” to join the chorus of this choir, even leading a delegation to the United Nations, not long before they passed away. How often does participating humankind see evil in politics when and only when their period of action is past?

Dr Ernest Molua is Awarded Visiting Fellowship to Makerere University, Uganda and University of Pretoria, South Africa

On 12 January 2009, Dr Ernest Molua was awarded the Visiting African Scholar Fellowship to Makerere University in Uganda, from 1 March to 20 June 2009 and to University of Pretoria in South Africa from 1 July to 5 December 2009, under the CEEPA (Centre for Environmental Economics and Policy in Africa) African Scholar Programme. Under this programme, African scholars working in Universities in Africa are funded annually, to enhance teaching and research capacity in environmental economics and to help sustain the staff development and to contribute to creating an environment in which retention of staff within participating departments is enhanced. The fellowship is used to support faculty members who wish to use a study leave away from their home institution. Fellows may spend a visiting residency at University departments in the continent or international centres of excellence.

Cameroon Diaspora and National Development

Diasporans are Begining to Speak Out.......

“The Biya government stands to gain if it includes the Cameroon Diaspora in the economic and political life of the country,” says Joachim Arrey, Communications and Translation Expert with the African Development Bank Group. We caught up with him in Tunis, Tunisia, and he had a lot to say about Cameroon.

"Many back home are wasting away because of psychological problems. Thousands of them are in the West wasting their youthfulness and reducing their lives because of the soul-destroying jobs they are doing. Many just think they have disappointed their parents and cannot live with such a burden. Premature aging has become a reality in Cameroon..."

Read full interview......

Barrister Ntumfor Nico Halle: The Grassfield Trojan Horse in Cameroon’s Twin Municipal and Parliamentary Elections of July 22, 2007

Busted the SDF Rigging Machinery in the Northwest, Increases the Diversity of Political Choices for Grasslanders …….

By Ben Nakomo, Sirri Alette Ngwa & Yvonne Soppo Disso, with additional commentaries and pictures from Bright Lokenge.

About 60% of the 5.5 million Cameroonians who registered to vote in the twin municipal and legislative elections in Cameroon, cast their votes in favour of one of the 40 political parties that partook in the elections of July 22, 2007. No where in Cameroon was the election battle as fierce as in the Northwest Province of the country, where the Social Democratic Front (SDF), Cameroon’s leading opposition, has supposedly had its stronghold since the 1997 democratic elections. The elections were organised by the Ministry of Territorial Administration (MINADT) and supervised by Cameroon’s National Election Observatory (NEO) to the chagrin of political observers and stakeholders. The elections went ahead, notwithstanding, as some political scientists, even the ardent SDF scribe and International Law guru, Prof. Ndiva Kofele Kale in a famous radio show, Cameroon Calling, on the run-up to the elections, cited numerous countries in the world including Costa Rica where clean, fair and transparent elections have been held supervised by state-owned election organisations. In his view, what matters most is the intergrity of the men and women who manage such institutions.