"This is the time for all groups to work behind closed doors together to agree on the way forward, because Republique, true to itself, will be planning its intimidation..."( SCNC)
Compatriots,
Time for dialogue and negotiation with the oligarchy in Yaounde is over! I have said in many of my books and articles (see http://www.pambazuka.org/democracy-governance/seeds-cameroonian-popular-revolution) that freedom is achieved; not given to the oppressed. The only language that dictators pay heed to is the language of force. The rhetoric about the force of language has not served the ANGLOPHONE CAUSE in Cameroon for decades and should be abandoned outright ! It's time to change the modus operandi. I have followed with rapt attention the unfolding trajectory and momentum of the ongoing strike by Cameroon's Common Law Advocates. I laud the Teachers' Union for the sturdy support they have offered the grieving lawyers. It's now our turn to join the fray with robust material and intellectual support.
Southern Cameroonians must extricate themselves from the claws of the Francophone-led contraption in Yaounde. The political charade is not working and should be dissolved forthwith.I am going to be very blunt here: It's time for Southern Cameroonians to declare their divorce from this unholy marriage code-named La Republique du Cameroun and secede once and for all. We have the numerical strength to form a Republic! Eritreans have offered us a lesson to learn from. The Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic is another case in point. Make no mistake, the Francophone leeches in Cameroon will not surrender without putting up a fierce fight. They are aware that their very survival depends on the natural resources that exist in abundance in Southern Cameroons. But who said popular revolutions are a piece of cake? We have some lessons to learn from revolutionary icons like Reuben um Nyobe, Felix Moumie, Albert Mukong, Nelson Mandela, Patrice Lumumba, Dr. Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, Malcolm X and Thomas Sankara. These are martyrs who believed in the sanity of the cause they fought for. We have to follow in their footsteps.
The position statement written by the leadership of the SCNC is laudable and serves as a viable starting point. But we must to scale up the struggle. To do so, I offer Southern Cameroonian compatriots a blueprint of sorts:
1. STRATEGIC PLANNING
To move this struggle forward to fruition, we need human capital. In other words, we need strategic thinkers. Successful revolutions are not spontaneous acts. Revolutions are premeditated and properly orchestrated events, involving the conjugation of ideas from intellectual think-tanks and the rank and file(see SPEAR OFTHE NATION: UMKHONTO we Sizwe (2012). The secession that we desire will not happen if we continue to function in silos. We must curry support from Cameroonian intellectuals at home and in the diaspora. The difficult part of a revolution is not the boots on the ground component; it is the strategic orchestration of the movement. I don't say this light-heartedly. Experience is the best teacher(See CHE GUEVARA: A REVOLUTIONARY LIFE (1997). Most importantly, Southern Cameroonians must be smart enough to steer clear of the divide and rule antics of the Biya Regime that has ruled us for 34 years by pitting grafis against southwesterners. Anglophone Cameroonians must rise to the occasion and desist from being bought over with crumbs from the master's table. We should put a premium on the role of the diaporan intelligentsia because they have witnessed other effective revolutionary paradigms that remain unknown to home-based revolutionaries.
2. COGNITIVE AND MATERIAL SUPPORT
No revolution has ever succeeded without intellectual and material support. All the abortive revolutions that I have studied have failed on account of the dearth of material resources. Malcolm X echoes this in BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY(1992). Human beings easily lose steam and stamina when subjected to deprivation (food and water). Those of us who are old enough to remember what transpired during the maquisard days of Reuben um Nyobe and ilk would attest to the fact that the maquisards used local populations as a source of food supply. The 1990's Ghost Towns Operations failed partially because our people ran out of steam, to put it figuratively.This means that the success of our current revolution depends on how long revolutionaries can withstand the pangs of hunger and thirst. To ensure that we succeed in the long haul, we must ensure that during the entire duration of the revolution, our people have a means of subsistence. In the run-up to the revolution, it is not unwise to organize community cohorts whose duty would be to educate our people on the positive fall-outs of the revolution as well as the need to horde food products in the long term.
One thing that grassroots organs could do would be to prioritize food crop farming over cash-crop cultivation. During the normalization phase that will follow secession, the trend will be reversed in order to give our people a steady source of cash flow for non-subsistence consumption. The Diaspora has a vital role to play in all this. Those of us who live in the diaspora are privileged in the sense we have the wherewithal to support the revolution intellectually and materially. I call on all Southern Cameroonians living in the diaspora to start Revolutionary Tontines and Njangi houses right now! The purport of these fundraisers would be to ensure that our brothers and sisters who serve as revolutionary foot soldiers never run out of cash! On the home front, we need honest Southern Cameroonians who have a proven sense of integrity to manage these funds collected from the diaspora and channel them toward to the revolution cause.
3. RECOURSE TO ARMED STRUGGLE
The demilitarization of British Southern Cameroons will never transpire without armed struggle. In one of my articles I have called for recourse to armed rebellion in Cameroon (See link: http://www.postnewsline.com/2011/04/time-for-armed-opposition-in-the-republic-of-cameroon.html)
We have tried peaceful means to no avail. It is now time to resort to armed struggle in Cameroon. It is not arms that are in short supply in Cameroon. In fact the country is awash with fire-arms imported clandestinely from the West.
CONCLUSION
I am going to end this article by echoing the sagacious words of late Nelson Mandela who once said: "Dangers and difficulties have not deterred us in the past. They will not frighten us now. But we must be prepared for them like men in business who do not waste energy in vain talk and idle action.”
Mandela was a great man partly because of his willingness to use violence, not in spite of it. Many believe apartheid would have endured much longer if he hadn’t rebelled and overturned the ANC’s long-standing nonviolence policy.
Prof Peter Wuteh Vakunta
United States of America
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