The recent scene, wherein, Paul Atanga Nji, Ambazonian slave to La Republique du Cameroun (LRC), is sharing the peace plant, may just be a prologue in an unfolding melodrama. Many optimists see his recent visit to the Northern and Southern Zones as one that looms large like a balm on the restive crisis.

Some hallelujah singers have even mooted that the visit could be the be-all and end-all of the crisis. But, let us face the truth here! Can someone who denied the existence of a problem solve it just by sharing peace plants in Bamenda, Batibo, Kumba and Buea?

If the answer to this question is “yes”, then, someone is hurling a huge insult on the intelligence of Ambazonians. Yes! Someone is mistaking Southern Cameroonians for simpletons with hard holes in their brains. Again, someone is saying that Ambazonians dangerously lack the tenacity of memory.

These same peace plants sent hundreds of Ambazonians to the grave on September 22 and October 1, 2017. It should be recalled that over 5 million Ambazonians took to the streets on September 22 and October 1, 2017, holding peace plants and chanting freedom songs. LRC forces retaliated by killing hundreds of them, with this same Atanga Nji and other Beti cohorts, brandishing them as terrorists.

How can Atanga Nji, who continues to hold his ideological fort to the effect that there is no Anglophone problem, beckon the people aboard the ship of a solution to the problem? Was it only the Minister in Atanga Nji that was talking while the real Atanga Nji was away?

If Atanga Nji wants to go back to his people like the prodigal son cum born-again who now believes in the Anglophone Problem, let him tell us. By denying the existence of the problem, Atanga Nji had committed a political blasphemy of the most primitive type. Does his call on the people to embrace peace now mean that he has exonerated himself from that falsehood incubus?

Let truth be told here: that the waters of a thousand rivers cannot wash Atanga Nji clean from the self-inflicted curse. His mea-culpa should be preceded by an apology to the Ambazonian citizens of this country who were badly hurt by his brutal cant. That is the chronological sequence he must follow in order to prove to the world that he is not just a pretender to the due process of peace. Atanga Nji should know that he cannot get salvation from his people without carrying his cross of apology to them. He must do that to prove that he is a leader with a visionary clarity to put things in order.

If he does the right thing, posterity will hail him for taking sides with the truth after a show of soap box cant and chicanery. That is the only way he could stop that betraying denial from appearing and re-appearing like a bad coin in the market. For, history is that surreptitious catalyst that has its riddling hand in the plot of every story.

It was this denial that motivated LRC to choose to war-war instead of talk-talk with all the Anglophone activists. It was this fallacious claim that caused the army to descend with medieval barbarism on the people of the Northwest and Southwest Regions who were only asking for fair treatment in the republic.

Instead of hitting the issues of the Anglophone Problem on the head, LRC rather made the two Regions a conquered territory where the national army virtually became an army of occupation. Extrajudicial killings, torture, rape and arson agogo!

From every indication, the establishment word-benders rigged the semantic aura of the Anglophone Problem by equating it to secession. No! The overwhelming majority of Ambazonians believe in living together in separation. Nonetheless, living together can only be sanctioned by mutual understanding and tolerance. It cannot come through any act of coercion or military brutality.

The hearts of many Anglophones who still believed in the unitary State are bleeding with pain and venom. They have been tortured, their children killed and their houses burnt. All sorts of opportunists have taken advantage to kill some military and security elements and kidnap Government officials. This gun and bullet army of desperate robbers has just exploited the fact that our soldiers are not people-friendly. Otherwise, the people would have been collaborating with the military and security operatives to nab all those who have taken advantage of the crisis to seek to impose their agenda on the nation.

LRC should stop believing that Ambazonians are cowards, who can always capitulate under the threat of the whip and the lash. Rather, our citizens easily surrender under the threat of dialogue, appeasement and reconciliation than anything else. Thus, it can only be suicidal for Government to continue to detain people for voicing opinions that did not put a smile on the faces of the powers-that-be.

Atanga Nji’s meeting with motorcycle (bendskin) riders in Kumba revealed the effervescence of love-hate ambivalence whose smack came before the smile. It was a rape on procedure, because, the smile usually comes before the smack in conventional political etiquettes. Atanga Nji’s first administrative injunction on bendskins in certain towns was counterproductive. He slapped that avoidable bloomer on that situation without weighing the stakes. In his youthful Ministerial exuberance, he acted before he reasoned.

Atanga Nji ought to know more than anyone else how much of a security risk the bendskin riders pose when forcefully put in limbo.

Let it be known to the world that, Paul Biya is no way close to initiating dialogue. He keeps on sending “agent provocateurs” to carryout selective appeasement meetings, hence, creating more disgruntlement in the minds of Ambazonians.

One thing is clear, Ambazonians shall continue to fight until they free their land from the colonial occupiers. Just as September 22, and October 1, 2017, Ambazonians shall remain resolute in cleaning their land bringing back the lost glory of Ambaland.

By Lucan Muma,

Managing Editor – BaretaNews