HIJACKING THE GCE BOARD HAS ALWAYS BEEN GOVERNMENT’S AGENDA
I have flirted with the idea of writing about the falling standards of the GCE board for about three years. I was primarily concerned about the sloppiness with which results were handled. For the past two years we have been alarmed by students passing in 21 subjects in the Ordinary Levels, and 7 in the Advance level. In the last session, some students had sulked for weeks for not making it in the examination, only to realize, upon collecting their result slips that they had passed, in some cases, exceptionally. Others whose names had been published in newspapers as having passed somehow failed in the slips. A type of unfettered chaos that completely waters down value for a hard-fought institution which is supposed to embody and safeguard the anglophone educational system.
But that’s not my beef today.
The history of the GCE board, like every stride in the Anglophone existence under the successive Francophone governments, is like a civil rights film pithing a marginalized people against a brutal and repressive system bent on wiping them out or making them smaller. The GCE board is a vestige of that struggle from which Anglophones emerged bloodied as usual.
For a long time, Anglophones complaint about disproportionate integration into professional schools and institutions of higher learning since they were skewed almost exclusively towards the French educational system. It was diagnosed that the key reason for this imbalance, was the lack of corresponding Anglophone sections in schools such as ENAM and ENS.
The government in the typical fashion of prescribing wrong medication decided that it would be better, for the sake of national integration, for the Anglophone educational system to be subsumed and for Anglophones to be preferably trained in French in order to better integrate. This was interpreted, and rightly so, as an attempt to finally wipe out the leftovers of the Anglophone identity. What followed was an epic strike action championed by Anglophone students in the University of Yaounde II and the Teacher’s Association of Cameroon, TAC, which together rallied the English-speaking population into a three-year strike action. The government finally succumbed to the pressure after Anglophone teachers took the bull by the horns, and began operating a GCE board at IPAR in Buea without government authorization. It was one of the few victories that anglophones could savour and take pride in. The government, in a seemingly retaliatory move, created a BACC board for the francophones.
Bottom line is the government did not and has never liked the idea of a GCE board and has sought ways of bringing it down or hamstringing its operational ability or hijacking it and placing under its control. Because anything Anglophone somehow invokes in them an obstinate longing for annihilation. In fact, when the Technical Education Exams was finally included into the text of application of the board, the then Minister of Education, Mbella Mbappe, swore that he would die before the technical exams take roots under the board.
Still dissatisfied the government continued to find ways of hijacking the board. In 1996 the GCE examination was flawed by massive leaks. The government reacted by appointing the late Prof Herbert Endeley to oversee investigations to the cause and perpetrators. It is widely believed that the leaks were government sponsored, seeing as how Prof Endeley recommended that part of the running of the board should be handed to the government, even though he did not find the board culpable in the leakage. Paradox has never been something which this government understands or even avoids. It basks in it.
The GCE board office building was originally designed as an imposing edifice, with ample capacity for the complex operations of the board. In a fascinating twist, complaints emerged from persons within the system, who saw the size and architectural design, yes that too, as an attempt by anglophones to create their own ministry of education. Consequently, the structure was trimmed to a less threatening size, while greatly affecting the boards’ ability to operate properly.
So, the recent presidential decree repealing the statutes of the board and turning it into a parastatal comes as no surprise. It has always been the plan. Of course, it comes with many fears, at the top of which is the appointment of out-of-touch francophones, with the sole responsibility of overseeing the destruction of the last vestige of the Anglophone identity in Cameroon.
Kwo Elonge
2 comments
biyer’s yaounde can do all they want in Ambazonia such as killing, maiming, raping and imprisoning innocent people and creating parastatals. Ambazonia shall have the last laugh and biya shall leave Ambazonia sooner or later. Ambazonia never voted for biya and has nothing to do with him. Let biya continue in his delusion and corruption which will soon destroy him. biya and his cabal shall run but have no place to hide. For every drop of Ambazonian blood shade, biya shall pay for dearly when he turns the guns on francophones and finally on himself.
Those devil in Yaounde thinks they can impress us by this foolishness. With all the demonism, Satanism, stupidity, unimaginable cruelty they have done to us Ambazonians, we are still moving with full force, then what then about this lame duck.
The devil Biya needed no degree to steal the GCE board, all he needed to do is ask us Ambazonians and we will freely give it to him. If all that he and his criminal cartel has stolen is not helping them, how is this going to change them?
We know he is a thieve, a great grandpa that steals more than a breastfeeding infant.
Elections he steals,
Ambazonian resources he steals,
The Money of the people he steals,
The Girlfriend he stole and even murdered the young man,
The GCE Board, he just snatched away
…
A grandpa with stealing in his DNA, not even God can help. I think he gonna steal himself soon. He has a well-established track record. Probably the last second before he passes away, he gonna snatch something from someone.
Disgrace, I don’t know how that grandpa has the courage to walk in front of people on this earth.
One of the hardest days in Gods life is going to be the day God judges Biya. All the raping, genocide, assassinations, stealing, all the innocent mothers, babies, infants, … I don’t think God will be able to handle this from one man.
If Biya gets into heaven there is gonna be some serious problems there. He probably gonna
snatch the virgin Mary first.