Our New Name
I have recently defined my destiny and spelt it its proper name. The brutal thought comes and quickens the desire to want to free yourself from their contemptible yoke. It comes from the tremors of learning that the country where your native land is found and the land you owe your being and name has not in its whole structure of actuality fashioned any space for you.
One of the key qualities of sovereignty is the ability to spell your proper name, to tell your own story and decide your destiny. We traded our true name and took over something that caged us for 56 years. They did to us what Tortoise once did to other animals in the legendary story our old parents used to tell us around the fireside. It is the story of Tortoise and the Birds. The birds are invited for a great banquet in the Sky and Tortoise their friend convinces them to take him along. They first hesitated because they know how cunning, untrustworthy and covetous their friend the Tortoise is. Tortoise convinces them that he is a changed person, a born-again Tortoise. So the birds accept and decide to donate a feather each to help the Tortoise join them in the flight to the feast. They further fall for the Tortoise’s tale that it is a good thing to change names for such an important banquet. They birds have never heard such a thing, but see it as a wonderful idea. Each one takes a name. The birds carry very boastful and glorious names like ‘the elephant’, ‘queen of peace’, ‘Daughter of Zion’, ‘Star of the Sea’ etc. The tortoise declares his own name. It looks a very strange and unattractive name. He says he would like to be called during the party ‘You all’. The birds give it a laugh and congratulate themselves for taking such a comedian for a pleasure trip. When they arrive the venue of the feast in the Sky, and the people of the Sky present assorted dishes for the feast, he tortoise jumps up and asks the host: “who is this feast intended for?”“You all of course”, replies the hosts. “You heard them,” says Tortoise to the birds. “the Feast is for me. My name is ‘You All’.
We are told the birds took their revenge by taking back their feathers and leaving the Tortoise high and dry in the Sky. But that does nothing to satisfy their hunger as they get back to the earth hungry.
The lesson, on our struggle, is clear: never again should we take a false name as we did during the 1961 and 1972, even when taking them in playfulness among ‘friends’ and ‘brothers’.
Just like a plant must have the soil from which it grows, so also a culture must have a political framework within which it grows.
The destruction of the English State of West Cameroon in 1972 by LRC was therefore a destruction of the political framework within which an English culture could grow in Cameroon. Given the hostile attitude of the French imperialists towards Anglo-Saxon culture in Cameroon these past 56 years of the so-called Cameroon Reunification, it is clear that English culture in Cameroon is completely dead. And nobody can ever accept a political arrangement which leads to its own sterility or death.
As I see it, the independence of the British Southern Cameroons is an urgent necessity today.
It is surprising that the other members of the British Commonwealth Organization could accept a political arrangement which leads to the death of English culture in any part of the world. Conclusively, the membership of LRC in the Commonwealth should be terminated because she cannot be bent on the destruction of English culture in Cameroon and still lay claim to its membership of the Commonwealth. For where are the English examinations today in Cameroon? Where is the City and Guilds? Where is the London Chamber of Commerce? Where are the RSA stages One and Two? The other members of the British Commonwealth should follow the example of South Africa which now houses the Southern Cameroons Broadcasting Corporation (SCBC) and press for the independence of the British Cameroons.
Father Gerald Jumbam
Kumbo Diocesan Priest
To be continued
