AFRICAphonie AFRICAphonie is a Pan African Association which operates on the premise that AFRICA can only be what AFRICANS and their friends want AFRICA to be.
Bakwerirama Spotlight on Bakweri Society and Culture. The Bakweri are an indigenous African nation.
Bate Besong Bate Besong, award-winning firebrand poet and playwright.
Bernard Fonlon Dr Bernard Fonlon was an extraordinary figure who left a large footprint in Cameroonian intellectual, social and political life.
Fonlon-Nichols Award Website of the Literary Award established to honor the memory of BERNARD FONLON, the great Cameroonian teacher, writer, poet, and philosopher, who passionately defended human rights in an often oppressive political atmosphere.
France Watcher Purpose of this advocacy site: To aggregate all available information about French terror, exploitation and manipulation of Africa
Jacob Nguni Virtuoso guitarist, writer and humorist. Former lead guitarist of Rocafil, led by Prince Nico Mbarga.
Martin Jumbam The refreshingly, unique, incisive and generally hilarous writings about the foibles of African society and politics by former Cameroon Life Magazine columnist Martin Jumbam.
Nowa Omoigui Professor of Medicine and interventional cardiologist, Nowa Omoigui is also one of the foremost experts and scholars on the history of the Nigerian Military and the Nigerian Civil War. This site contains many of his writings and comments on military subjects and history.
Postwatch Magazine A UMI (United Media Incorporated) publication. Specializing in well researched investigative reports, it focuses on the Cameroonian scene, particular issues of interest to the former British Southern Cameroons.
Simon Mol Cameroonian poet, writer, journalist and Human Rights activist living in Warsaw, Poland
Victor Mbarika ICT Weblog Victor Wacham Agwe Mbarika is one of Africa's foremost experts on Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs). Dr. Mbarika's research interests are in the areas of information infrastructure diffusion in developing countries and multimedia learning.
Tunduzi A West African in Arusha at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda on the angst, contradictions and rewards of that process.
Dr Godfrey Tangwa (Gobata) Renaissance man, philosophy professor, actor and newspaper columnist, Godfrey Tangwa aka Rotcod Gobata touches a wide array of subjects. Always entertaining and eminently readable. Visit for frequent updates.
Francis Nyamnjoh Prolific writer, social and political commentator, he was a professor at University of Buea and University of Botswana. Currently he is Head of Publications and Dissemination at CODESRIA in Dakar, Senegal. His writings are socially relevant and engaging even to the non specialist.
Ilongo Sphere: Writer and Poet Novelist and poet Ilongo Fritz Ngalle, long concealed his artist's wings behind the firm exterior of a University administrator and guidance counsellor. No longer. Enjoy his unique poems and glimpses of upcoming novels and short stories.
Scribbles from the Den The award-winning blog of Dibussi Tande, Cameroon's leading blogger.
Enanga's POV Rosemary Ekosso, a Cameroonian novelist and blogger who lives and works in Cambodia.
GEF's Outlook Blog of George Esunge Fominyen, former CRTV journalist and currently Coordinator of the Multi-Media Editorial Unit of the PANOS Institute West Africa (PIWA) in Dakar, Senegal.
The Chia Report The incisive commentary of Chicago-based former CRTV journalist Chia Innocent
Voice Of The Oppressed Stephen Neba-Fuh is a political and social critic, human rights activist and poet who lives in Norway.
Bate Besong Bate Besong, award-winning firebrand poet and playwright.
Bakwerirama Spotlight on the Bakweri Society and Culture. The Bakweri are an indigenous African nation.
Fonlon-Nichols Award Website of the Literary Award established to honor the memory of BERNARD FONLON, the great Cameroonian teacher, writer, poet, and philosopher, who passionately defended human rights in an often oppressive political atmosphere.
Bernard Fonlon Dr Bernard Fonlon was an extraordinary figure who left a large footprint in Cameroonian intellectual, social and political life.
AFRICAphonie AFRICAphonie is a Pan African Association which operates on the premise that AFRICA can only be what AFRICANS and their friends want AFRICA to be.
Canute - Chronicles from the Heartland Professional translator, freelance writer and a regular contributor to THE POST newspaper. Lives in Douala, Cameroon
At almost every funeral that I can remember attending, there has been at least one person whose eulogy has been a reminder that “we are here to celebrate the life of …” I know I said it at my mother’s passing in December 2000.
But this statement, which evokes fond memories of our loved one, has also not prohibited me from wondering ever so often whether those of us from the developing world, particularly Africa, are not exaggeratedly misplacing priorities by how much is spent and sacrificed for the dead over the living. I am wondering how much we are spending when our loved one is sick and dying on a hospital bed or at home? Is that cost more than or less than the funeral costs?
By Innocent Chia It costs a minimum $12,000 (6 million CFA frs) to transport a corpse from the United States to Cameroon. The majority of Cameroonians who are neither home owners nor car owners list the death of a loved one in America as their largest single expenditure - other than a trip to the emergency room…. But that may be over now. An association has come to the rescue with a scheme where members spend a maximum of $15.00 and the corpse is taken all the way to the village in Cameroon.
If anyone had lingering doubts about Obama's inaugural promise to unclinch the fists of dictators across Africa, he served another reminder in a pre-taped interview on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. The spate of dictatorships that have crumbled within the last 10 months - Ben Ali of Tunisia, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Muammar Gaddafi of Libya - provides more than a sneak-preview of prevailing anxieties in surviving dictatorships - Paul Biya of Cameroon and Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea.
While Cameroon's CPDM has uncharacteristically not celebrated its "People's choice" "victory" from the elections of October 9th, Obiang is beginning to feel some ground shifting from underneath...If the dictator will not crumble on his own, his collaborators do not have the same security in the respective villages and neighborhoods... If the collaborators crumble, the dictator cannot replace them fast enough... The Obama doctrine is that there is no safe haven for dictators, their kids or collaborators...at home in Cameroon or abroad in the US!
By Innocent Chia When the UN authorized Military Action against Libya’s Muammar Kaddafi over 7 months ago on March 17, 2011 there was fierce opposition to yet “another Western invasion of an African and Muslim country”- (my paraphrase). African proponents of this anti-Western rhetoric viewed it in black and white terms – the invasion was all about Libyan oil and little to do with the freedom of Libyan people. With reports confirming the killing of Kaddafi in his home town of Sirte, there is much to consider about the claims that only the West wanted Kaddafi gone. But today, The Chia Report makes the argument that when African leaders begin respecting the wisdom of limited terms in office, it will guarantee Africa and Africans the beginning of truly fair treatment from peers and the rest of the World.
By Innocent Chia Beyond midway from voting on Sunday, October 9, 2011 and next Sunday, October 23 when results of Cameroon’s Presidential elections are expected, credit has to be given to the Biya rigging machine – in cahoots with the non-descript and hollow ELECAM – for the wholesale bribery of opposition leaders. The scheme that advanced 50 percent of campaign funds before elections, and a promissory note to pay the other half post electorally, not only pinched most of the already cash-strapped opposition; it guaranteed a staying power for the mendicant and sucked the oxygen out of any pipedreams for a united opposition front. But the greatest coup yet by the Biya camp may be the messianic victories that he is getting, thanks to simulated citizens like Lady Kate Njeuma, from the recently enfranchised and controversial Diaspora.
Equities in the US are on track for their worse quarter since 2008 even as many investors fear that economic data from China and Europe is pointing toward a global slowdown. My focus in this article is on the current financial nightmare in Europe that is the catalyst of the current bearishness, and more importantly the potential short and long-term consequences to African economies regardless of the fix.
Dr Mal Fobi’s much coveted endorsement has been won by Kah Walla, Presidential candidate at the upcoming October 9th elections in Cameroon. In the shell shocking move particularly rebuking of erstwhile Cameroon opposition front leader, Ni John Fru Ndi - said to be mimicking President Biya’s every move to eternalize himself at the head of the party and the nation – the US and world renown surgeon touts Kah Walla as a "tool for Devine Intervention" by which Cameroon will be spared of the Arab spring bloodbath.
It is not only an endorsement that revitalizes a campaign that many see as doomed to fail on the merits of geopolitics and limited knowledge of the candidate outside her stronghold of Douala and a couple other cosmopolitan areas. The campaign is in dire need of financial support, a boon that the California based Dr. MAL Fobi brought to the SDF in 1992. Even more than inviting the rest of the Cameroon Diaspora, and possibly some Hollywood heavy-hitters, to support financially and otherwise, the endorsement also turns the lights on President Paul Biya’s charade as much as on Kah Walla and the Cameroon People’s Party to deliver.
Robert Ndifor Tamukong has been ushered in as the new President of Minnesota Cameroonians following elections on Saturday August 13, 20011 at 5801 John Martins Dr in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota. Winning over 60 percent of the vote of registered MINCAM members, the incoming President acknowledged his rival and pioneer outgoing President, Esq. Michael Fondungallah and his team for their vision and leadership over the last three years. Beyond the acknowledgement however, concerned Cameroonians within proximity that have been monitoring the otherwise remote election heaved a sigh of relief when the incoming President extended an olive branch to the outgoing team. Both campaign teams were accusing each other of crossing over the fine line of political civility and linguistic probity on the last stretch of the campaign.
In the first open election of its three year history, an acrimonious rift is engulfing members of the association of Cameroonians in Minnesota (MINCAM) who are expressing loyalties to two main rival teams. At best, there is a discussion going on as to the needs of Cameroonians in Minnesota and what it takes to meet those needs.
At worst, and currently overshadowing the best, there has been overzealousness by some within the campaign teams to capitalize and win sympathies through fueling fires along ethnic divisions and tensions against the elections that take place on 8/13/2011. But tonight, esteemed Cameroon journalist Eric Chinje will be having a town hall type meeeting with members of MINCAM on the eve of their elections.
By Innocent Chia, first published in Dunia Magazine print – issue 4
Arnold Schwarzenegger’s love-child affair has sent reverberations the world over not only because it happened right under the nose of wife Maria Shriver with a trusted maid of over 20 years, but also because the drama highlights a contemporary challenge for spouses – babysitting and housekeeping. Far from the melodrama in Hollywood, almost every family with kids in America confronts the difficult choices of finding affordable childcare for the family. Within immigrant communities the challenge of affordability is often compounded by nostalgic cultural affinities.
An extrapolation from the latest British Medical Journal, the Lancet, indicates that diabetes is on par to be the leading killing disease among Cameroonian women. According to the study that spans almost three decades, from 1980-2008, there has been a 60% increase in the prevalence of diabetes in the Cameroon female population. Compare this number to the 15-30 % increase during the identical timeframe among the male population. In the following piece, Hinsley Njila speaks his heart through his mind, imploring the government and Cameroon media to spring to live before the clock runs out of the ticking timebomb. The call for a sense of urgency stifles popular cliches that "Black men love their women fat".
Summer time in North America is Convention Season for most every immigrant group - ethnic, alma maters and professional organizations alike. Indeed, because of these conventions there is an inordinate number of immigrants who plan their annual vacation time to coincide with these events that typically alternate from State to State, depending on the ability and willingness of the local chapters to host. And so it is that former students of the all female secondary school located in Cameroon's Northwest Regional city of Bamenda, Our Lady of Lourdes College, are meeting in the midwest brewing Capital of Milwaukee, Wisconsin to celebrate and refocus following a year of serious hot flashes... Meantime, proud sons and daughters of Kom - village of the renown Afoakom - will not only be showing off juju styles in Minneapolis-Minnesota...
By Hinsley Njila for The Chia Report In the increasingly growing and, in my opinion, critically important relationship between Africa and China, Africa is by far the loser on almost any bilateral indicator you may want to examine. Of course I’m willing to concede that there are some very smart people who look at the same data like me and point to a slightly different conclusion that benefits Africa; for instance the fact that China currently has a trade deficit with Africa, and that China presents an almost friction-free marketplace for African goods that would otherwise be unavailable are two of the most often talked about reasons.
Regardless of this honest difference in opinion, there’s overwhelming agreement that Africa will benefit many folds if a little leverage was exercised. In this piece, I take you through a fact finding journey talking to some powerful Chinese businessmen, and I offer a few experienced-based insights for African businesses and governments to exploit.
Since I authored a piece in The Chia Report a few weeks ago there have been a significant outpouring of commentaries and expectations. I essentially drew two conclusions from all the commentaries I received. The first is an expressed need for immediate action that will bring change to Cameroon.The second point I deduced is that people are yearning for a decisive strategy that will lead to eventual change. This follow up is intended to call on every Cameroonian to join the dialogue and take action that will bring positive change to Cameroon. We are no longer entitled to stand by as idle spectators while others make decisions that define who we are and where we are headed.
MyGlobalPay, Ltd, a subsidiary of Chartered Diversified Holdings Limited Liability Company, and TreasureCom Financial Holdings, Inc. (TreasureCom) announced (4/4/11) that MyGlobalPay will become the exclusive representative of TreasureCom in Africa. MyGlobalPay acquired exclusive representation rights in Africa after purchasing TreasureCom’s licenses previously issued to two other African companies based in Cameroon and Kenya. In addition to reaching separate agreements with these companies, MyGlobalPay then sought rights to represent TreasureCom throughout the African continent.
By Innocent Chia - Courtesy Dunia Magazine – issue 3(Feb – May 2011)
I cannot remember thinking much about why my parents named me Innocent until I was an old twenty nine year old man in grad school in Madison, Wisconsin. One of my professors was certain – as if he knew something that I did not – that it was not by happenstance that I had been given the name. I decided that I wanted to know whether there was a story behind it, and if there was a story, what was it? Why did my parents name me Innocent? In fact, why are you called Grace or Nicoline, Valentine or Paul, Alice or Prudence, George or Kolkman, Eva or Albert, Angel or Kenneth, Laura or Simon …?
I was at a wake over the weekend. A friend lost the mother and the community was visiting with his family to express condolences and support. As it generally happens at these events, solemn conversation and prayer eventually turned into animated discussions about the political theater that has been unfolding in the Middle East, culminating as it were in the “No fly Zone” resolution at the UN Security Council and its enforcement largely by the British, French and American tripartite. While there was no disputing the brutality and savage cruelty of Gaddafi’s regime vis a vis Libyans, I was surprised by the readiness of some to defend a self-conceited bully who has referred to fellow citizens as “rats and dogs” for denying the magnanimity of a “beloved despot”. I have been asking myself why many oppressors across the world, including miscreants like Gaddafi and Paul Biya of Cameroon, invariably get sympathies from the very ones they oppress. This concern is more often than not encapsulated in the following question: who will fill the vacuum (after Biya/Gaddafi…)? My all time favorite is “what next”?
In an amateur video shoot circulating on Cameroon cyber groups, Cameroon’s Ambassador to the United States, Joseph Bienvenue Charles Foe-Atangana has been inviting Cameroonians in and around the D.C metropolis to a cultural evening at a popular Cameroon joint on Friday night, March 18th, 2011. The video of talking-heads predominantly features traditional chiefs - supposedly custodians of the culture and traditions – of villages mostly from the grass field regions of Cameroon.
As a son whose early childhood was squarely steeped in my Kom culture, traditions and history, the mockery of seeing people who are, otherwise, no more than palace guards introduce themselves as chiefs in America speaks volumes about the extent to which the government has compromised the authority of real traditional rulers in Cameroon to effect its divide and rule policy.
As Cameroon's veteran journalist, Henriette Ekwe Ebongo earned her time in the spotlight (March 8th) at the 2011 Women of Courage Awards ceremony at the US State Department - presided over by First lady Michelle Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton - I could not help but think of it as a bitter sweet moment for her.
The award crowns her personal dedication, often at the risk of her life, to a profession that has given her license to stand up for the oppressed and stand up to the oppressor. Even while on US soil for the Awards, stories of threats to her life have been pervasive within the Cameroon online community...springing back memories of Pius Njawe, another Cameroonian voice for the disenfranchised, whose untimely death on a US highway nine months ago was anything but accidental.
Reports trickling in from Cameroon confirm that Cameroon O'bosso leader and 2011 Presidential candidate, Kah Walla has been hospitalized with major injuries following confrontations at which the military is pummelling and dispersing protest marchers with lightening speed across Douala, arterial towns and combustible Regions. Other leaders, including Nitcheu and Mbuoa Massock - arguably the most visible co-sponsors of the protest marches against the 28 year old regime of President Biya – were arrested by forces of the Special Intervention Brigade (BIR) and later dropped off several miles in the bushes away from the city of Douala.The Cameroon Minister of Communication, meantime, has been on an all out offensive a la Muammar Gaddafi, accusing Cameroonians in the Diaspora of using social media websites to sow discord at home while hiding abroad.
Innocent Chia
Citizen Journalist
Email: innochia@gmail.com
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