Move for Political Transition in Cameroon

“Non Violent Demonstrations should move from the Regions to the Center” -KAH WALLAH 

Kah Wallah is a leading opposition Political figure in Cameroon and National President of the Cameroon People’s Party. She holds an MBA and is an entrepreneur based in Douala though she shuttles the five Continents on the globe. She presently runs her own International Consultation firm and has been doing so for 22 years. After running her business for close to 15 years, she decided that it was very restricting and started working with Civil Society. She was frustrated by the slow pace of development in our society and started working with local communities. She concentrated her efforts on youth and women entrepreneurship. In her ten years in politics she has grown in prominence and has become one of those few political voices listened to by Cameroonians especially in these times of crises. In this interview she proposes a political transition for Cameroon and gives a vivid description on how this can be realised. As a first step towards creating a platform for dialogue she calls for calls for all non-violent demonstrations to leave the regions and converge on the centre. She equally refers to Cameroon as a house with a rotten foundation that needs to be rebuilt. She was interviewed by Francis Ekongang Nzante. She begins by narrating how she took those first steps in politics.

I discovered that the obstacles in Civil Society were the same like those found in the Business world. The main obstacle I noted was basically that of governance so I decided that instead of dancing around the issue I had to jump straight into it. I have always been politically active though I was not a member of any political party and after my studies in the US I came back home in 1989 and you can imagine how hot Cameroon was at the time. I joined the Union for Change and was very close to Chairman Fru Ndi. I was one of the two people who wrote the speech he made in 1992. I had been very close to the SDF and it was but normal that when I decided to join partisan politics in 2007 it was the SDF. But when in 2010 I noticed that the SDF was not actually putting in place the strategies necessary to bring about change I decided to quit the SDF and join the Cameroon Peoples Party CPP on April 30, 2011. 

 Cameroon is in a political cul-de-sac and elites have been putting forth all sorts of proposals. What is the Kah Wallah prescription?

I can’t really call it the Kah Wallah prescription as such since I don’t consider myself a genius. Luckily, I come from a political party where we carry out a lot of analyses and political thinking. We even go out to accommodate other parties and organisations. For the last two years we have been talking about a programme for Political Transition in Cameroon. We are in a house that has a rotten foundation. Cameroon is a house with a rotten foundation. This is what has created the Anglophone problem which has reared its head several times over the last 57 years. Yesterday was also the day that Robert Um Nyobe was assassinated. These are the people that actually fought for the independence of this country but there is not a single monument to remember them for it. This rotten foundation is also at the origin of Boko Haram in our country. Even though Boko Haram came from Nigeria and even though it is extremist, we created fertile ground for it to get installed in Cameroon. It stems from our history which is that of neglecting the Northern part of the country. Every time I visit the North I am always a shamed to believe that’s part of Cameroon. To see people digging sand to be able to have access to drinking water is disgraceful for Cameroon.

What does CPP propose as the best line of action of Cameroon?

 We believe that political transition which will rebuild everything from the foundation is the only way. We cannot just say we are going for elections. We need to stop, bring down this house and then rebuild it from the foundation. Political transition is the answer to everything. It is the answer to the Anglophone Crises, it is the answer to the unresolved political history of Cameroon and the answer for regional development for the East, Far North, North West and South West Regions.  The Biya Regime cannot lead this Political Transition in Cameroon. You cannot be asked to fix a pot of soup that you spoiled. The regime simply has to step aside as we have seen it done in Tunisia, Burkina Fasso and other countries. Then people who are technically apt, morally up right and have shown so through their actions can be brought in around the table. People like Cardinal Tumi , among others like Barrister Agbor Balla and Dr. Fontem who were part of the protest not because they are Anglophones but simply because they believe in justice. These and others from across the country can be brought together for something meaningful to be realised. We must therefore sit across the table and ask ourselves what our identity is and what it means to be a Cameroonian. What are the historical mistakes we made and how do we solve them?

Such deliberations are normally supposed to begin from somewhere considering the deep nature of crises in Cameroon.

 We have to first of all define the nature of the state. What is the nature of the relationship between the citizen and the State? The nature of the American State is very different from that of the German State. The German State believes it has to provide certain services like Health Care, Security at the cost of the state but Americans believe that everybody should pay for their Health Care. It is only when you decide on the nature that you decide on the form. What is clear today is that the Unitary State has failed us. When something has failed it should be changed. We as a political party will bring forth our own proposals to that table which is that Health Care is a right, Employment is a right etc. We will bring to that table our idea of the form of the State.

What form of the state do you propose?

 Ours is a state in which the Region has two things; power and money. Each Region will have the power to take decisions on key developmental issues and the money to execute them.  We should have elected Governors and elected Regional Assemblies. We don’t want to talk about all of that now but it is when we have succeeded to obtain a dialogue platform that we can then put forth these proposals. People keep talking from diverse ranks. Some are for a two state federation, others for secession and all of that but what we should gun for now is a dialogue forum and a level playing ground. If we have two ideas and we don’t agree with each other then we could talk for ever with no outcome. What all Cameroonians have to fight for today is political change. The present regime has to step aside let neutral people step in and create a level field for dialogue. This will help us to rewrite our constitution on the bases of what we have arrived at in the process of the dialogue.

The powers in place are persistently walking away from National Dialogue.

We have to push since it is because the government has not been willing to move towards national dialogue that we find ourselves where we are. We must bring our voices together and demand one thing. We must bring our voices together and present our requests. We can bring our voices together by communicating and acting non-violently together. This can be done by protesting non-violently together. Our non-violent protest is a right that we must exploit. In Stand Up For Cameroon, we are in black every Friday and we have been doing this for a year. We want to see the whole Cameroon in black on Fridays demanding political transition. We want to go for a sit-in in front of the National Assembly, the Presidency and where ever we deem it necessary. We must move our non-violent demonstrations from the Regions to the centre where decisions are taken. If what is happening in the North West and South West was happening in Yaounde I don’t think authorities would have shown such complacency. We must re-think our strategy.

What concise message do you have for Cameroonians?

As Cameroonians, we must stand up for our country. We are going through deep crises in which there are two extremes. On the one hand there is an extremist government arresting people illegally and creating a situation of tension and on the other hand a set of people who believe they can use violence to make others think and see things their way. We strongly believe a majority of Cameroonians find themselves in the middle. We want a   Cameroon in which every person is a first class citizen and not a Cameroon in which some are second class and third class. If that’s the country we want, then we must fight for it. Join Stand Up For Cameroon or the other groups working on the middle ground.

Les Gens Du Cameroun/ Email: francoeko@gmail.com/ Tel:+237696896001/+237678401408