Yaounde, the 13th November 2020
(In The Form Of A Letter To Him),
FROM Senator/Barrister KEMENDE HENRY GAMSEY
Dear Learned Brother, Mr. President, Sir,
What really happened to you after you and I in your Bar office in Yaounde, drew some lessons from the passing-on of your Learned Brother and predecessor, Batonnier SAMA Francis ASANGA. This was after you had consoled me upon joining you at the club of orphans. I had not finished thanking you for the show of solidarity in that regard when you decided to exit the world of the living. One of the lessons we drew from SAMA’s death was that he was late in seeking medical attention and that by the time he seized the hospital, it was already too late. What then happened in your case such that you were rushed to France and died less than three days after? I would want to think that you were overtaken by work to an extent whereby you forgot about some of your supposedly delicate medical dispositions. No, No, Mr. President, you fell into the very trappings we analysed of Batonnier SAMA Francis and it would appear, from the look of things, that nobody is spared that temptation, for all of us most often forget we are made of flesh as opposed to iron, even though iron equally gets weak.
I had often told you personally that since joining us in the Bar Council (after you had stayed off for some time), I never for one minute regretted knowing you. Without waiting to praise you through an eulogy like this, I praised you in your face for your piercing and didactic contributions over every topic under discussion in the Bar Council. Proof of my appreciation of your intellectual wealth is when after specially inviting me for the Elective Bar General Assembly in Douala in 2018 that saw you elected Bar President, I put in all it took for that successful outing. I even supported some of your candidates I would never have supported but for my love for you in particular, and the Cameroon Bar at large, for I had withdrawn my candidature in a bid to concentrate on my debut of the Senate experience. Thereafter, even though I watched you from a distance (i. e. away from the Bar Council), your performance did not the least disappoint me. Until your untimely departure, your second mandate was a foregone conclusion. However, God the Almighty knows why he has called you home just when you were at your best.
Batonnier TCHAKOUTE, permit me hereby inform you of the aftermath of your departure in the life of the Cameroon Bar Association. To tell you how human being make meaning only when alive, shortly after news of your death covered the entire social media and other media landscapes and while the Cameroon Bar was still gripped in an atmosphere of disbelief, who to fill the vacancy created (both in the short and long terms) became the subject of discussion, some openly and others behind the scene. I hope you do not take offence hearing about this, even if it has to do with some of your hitherto closest associates. After all, you are quite conversant with our grassfield tradition that the throne is never left vacant and that meetings by Kingmakers for a new Chief multiply with each passing day. Never mind, for you shall hear more to your disbelief when the first witness shall personally meet you.
Batonnier, to conclude my short story of events after your demise, we are presently feeling what it takes to be professional orphans. You would not want to believe that the Courtroom at Bonanjo – Douala; the official shrine of Justice; the pride and source of the Lawyers’ power; ‘caught fire’ in the night of the 10th December 2020 when your colleagues were teargased and others received bullet wounds. Our bereavement through your passing-on meant nothing to the Forces of Law and Order and the Authorities commanding their actions. The treatment that was earlier meted out to the Common Law Lawyers repeated itself before the Douala – Bonanjo Court of First Instance. From the streets and now into the Courtroom, there is no gainsaying the fact that our professional identification papers and windscreen stickers shall soon have no meaning. God forbid!
Please, Batonnier TCHAKOUTE, intercede for us in order that the good Lord and Most High could save our world-cherished profession. You cannot imagine that everyday everybody in one way or the other, play the role of the Advocate but nobody wants to see the professional Advocate. This can only happen in Cameroon, a country of the ‘jamais vus’. Let this incident not however, worry you a lot since you cannot return to do what you could have done in the circumstances. What I can tell you in order that your spirit can rest in peace is that unless some of us are taken off the scene, we shall not see the worst happen. Faced with the challenge of survival, the Lawyers are expected to sharpen their legal fighting skills, for that remains the only weapon they understand manipulating better. With you, Batonnier SAMA Francis and Batonnier Bernard MUNA on the other side, we are sure to succeed, God being our helper.
Without much ado and in order not to disturb your quiet and deserved rest, permit me end here by wishing you safe journey to the world of no return. We shall live to remember you as the Bar President who made a historic tour of the country in a bid to ensure continuity in the life of the Cameroon Bar Association. We now understand you bid us farewell as you moved from one Court of Appeal to the other, over-seeing the swearing-in of young colleagues.
ADIEU, ADIEU, Most Learned Batonnier, Our Bar President !! You are FOREVER IN OUR HEARTS.
MAY YOUR SOUL REST IN PEACE !!
Yours truly,
Senator/Barrister KEMENDE Henry GAMSEY
Les Gens Du Cameroun
Email: francoeko@gmail.com
Tell: +237671262198 WhatsApp +237691520771
