God the Politician

Peterkins Manyong

Description

God the Politician is a compelling analytical, critical, informed and largely eyewitness account of the major events that have taken place in Cameroon since the return of multiparty politics in the 1990s. The accession of Paul Biya to power under the one-party regime in 1982 and the attempt to overthrow him in a coup d'?tat in 1984 are told in flashback, so are the excesses of power without responsibility that have come to be associated with over 25 years of Biya as President. Most of the story is centred on the struggle by the opposition, led by the Social Democratic Front (SDF), to overthrow the incumbent. In his determination to crush opposition, President Biya and his collaborators have sometimes used intrigue, but mostly force and callous indifference to basic human rights and to democracy. Bloodshed has often been the result of the regime's titanic struggles against freedoms. President Paul Biya is not in a hurry to go and so instead of democratizing Cameroon, he has chosen to Cameroonize democracy, turning electoral fraud into an art. Because of massive fraud during elections and the inability of the opposition to unite, political party leaders have decided to join him who they cannot beat. The book is an x-ray of a regime and the Frankenstein monsters it has created and sustained to thwart democracy. It exposes the corruption, electoral fraud, human rights abuse and cynicism that make politicians believe they can play God in the lives of Cameroonians.

Sujets

• Politique
• History

Informations

• Publié par: Langaa RPCIG
• Date de parution: 15 mai 2008
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9789956715787
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 11 Mo

Extrait

The accession of Paul Biya

GOD THE POLITICIAN

Peterkins Manyong

Other Titles byL an gaaRPCIG Francis B Nyamnjoh Stories from Abakwa Mind Searching The Disillusioned African The Convert Souls Forgotten Dibussi Tande No Turning Back. Poems of Freedom 1990-1993 Kangsen Feka Wakai Fragmented Melodies Ntemfac Ofege Namondo. Child of the Water Spirits Emmanuel Fru Doh Not Yet Damascus The Fire Within Thomas Jing Tale of an African Woman Peter Wuteh Vakunta Grassfields Stories from Cameroon Ba'bila Mutia Coils of Mortal Flesh Kehbuma Langmia Titabet and The Takumbeng Ngessimo Mathe Mutaka Building Capacity: Using TEFL and African languages as development-oriented literacy tools Milton Krieger Cameroon's Social Democratic Front: Its History and Prospects as an Opposition Political party, 1990-2011 Sammy Oke Akombi The Raped Amulet The Woman Who Ate Python Susan Nkwentie Nde Precipice Francis B Nyamnjoh & Richard Fonteh Akum The Cameroon GCE Crisis: A Test of Anglophone Solidarity Joyce Ashuntantang & Dibussi Tande Their Champagne Party Will End! Poems in Honor of Bate Besong

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GOD the Politician Peterkins Manyong LangaaResearch & Publishing CIG Mankon, Bamenda

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Publisher: LangaaRPCIG (LangaaResearch & Publishing Common Initiative Group) P.O. Box 902 Mankon Bamenda North West Province Cameroon [e-mail] http://www.africanbookscollective.com/publishers/langaa-rpcig ISBN:9956-558-96-6

© Peterkins Manyong 2008 First Published 2008

DISCLAIMER All views expressed in this publication are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Langaa RPCIG.

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Content Introduction 1.Birth of a Political Messiah 2.Unwise Men from the East 3.Murdering the ‘Insurgents’ 4.The Ndu Genocide 5.Electors and Cheaters 6.Sacrificial Lambs and Wolves 7.Particulars of a State of Emergency 8.Patriots and Gangsters 9.Recollections of a Faked Coup Plot 10.Constitutional Acrobats and the Anglophone Problem 11.Home-Bred Terrorists 12.State Prosecutors 13.Released Terror Suspects Narrate Harrowing Tales 14.Electoral Gymnastics and the Military Option 15.Tribute To Machiavelli 16.The Law of Karma 17.The Cardinal, Politicians and State Terror 18.Spiritual Democracy 19.Power and the Man 20.Bloody Universities 21.Hunter Hunted 22.The Phenomenon Called Baba Danpullo 23.A Magician at the Presidency 24.The Role of the Church in Cameroon Politics 25.Postscript

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Introduction his book consists of 24 chapters in which the author covers a T variety of issues on blood and terror in Cameroonian democracy. Titled ‘A Political Messiah is Born’, Chapter One recounts the launch of the SDF on 26 May 1990 in Bamenda, the capital of the North West Province of Cameroon. In a desperate attempt to prevent it, six youth were shot dead during Fru Ndi’s speech to launch the party in which he called on fellow Cameroonians to stand up and shake off what he saw as the yoke of dictatorship imposed on them by the Biya regime. Chapter Two on ‘Unwise Men from the East’ recounts the attempts by the Biya regime first to bribe and then to intimidate Fru Ndi and force him escape to Nigeria but these attempts instead drew national and international attention and sympathy for him. Chapter Three, titled ‘Murdering the Insurgents’, recounts the fierce political battles between Biya and the CPDM on the one hand and the opposition on the other. The opposition formed an alliance called the National Coordination of Opposition Parties and Associations and launched ‘Operation Ghost Town’ and civil disobedience campaigns that paralyzed economic activities in nearly three-quarters of the country. Biya retaliated by dispatching security operatives to engage in taxi driving and intimidation to break the operation. This is followed by a discussion on the Ndu Genocide in Chapter Four, which recounts how gendarmes invaded the opposition stronghold of the Ndu, massacred the people and raped women. They were acting on the instructions of the ruling party’s barons and the administration. Called ‘Electors and Cheaters’ Chapter Five recounts how the 1992 presidential elections were won by Fru Ndi, but the Supreme Court said it was not given the power to cancel the results. Chapter Six deals with the post-election violence that resulted in the killing of a political party leader and the massive destruction of homes belonging to supporters of the ruling party in the Northwest. Chapter Seven discusses what happened during the state of emergency imposed in the North West Province following the 1992 elections, putting Ni John Fru Ndi of the Social Democratic Front under house arrest and the killing and rape of opposition supporters. Chapter Eight discusses ‘Patriots and Gangsters’ and narrates how Fru Ndi and his supporters staged demonstrations to recover his ‘stolen’ election victory and how this led to clashes with gendarmes and the killing of two SDF vanguards. At the

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same time, armed robbers targeted French installations in Bamenda. In ‘Recollections of a Faked Coup’, Chapter Nine recalls the 1984 coup attempt on 6 April against Biya, how it was crushed and the reprisals that followed. Chapter Ten titled ‘Constitutional Acrobats’ shows how Biya announced a constitutional conference but then manipulated it in such a way that the opposition boycotted it and Anglophones became angry and held a conference in Buea, the headquarters of their former government. The fight for an autonomous board for Anglophone exams began and was accomplished in the period when the constitutional conference was being held. Chapter Eleven called ‘Home Bred Terrorist’ narrates the story of how a gang of supposed brigands launched and sustained a hit-and-run attack for three consecutive days on military installations in the north. Stations were targeted, more than ten people were killed and a dusk-to-dawn curfew was imposed on the province. Chapter Twelve titled ‘State Persecutors’ recounts the trial of the supposed terrorists in which the Francophone judges who were involved in it were more persecutors than prosecutors. Chapter Thirteen ‘Terror Suspects Narrate Harrowing Tales’ is an account of the torture and rape of the Anglophone terror suspects while they were in detention. Chapter Fourteen deals with ‘Electoral Gymnastics and the Military Option’ and recounts how the SDF planned a military offensive but later dropped the idea. Chapter Fifteen ‘Tribute to Machiavelli’ recounts the beating up of a Fru Ndi challenger who wanted to hold a convention because the party and its chairman were not doing things the right way. Chapter Sixteen ‘The Law of Karma’ focuses on Fru Ndi’s illness which many, including the chairman, attributed to poison and how after his recovery he authorized the brutalization of some of his opponents. Chapter Seventeen called ‘The Cardinal Political Parties and State Terror’ throws light on the activities of the Operational Command, a squad created to fight banditry in Douala, Cameroon’s political capital, but which ended up being used to settle scores. Chapter Eighteen, ‘Spiritual Democracy’, comments on the activities of the national elections observatory created by President Biya to supervise and control elections. Ntumfor Nico Halle, the Northwest representative was exemplary in controlling the election. Chapter Nineteen titled ‘Power and the Man’ dwells on the power struggle between Fru Ndi and some top party officials that led to the death of an innocent man. Chapter Twenty titled ‘Bloody Universities’ focuses on the strikes and killings that rocked Cameroon universities, especially that in Buea. Chapter Twenty One titled ‘Hunter Hunted’ narrates the brutal killing by Fon Doh, a CPDM baron of an SDF district chairman and how the culprit and accomplices were tried and jailed. Chapter Twenty Two

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‘The Phenomenon called Baba Danpullo’ recounts the activities of a rich political baron who oppressed the Mbororo, a minority tribe with the backing of local government officials. Chapter Twenty Three is a portrait of President Biya, a political magician who manipulates even Western nations. And finally Chapter Twenty Four examines the role of the church in Cameroon politics. “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly and prescribing the wrong remedy”Ernest Benn

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