Letter from Buea to Yaounde

What happened last week? I told you that you and I should not commit the same crime and you turn around and accuse me of it. We are both guilty of failing one another.

Well, I should have written but I was up-country to assist a friend out in some funeral rites. You know we cannot continue pretending, we are Africans and what our parents practised since the beginning of time and has existed all through should not be ignored. Can any of us today with our so called modern ways live as long as your grandfather, Ngwa?

While in town, I put my ear to the ground and heard quite a lot. The word on every lip was that the man bestriding all the three local collectives has embezzled money meant for maintenance of some public infrastructure and other development projects. They talk of a whooping sum of FCFA 350 million that the man has swallowed as if it were okra. The tenants at the three town halls are very bitter against him.

I want to ask you a question. What magic did President Ahidjo have that all projects realised under him were and are long-lasting? Have you been up country lately? All the so-called projects realised in view of 50 years of the armed forces are in a terrible state of disrepair. With all the engineers that we have today, some of them occupying the city hall, it is incongruous that the streets be that bad.

It is the same thing happening here in Gbeya. The streets done for the celebration of Unification are all gone. The one in Bakweri Town is the worst, yet the authorities are only busy collecting money by hook or crook from citizens.

Ngwa, did you read what the one-time Mayor and former MP said about the Senator and the Member of the National Assembly? That the honourable man and woman have done nothing for Fako III! What has he to show when he was himself MP? What did he achieve? Well, maybe he achieved one thing by becoming a mere Councillor after being a Mayor and MP. What a shame?

Must he hate them because his minder hates them? Is he not merely piping the tune that is being dictated by his payer? Is that why he is given the sine cure position of committee head at the city hall? I don’t know whether to ascribe it to mere senility or being just a sheer mendicant.

Mola, wonders shall never end. I hear Teke Julius CRTV Southwest was arrested and detained for recording “without permission” what Prime Minister Yang was saying during his visit to the Southwest for inspection of the AFCON projects. I hear it is the Prime Minister himself who ordered for his detention. However, he was released a couple of hours after.

But I did not know that the reporters working for the indomitable lions of broadcasting can also receive baptism of fire. The only difference is that Julius received his own very late into the profession after practising for long. The main issue is, what was the reason for his arrest and detention? How could he be talking in public and would not want his message to be recorded? Did the PM have something to hide?

I expect to get answers to this question and others from you next week

So long

Mbella