CAMEROON INTERNET
A few dates
1996 internet began to be regularly mentioned in the speeches of Cameroonian officials . The project to bring the network of networks in Cameroon mentions a dull battle between three large state structures, namely the Polytechnic of Yaounde, National Informatics Centre (Cenadi) and Intelcam (International Telecommunications Company ), for the management point cm (Cameroon). Intelcam is chosen, which becomes CAMTEL (Cameroon Telecommunications) three years later .
February 1997 Cameroonian Prime Minister Peter Mafany Musonge inaugurates cm node in Yaoundé. We discovers the internet arrives in Cameroon with an American firm, ATT (http://www.att.com/).
September 1997 the first private cafe moved to Douala, the Web café , the work of a Cameroonian engineer residing in the United States.March 1999 a private operator, Jean Adolphe Ngangué Nseke, installs its own antenna in Douala, with the help of Canadians.
April 1999 Cameroon signed an agreement with Teleglobe (http://www.teleglobe.ca/), a Canadian company, which installs a second channel of arrival of the internet in the country in Douala. The people of the economic capital grow a sigh of relief, those who were forced to go through Yaoundé, with what it entails technical difficulties. The internet takes off in Douala.
Weaknesses
The real problem with the internet was technically. Among general problems relating to internet infrastructures, Cameroon specifically faced some major problems: The poor quality of telephone lines and failure were the main difficulties for Cameroon. When it rained water entered the telephone cables causing crackling and constant interruptions on the network .
The age of the telephone network made it difficult to dial- up and thus complicated the data transmission. But the issue was gradually solved, and the cuts became few and far in bewteen. Many experts at that time were convinced, however, that the internet would make satisfaction to the users if the Cameroonian State renews telecommunications network in the country.
Other weaknesses include;
- Poor telephone lines, though tremendous efforts are being made to improve underground lines, mostly in big towns
- Lack of more qualified technicians to run TCP/IP networks, despite the enormous effort made by the Ministry of Higher Education and other governmental organizations
- The inadaptability of modems (even when highly sophisticated) to existing computers and software, for example Windows 95 when relating to the PC environment
- The difficulty the average African has in affording a computer, subscribing for a telephone, or having access to information about the Internet
Solutions
With the assistance of some European partners, Cameroon has implemented an Ethernet fiber optic university campus network. This is aimed at training some 150 highly qualified engineers in UNIX and LAN within the next five years.The University Network has access to Internet (e-mail services only), although the flow has up to now been limited to 9.6 kilobytes per second (kbps).
Some 25 private organizations are already using the facilities of this network to communicate with their various headquarters and partners. The many diverse computers, modems, and software used by the clients have resulted in the design of a database by system administrators in order to rapidly solve the problems of matching equipment, peripherals, and software.
Until 1992, Cameroon still used the traditional media devices - press, radio, television - based on the star model. A center speaks to isolated receivers who constitute a passive community. There was also the telephone network, on which one can communicate only one-on-one. What is new in the interconnection of microcomputers is the wonderful possibility offered to all to speak with all.
From the conceptual point of view, it is a varied and moving space which each contributes to build, and on which each can find his place. Levy thinks that with the Internet network, any user takes part in a cooperative construction of a common context. What is new here is to be able to speak freely, without an intermediary, to a vast international public without anybody deciding for you what is important and what is not.
It is owing to this philosophy that ENSP, technological pole of excellence in the central African subregion, has taken upon itself for some years to host and administer E-mail servers.
