I Beg Your Pardon Again

By Vincent N. Feko

The 6.30 BBC news this morning (8 October,2008),reported that some 30 Southern Camer-
oons National Council ( SCNC ) members had spent their second night in the Tiko Police cell
following their arrest when a combined detachment of Police.Gendarme, and the Army swooped
on them, afternoon, October 6th 2008 in Mutengene; a rapidly growing township on the out-
skirts of Tiko, South West Province, one of the two provinces, that resulted from La Republique
du Cameroun’s mutilation of Southern Cameroons.

Reporting from Yaounde, the BBC correspondent, Randy Joe said, among those arrested was
Chief Ayamba, SCNC Chairman, who has recently returned from a long tour of Europe and was
holding a meeting with his members when the Forces of Law and Order swooped on them. Ac-
cording to Randy Joe, the SCNC is advocating for a separate state of Southern Cameroons which
reunited with la Republique du Cameroun in 1961.He said the separatists complain that they are
marginalized and treated as second class citizens.

I would have had no bone to pick with the reporter had his use of the word “reunited” not elicited
my reaction. In the first place,the Plebiscite of 11th February,1961, the bridge by which it is al-
leged brought Southern Cameroons and la Republique du Cameroun (LRC) together, was
predicated on the word “ Joining” and not “Rejoining.” Just to freshen memories, the plebiscite
questions to British Cameroons (Southern and Northern Cameroons-jointly) were, “ Do you
want to achieve independence by joining the Federal Republic of Nigeria.” OR “Do you want to
achieve independence by joining La Republique du Cameroun ?” This is what came to be known
as, “THE TWO ALTERNATIVES.” In grammar, the word, “ joining” is the present continuous
of the verb, “join” and the word is similar to, “ combine,” “unite,” that are completely dissimilar
to recombine, reunite.The Plebiscite,though in application of UNGA Resolutions:
1514,1541,and 1608 respectively of 13th December 1960,15th December 1960,and 21st April
1961; was Britain’s modus operandi of circumventing Art.76(b) of the Charter of the United
Nations under which non independent countries and territories were granted unconditional in-
dependence. Those resolutions were pursuant to Art.102(1)(2) of the Charter. As has now been
proven, these resolutions were never implemented and as a result, the British Cameroons has
never been decolonized. In the sad case of Southern Cameroons, it was simply invaded.

If Southern Cameroons had been decolonized, and it came together with LRC, we should have
been referring to that relationship as a united one or unification and not to a reunited ,or reunifi-

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cation. It is extremely important to note that the plebiscite per se, was a declaration of intent.
What was that intention? To join LRC. The procedure leading to the consummation of the act of
joining was laid down by UNGA resolutions 1541 and 1608,and Art.102(1)(2) of the Charter(
cited above ). Again, as a matter of emphasis, since those United Nations requirements for con-
summation of the said joining were never executed, there was, ipso facto, no independence, no
joining, no union, no unification.

Of course, you can have a union by ambush or a union by mutual consent. For example, The
Gambia and Senegal at one time, arduously worked on what would have turned out to be SENE-
GAMBIA, a union by mutual consent. But when negotiations broke down, each party went its
separate way and that was the end of the Senegambian union or confederation. Senegal could
have used its numerical strength, as well as its ethnic and demographic arguments, to get a union
with The Gambia by ambush but it could not because, The Gambia, though a small country by
land mass and population like Southern Cameroons, is an independent country. The union by
ambush which democratic and international norms restrained Senegal from enforcing on The
Gambia, was the type LRC forced down the throat of Southern Cameroons and got away with it
because Southern Cameroons was not independent. It is this union by ambush that the SCNC
and the other Southern Cameroons nationalist movements are fighting against, in order to pave
the way for the Territory’s accession to independence. The marginalization or deprivation is a
direct result of the unwarranted military and administrative occupation of the Territory in ques-
tion by France and the French outpost of LRC.

It is hoped that this, and the write up and television lectures of some of the frontline nationalists
on the Southern Cameroons plight will straighten the records so our compatriots, especially our
journalists who have the ear of the public, may desist from using inappropriate adjectives or
wrong words in reference to the unwholesome relationship between Southern Cameroons and
LRC.