L'Effort Camerounais (English Version)

Editorial: If We Deny Our People Even This, What Else Can We Give Them!

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

Water, water, everywhere, but not even a drop to drink!!!  If you live in Yaoundé, Douala and Bafoussam in particular, and in other towns and places in Cameroon, where having water has or is becoming another of Cameroon’s litany of things reserved for a privileged few, then you will understand Coleridge’s mind frame when he cried out in frustration about the abundance of surrounding seawater and not even a drop to drink. It is no longer news talking about the dehumanising poverty Cameroonians are living through, but when they cannot have water, life itself, then the level of suffering is becoming disquietingly long. Even water!

Editorial: We Only Reap What We Sow!

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

If a country were built on speeches alone, Cameroon will ineluctably be a citadel of development. If a country’s economic take-off and growth were tied to carefully-worded growth strategies alone, Cameroon would have been miles ahead of many countries. If slogans alone could kick-start a lethargic disoriented people into action, Cameroonians would have long rolled back their sleeves and fell behind their ploughs. But despite the abundance of speeches that whet many an appetite, carefully crafted development strategies and slogans, Cameroon remains caught in an underdevelopment and non-accomplishment vicious circle. Why?

Editorial: What better time to launch reconciliation efforts than December

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

The government has been accused of going off at a tangent in her fight against the embezzlement of public funds. Many have out rightly described the ongoing fight against the embezzlement of public funds as vindictive and full of double standards. This may also indicate the complexity of this hydra as it mutates to different forms, either rendering ineffective or innocuous the measures taken to overcome it. The latest medicine in the government anti-embezzlement drugstore is the creation of a Special Criminal Tribunal to speed up the trial of those suspected of embezzling public funds. It, however, provides a way out for those who repent and refund what they have wrongfully siphoned. There is something “Christian” in this provision!  

Editorial: Reconciliation, Justice and Peace: Transcending Theology To Action

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

The world, Africa, Cameroon, our communities and families; in a nutshell- the individual, have never been more in need of reconciliation, justice and peace than they are today. It is against this backdrop that Pope Benedict XVI, while on a recent visit to Benin, signed and entrusted the Post Synodal Apostolic Exhortation, Africae Munus, to the contemporary African Church. The document, which seeks to reinforce the ecclesial dynamism of a continent overwhelmed by immense socio-economic, political and religious conflicts, challenges Africans, from a purely biblical and therefore spiritual springboard, to stand up and walk. So Africa, stand up and walk!

Editorial: So That These Things Do Not Continue Happening In This Country

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

One of the experiences a country should dread going through is deliberately treading the path of self-deception and self-destruction. This twin ill has insidiously sapped and rendered ineffective Cameroon’s human resources for many years now. Whereas elsewhere leaders are either willingly and ambitiously, obliged or challenged to work towards fostering their countries’ political and economic destinies, such is regrettable not the case in many African countries, especially in Cameroon.

Editorial: First, A Mental Revolution, Then Any Other Revolution Can Follow

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

Of all kinds of poverty, mental impoverishment is the most dangerous. Uncanny politicians have tested and confirmed that to keep a people docile  and servile, they have to tele-guide them, giving the impression their survival depends on how closely attached the governed remain to the governors’ dictates- mental dependency, call it.

Editorial: Despite Positive Signals, Cameroon Still Has A long Way To Go

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

The October 9 Presidential election is now history and even before the Supreme Court sitting for the Constitutional Council has officially proclaimed the results, seven key opposition figures are already calling for the polls to be cancelled and fresh elections organised within 6 months. Although this is highly improbable given that national and international organisations have already rated the exercise as generally free and fair, the high abstention rate indicates that despite repeated appeals many Cameroonians, contrary to expectations, continue to lose interest in public affairs and mistrust their leaders.

Editorial: Is politics All About Personal Over Collective Welfare?

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

As the countdown to the October 9 presidential election narrows, some disturbing declarations, revelations and actions, have pushed many to question if politics is all about personal interests over the common good or welfare. While one, not the exclusive, raison-être of a political party is the conquest and preservation of power, when this goal becomes the "be all" and "end all" of all political action, then it defeats that very purpose for which a party has been created. For any political party that is devoid of people-centred and oriented action is simply treading a slippery course, feeding on the very germ that will kill it and knotting the rope with which it will be asphyxiated politically.

Editorial: When Elections Should Take A Christian Face

By Ireneaus Chongwain Chia

A clearer picture of candidates vying for the October presidential election in Cameroon has just emerged.  A historic number- over fifty (50) candidates deposited their files with the elections management body-ELECAM. They were the "knowns" - party incumbents and heavy weights, the not-so- influential but ever present political Spartans or presidential hopefuls, and definitely the "little knowns", or call them the election neophytes or outsiders.

Editorial: Catholic Education and parental obligation

The 2011/2012 Academic Year is just round the corner and parents are already making, or will soon make up their minds which schools their children will attend, especially at the primary level. This choice is becoming increasingly difficult within the context of what Pope Benedict XVI has described as, "---a certain contemporary culture that casts doubt upon any kind of absolute value, even the possibility of recognising truth and goodness."