Education

19, January 2017

Anglophone Problem: Government backtracking on Ad Hoc Committee decision ⁰

The Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo government is backtracking on its decision that dissolved the Ad Hoc Committee and eventually led to the arrest of the leaders of the Consortium. It is now even hard to say who is really in charge in Cameroon. The Minister of Higher Education, Jacques Fame Ndongo made public a press release stating that the government will resume dialogue with the teachers on the 31st of January 2017.

The Fame Ndongo communiqué also stated that the fourth round of talks shall be held at the conference hall of his department. A lot of tongues have been waging ever since the Biya acolyte published the press release yesterday January the 18^th 2017. We understand the Director of Cabinet at the Prime Minister’s Office; one Mr Ghogumu Paul Mingo had announced that discussion with the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium was over.

Ghogumu Paul Mingo’s pronouncement prompted the banning of the Consortium by another inexperienced Francophone Minister of Territorial Administration and Decentralization, Rene Emmanuel Sadi. The MINAT order led to the arrest of the leaders of the Consortium. Cameroon Concord News sources say Wilfred Tassang is currently at the US embassy in Yaounde.

One of the interesting features of the Minister Fama Ndongo press release is that the CPDM operates many governing councils within the crime syndicate. At present, we do not know if Minister Fame Ndongo intends to appoint teachers representatives who will brave the bad roads and come to Yaoundé to dialogue with him. “This is highly unsatisfactory from a government that has many cabinet ministers with PhDs attached to their names” noted a retired Anglophone Head Master contacted by CAMCORDNEWS.

But something very unusual has just happened. The Minister of Higher Education observed in his press release that he was by his action informing “national and international public opinion” of the 31^st of January meeting. The inclusion of international public opinion not by the government spokesman is a major backdown.

Nigeria has had numerous armed struggles: Boko Haram, Niger Delta Avengers and Biafra. It has never disconnected internet services in any of its region. The decision to cutoff internet and telephone services in British Southern Cameroons tells us how they (Francophones) see us and tells us that we are not part of them. It is sad to see the powerful Biya Francophone Beti Ewondo regime backtracking on this.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Editor-in-Chief

Cameroon Concord News Group

10, January 2017

Southern Cameroons Civil Disobedience: THIS IS WHAT OUR CHILDREN SHOULD LEARN ⁰

Let’s teach the children that today’s act of civil disobedience is the ultimate expression of their power over the dictator Biya and his coterie of corrupt ministers.

Let’s tell our children, that this act of civic education- of boycotting school, to demand accountability from an insensitive government is what developed countries have done to become developed.

Let’s teach our children that true education is an outgrowth of the needs of society, and that even the best education in a society where one is treated as a second-class citizen only diminishes one’s self-esteem.

Let’s teach our children that the ultimate purpose of education is to mould a free individual, who can think critically, and that having the best education and remaining under bondage is a negation of that education.

Let’s teach our children that the best education is the attainment of self-government where we can decide how far we want to go, and not forced to live in a system where we can only aspire to play second fiddle.

Let’s give our children historical examples where students stayed away from school for a year, and gained the right to earn a substantively richer education, through the use of cutting edge technology that is available in more open societies.

Let’s take advantage of this teachable moment empower our children to aspire to a genuine education that no despotism can enslave.

By Larry Eyong

9, January 2017

Francophone Minister of Secondary Education jeered and booed at Ndop ²

The people of Ndop in Ngoketunjia Division, North West region have reportedly jeered at the Minister of Secondary Education, Jean Ernest Massena Ngale Bibehe yesterday Sunday January 8, 2017 during a working visit to the region as part of measures to lure teachers, students and pupils get back to school this Monday.

In a crisis meeting held in Ndop, the people threatened to walk out of the gathering as soon as the minister started delivering his speech in French. The Secondary education boss was compelled to speak in English for close to thirty minutes after the people pressed on him to do so. After addressing the people in English Jean Ernest Bibehe begged for permission and read his speech in French which was interpreted in English by the Regional Delegate for secondary Education Mombakuet Victor.

The minister who has a one week mission to the North West region has been moving from one town to the other trying to lure stakeholders to give go ahead with school resumption activities today Monday. The minister met with leaders of trade unions in Bamenda in which he is said to have been on bended knees for them to call off the strike action. The Bamenda meeting did not yield fruits.

Cameroun Info Net

8, January 2017

Open letter to H.E. Okala Bilaï, colonial governor of the South West region ³

Your Excellency, it is with regrets that I write to your office at this crucial moment of your colonial occupational rule. Sir, after listening to you this evening (Friday 6th January 2017) over CRTV, I heard you saying “Teachers who will not return to school will have their salaries suspended.” Most of these teachers you are talking about don’t even have a service number yet. And those who got the service number are not different from the thousands of job seekers parading our streets on a daily basis.

These teachers work for close to four years or more before the said salary is made available. moreover, the machinery put in place by your hierarchy in “La République” has made it difficult for teachers to earn what you call salary. How on earth do you create a system that warrants a teacher to give away 20% or more of his or her pay package to an agent before he or she can seemingly boast of having his or her name on the list of those programmed to collect their salaries? Should you take it back, it makes no difference. I wonder whether that salary is the raison d’être of your behavior towards us.

If you are paying us so as to deal with us the way you have been doing in the past and even up-to-date, then you had better done what you have promised. By the way, which salary are you talking about? Is it commensurate to the job teachers do every day? How much is the salary and what is the work load of the teachers you are threatening? Our Fons and Chiefs rejected 50 million from your hierarchy. Our university students waved at the meager 50 thousand francs you people wanted to buy their consciences with. Gone are those days! Money is not our interest! FEDERALISM OR INDEPENDENCE is what we stand for. No amount of money can purchase our freedom!

We have suffered a lot under your colonial administration. No degree of threats can repel us from our target. It is time we stand for what we believe in and hope for. “He who refuses to fight today, will live to fight for ever.” ALUTA CONTINUA.

28, November 2016

Academic activities paralyzed as Buea University students begin strike ⁰

Buea University students have started a massive strike action today morning within the campus of the university. The students inter alia have demanded that all French-speaking lecturers who teach only in French be told to leave the university. To contain the peaceful demonstration, police forces have been deployed on campus and shots were reportedly fired to disperse the crowd. The police have also strengthened their anti-riot system around the student residential area in Molyko.

The Francophone governor of the South West region, Okalia Bilai said in a press release that an unidentified group was behind the strike to intimidate parents and students from going about their normal educational activity.

Some SDF parliamentarians decided to march peacefully in Buea to show their solidarity with the Anglophone community in Cameroon. Lawyers and teachers had staged similar demos which were repressed by the police and resulted in the demand for federalism. Biya dispatched his Prime Minister to negotiate a peaceful settlement. But the Yang Philemon mission ended in fiasco. The lawyers and teachers have extended their unlimited strike action.

By Rita Akana

14, November 2016

Cameroon army reopens schools in the Far North, soldiers serving as teachers ¹

The weakening of the Nigerian Islamic sect, Boko Haram by the Cameroonian military made it possible to reopen some of the schools in the Far North Region for the 2016/2017 academic year. A sister publication, Cameroun-info.net has reported that many teachers who fled the war zone have refused to return.

In order to ensure the education of the abandoned pupils, some soldiers have decided to take the chalk. The army recently reopened the Madina Public School (10 km from Fotokol) which currently has 150 pupils and Cameroonian men and women in uniform are now serving as teachers.

It is good news in the avalanche of sadness that for three years has rocked the Far North Region. Last year, the departments in charge of national, primary and secondary education reported that more than five hundred teachers had dropped out of classrooms to escape the war.

By Sama Ernest

19, October 2016

German language regional pedagogic inspectors meeting in Yaounde ⁰

Regional Pedagogic Inspectors for the German Language in Cameroon are meeting to learn improved methods of teaching the language in Secondary Schools. The three-day seminar opened at the Goethe Institute of Learning in Yaounde on the 18th of October 2016 prompted by poor teachings as revealed by the writings on the photo attached to this report by state-owned radio and television, CRTV.

The forum is holding under the theme, “the Teaching, Learning and Assessment of German Learners using Competent-based Approaches.” Organised by the Ministry of Secondary Education and the Goethe Institute, the seminar aims at providing teachers with new and better teaching techniques.

While chairing the opening ceremony, the Inspector Coordinator General in charge of Letters, Arts and Languages at the Ministry of Secondary Education, Charles Etoundi expressed the Ministry’s commitment to improve on the capacity of its teachers in order that goodbye will not be translated as goodbye in German but Auf Wiedersehen.

The Pedagogic Inspectors will also be introduced to a new international school exchange programme for teachers involved in the teaching of the German language. The programme is intended to create learning partnerships in a bid to improve pedagogic skills and create better working conditions for teachers. The session ends on 20th October 2016.

CRTV

17, October 2016

Yaounde hosting forum on learning and teaching of Mathematics ⁰

Pedagogic Inspectors of Mathematics in the Ministry of Secondary Education have begun a training programme in Yaounde to develop strategies towards inculcating the love for Mathematics in students. Placed under the theme, “Learning and Teaching Mathematics Differently”, the programme to run till 28th October 2016 is aimed at strengthening the content and delivery of Mathematics in secondary schools in the country.

The Secretary of State at the Ministry of Secondary Education in charge of Teachers’ Training, Boniface Bayaola chaired the ceremony to open the session which is being organised with assistance from the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences. The representatives of the Institute indicate the need to change the style of teaching Mathematics and encourage the use of technology for example, the recording of lessons.

Over the years, pedagogic officials proposed the use of cartoons and other images to incite the desire and love for maths especially in little children. This has yielded some positive results. However, much is still desired since students still complain of the long, complicated mathematics problems and the many formulae. The training programme which shall spread over a period of five years is expected to incite the love for Mathematics in about 1.700.000 Cameroonian students.

CRTV

12, October 2016

New dress code for Yaounde University II students ⁰

The Rector of the University of Yaounde II, Soa, Ibrahima Adamou has prescribed a new dress code for students in the university. The prescription is contained in a communiqué signed in September 2016.

Accordingly, the Rector prohibits indecent dressing, unnecessary piercings, excessive adorning with jewellery and extravagant hairdos. Both boys and girls on campus are exhorted to abide by these prescriptions which require that student tone down their general external looks.

In this light, short dresses above knee level, tight-fitting clothes, sleeveless tops, irregular hair colours and styles, extra-high shoes, slippers, earrings (for boys), caps and anklets, amongst others are prohibited on campus. The Rector of the University argues that the decision is intended uphold decency, virtuous behaviour and the respect of ethics in the University.

If the Rector’s instructions are heeded to, the University of Yaounde II, Soa will measure up with most professional schools where the administration has succeeded in keeping a keen eye on decency.

10, October 2016

University of Buea: After failed harmonization Plan, Faculty of Social and Management Science Board announces split of Faculty ⁰

The Faculty of Social and Management Science, FSMS, University of Buea has addressed attempts by government to create three new faculties and schools out of the current structure and to merge the social science facet with the Faculty of Arts. We gathered that the Faculty board recently met to strategize on the widespread reforms by the Ministry of Higher Education on the University of Buea curriculum. The Wednesday 5th of October 2016 meeting that held inside the campus and chaired by the Dean, Prof. Martha S. Tumnde, didn’t agree to some of the new formulation of three faculties with brand new nomenclatures such as; Law and School of Law, Social Sciences, and Economics and Management respectively. The partitioning of the Law school was however accepted.

The background information about the imminent creation of these faculties was transmitted to the Ministry of Higher Education. The proposals were mainly on the Social Sciences intended to be merged with the Arts to generate into the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences/Humanities. It is expected that the Faculties of Law and Law School, Economics and Management and a School of Journalism and Mass Communication would stand out. The three structures initially were envisaged against the backdrop of an argument that the Social Sciences were going to bolster the Faculty of Arts financially. A 2008 proposal by UB officials for higher education authorities to scraped Law off the FSMS which would have led to the birth of a School of Law went futile.

The Board on the procedure and validity of the planned merger of the Social Sciences with the Arts observed that; firstly, the merger had no scientific basis as they were independent faculties in English speaking Universities. The latter and Social Sciences were markedly different in terms of content and approach. Secondly, the Board argued that the splitting of the FSMS was to decongest its size, then merging the departments of Geography, Women and Gender Studies, Sociology and Anthropology and Political Science and Public Administration with the Faculty of Arts would also lead to congestion of the new Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. The board suggested that, it will not be proper to remove the nomenclature “Social Sciences” which has been used since the inception of the University of Buea because this Nomenclature “Social Sciences” reflects the Anglo-Saxon tradition and dream of education and not Arts and Social Sciences as obtains in the Francophone system.

Moreover, the Social Sciences disciplines have the prospects of growing with the creation of new programmes such as Social Work, Development Studies, Psychology, Demography, Urban and Regional Planning, some of which have been solicited to develop over the years. Lastly, the board also noted that the Social Science disciplines have been offering Bachelors of Science and Masters of Science and Not Bachelors of Arts and Masters of Art. The association with the Arts as Humanities will create problems of continuity and consistency that may cast doubts on our degrees especially out of the country. They also argued that the scientific approach with UB’s Social Sciences was an asset that ought to be maintained by creating its own autonomous faculty. The choices of the students who opted for this model should also be respected. In addition, the merger of the Social Sciences and Arts is a regression in intellectual development giving that these disciplines have moved apart a long time ago.

The faculty board at the end of the Letter addressed to the Vice Chancellor of UB urged the University and the Ministry of Higher Education to review the plan and leave the Social Sciences as an autonomous entity. At press time we gathered that the text of application to legalize the new faculties if finally promulgated will go operational this 2016/17 academic year. This implies that new students who had apply to read degrees in Sciences would be left with no option than to enrol in the Art degree program. Some observers say the imminent reforms are fallouts of the failed attempt to harmonize the country’s higher education system.

The desire to destroy and crackdown on Anglophone education is old and all a calculated attempt to ruin the hard earned genuine value and status the Anglo-Saxon system has achieved in contemporary times. The Ministry of Higher Education was represented by English speaking Prof. Gabsa Sixtus.

By Cham Victor Bama in Buea