Parents whose children took official national examinations in the crisis-hit northwest of Cameroon have raised an alarm over a series of kidnappings carried out by separatist fighters on their children.

In 2017, Cameroon separatists banned schools from operating in the two English-speaking regions of the country, warning defaulters would face consequences.

They began clashing with government forces in an attempt to establish an independent nation they called “Ambazonia” in the two Anglophone regions.

Despite the boycott call, many schools continue to operate, though students are asked to wear mufti over uniforms, in order not to be targeted.

Some 27000 candidates sat for the GCE Exams

2023 session in the Northwest region on May 30.

Bui division, one of the most affected communities of the six-year war, witnessed an increased number of candidates from 750 last year to 1260 in 2023. The Divisional Delegate of Secondary Education, Baijong Ezikiel, says this increase is a sign of progressive return to normalcy in the division.

Although these students successfully wrote the exams within three  weeks amid strict security, some of them have been kidnapped and regained freedom days later, after their families  paid heavy fines.

A local source in Kumbo, headquarter of Bui division said their daughter was kidnapped on her way back from a neighbour’s home and kept away from the family for three days.

“We were so confused because they often see her and know she is going to school. I don’t know why they decided to kidnap her. This has affected her immensely,”she said.

Another parent in Kumbo  who reached HumAngle on telephone said he paid $250 to free his daughter from a separatist camp.

“One of them asked me to pay $1663 dollars before my child could be freed. I pleaded and the leader finally said I should pay $500,” he cried.

Separatist fighters are currently making a lot of money from several kidnappings. In February, five students of a secondary school in Kumbo, headquarters of Bui Division, were kidnapped and over $1500 was demanded from each family.

The United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs reported that eight attacks on education were registered in February this year in the North-West and South-West.

Over 700,000 children have been impacted by school closures due to violence.

Source: HumAngle

As part of its 10000 Kids Education Project, the board of directors of the Orphan Kids Help Foundation has announced plans to provide annual scholarships to poor and needy secondary school students in the Republic of Cameroon.

Cameroon Concord News understands the scholarships will pay for 100 school students to study science, technology and global health.

A statement released by the Orphan Kids Help Foundation revealed that the students will be given enough money to cover the costs of tuition and accommodation throughout the period of their studies.

The money will come from the Orphan Kids Help Foundation that has for the past thirteen years provided resources to orphanages in Africa enabling children to sustain their physical, emotional, and spiritual needs.

The scholarships are expected to be formally announced in Cameroon next week by Dr. Ngasu Betek Etengeneng– a senior Lecturer at the University of Douala. Dr. Ngasu has also been tasked to actively recruit qualified students and to make sure that all candidates must be orphans or poor and needy individuals. In addition, the students must be of good moral and academic standing and above all, must be of Cameroonian nationality.

Orphan Kids Help Foundation is known in Cameroon and beyond as one of the philanthropic foundations based in the United States of America supporting orphans all over Africa. Some of the orphanages that have benefitted from the Orphan Kids Help Foundation in Africa include Love kids orphanage (Ghana), Little Saints Orphanage (Nigeria), Footprints Orphanage (Kenya), Mission of Hope Orphanage (Uganda), Hoptec Orphanage (Cameroon), Wellington Orphanage (Sierra Leone), Rainbow Orphanage (Cameroon), Amity Social Assistance Family (Cameroon)  and St. Arnile Orphanage in Cameroon.

The donation to fund the scholarships in Cameroon will be the largest given by Orphan Kids Help Foundation for any single cause.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai with files from our US Bureau         

Cameroon’s Parliament has approved a higher education reform bill aimed at modernising and improving the quality of university education – and, significantly, it will officially recognise the two sub-systems of public university education in the country – one English, and one French.

According to officials, two key reforms the new legislation envisages include the strengthening of the economic autonomy of universities and addressing the challenge of having a public system in which nine institutions are francophone and two are anglophone.

“The higher education system used this far was developed since 2001. After 22 years, things have evolved in university programmes. That is why we had to introduce some innovations. There was also a need to address the concerns of the English sub-system of education,” said Wilfred Gabsa Nyongbet, secretary general in the ministry of higher education.

The 2001 higher education law and the 1998 law to lay down guidelines on education in Cameroon (which covers early childhood, primary, secondary, technical, and teacher training education) existed, he said, after the bill was defended in parliament on 16 June.

Recognising two sub-systems

Article 4(3) of the 2023 Higher Education legislation now provides that “the state shall ordain and organise the system of higher education by taking into account the specificities of the two education sub-systems, Anglo-Saxon and francophone, as a contributing ingredient to the influence and performance of the higher education system”.

Each sub-system, according to the lawmakers, is “characterised by a body of specific and cohesive principles, which reflect its historical, cultural and philosophical peculiarities”.

According to Professor Simo Bobda of the University of Yaoundé 1, there has been no recognition of the existence of two education sub-systems in higher education (universities) in Cameroon prior to the bill.

By contrast, as far back as 1998, the law that governs the other tiers of education (primary, secondary, teacher training) had already explicitly recognised that Cameroon had two education sub-systems, each preserving specificities in its certification and assessment methods (as well as in pedagogic approaches), he explained.

Prior to the June 2023 bill, the only texts which recognised the existence of sub-systems in higher education were the decrees establishing the universities of Buea and of Bamenda (in 1993 and 2010 respectively) which chartered them as universities “in the Anglo-Saxon tradition”.

Language division contributes to conflict

Only on the basis of this provision was it obtained that English would constitute the language of instruction in both universities, for all substantive programmes other than French language learning. He said that injustice and discrimination, especially in the higher education sector, has proved a flashpoint in the ongoing anglophone crisis.

“This discrimination has been one of the causes of Cameroon’s anglophone crisis, which started off in the education and legal sectors before spiralling into political demands, strikes and armed activity in 2016,” Bobda said.

The anglophone crisis running for its seventh year is a source of turmoil in the two English-speaking regions of the Southwest and Northwest with armed groups and government forces in continuous battle.

Separatists, who have violently enforced a boycott on education since 2017, continued to attack schools, students and education professionals, destroying buildings and depriving hundreds of thousands of children of their fundamental right to education, according to a Human Rights Watch 2023 report.

He added that the fact that the recognition of the two systems and the recognition of common law as the legal system in anglophone regions built up resentment among Anglo-Saxon higher education lecturers, leading to a public protest in 2017.

“We had to go to the streets in protest, especially after the union got information of plans to harmonise the two curricula of all state universities in Cameroon. The reason the government advanced, was to enhance student mobility between universities,” he said.

The lecturers’ union at the universities of Buea and Bamenda objected, on grounds that harmonising their programmes directly with the other French-speaking universities would dilute their Anglo-Saxon specificities, especially since the templates for harmonisation used were strongly inspired by the French-dominant universities, Bobda said.

“After a hard struggle, we obtained the resolution to allow the universities of Buea and Bamenda to harmonise their programmes between themselves (and future universities in the Anglo-Saxon tradition could harmonise their programmes within them). We are happy the new law now comes to lay to rest the long-existing discrimination,” Bobda said.

Protection of both sub-systems

Experts say the new law will protect the Anglo-Saxon system of education from abuse just as the reforms that recognised the common law did in the legal system.

“Before the crisis, we had cases of French-speaking lecturers sent to teach in the two English-speaking universities, French-speaking magistrates who could not express themselves in English were sent to work in the anglophone regions, with challenges in communication.

The new law will protect each of the systems and prevent any unwarranted invasion or dominance of one language over the other,” Dr Livinus Esambe Njume, a lecturer and a member of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative Cameroon, told University World News.

Another key innovation in the June 2023 higher education reforms is the creation of entrepreneurial universities. The new law permits universities to create and run their own businesses.

“The government cannot do it all alone with the surge in university population and unemployment challenges. Building en entrepreneurial spirit in our universities provides opportunities for additional sources of income for them,” Jacques Fame Ndongo, the minister of higher education, explained after defending the bill in parliament.

Fame Ndongo said innovation in higher education is a continuous process that must reflect the realities of every country. “Higher education reforms are the key to quality growth. We are permanently in this process, moving at a pace that reflects the realities of the country,” he said.

Source: University World News

The Cameroonian government has submitted to parliament a draft bill aimed at reshaping its higher education system.

The new guidelines will advance modern higher education reform and improve the quality of compulsory education, said Wilfred Gabsa Nyongbet, secretary general of the Cameroonian Ministry of Higher Education, while defending the draft bill on Friday.

“The education system we have used so far was developed in 2001, but in 22 years higher education has evolved. That is why a lot of innovations have been introduced in the new draft law,” Nyongbet told reporters after the bill was presented to the National Assembly in the capital of Yaounde.

Nyongbet said Cameroon will create entrepreneurial universities to increase the possibility of universities having additional sources of income. This means that universities could have the leeway to create and run businesses. He stressed that the new system will allow more students to become job creators rather than job seekers.

The professionalization and overall development of students will be a priority, and these efforts must reach every student at every university, according to officials.

These changes are coming at a time when the Higher Education Ministry has been hit by many scandals over the last decades but none has been as big as the one that might take down the country’s higher education minister, Jacques Fame Ndongo, who is being described by his collaborators as a ‘man on a diet of sex.’

The minister’s office has become the theatre of multiple sex sessions designed to satisfy Mr. Ndongo’s out-of-control libido.

Mr. Ndongo seems to be shooting pornographic movies in his office as he has transformed his office into his own Hollywood.

Young girls, some as young as 21, are permanently streaming to Prof. Fame Ndongo‘s office and the soundtracks emanating from that office shortly after those girls walk into that “Hollywood studio” are always unsettling to the minister’s collaborators who simply want to do their job and head home to their wives and children.

Prof. Fame Ndongo’s sexual misconduct has reduced the higher education ministry into a playground for people to whom sex is medicine.

Some of the minister’s closest collaborators, most of whom are women, have been bedded by the satyr who passes off as a minister.

Some of these women are today senior officials of the ministry and since they are out of favor with the minister due to their ages, they no longer feel valued and are doing their best to sabotage the minister’s work.

According to an official of the Higher Education Ministry who spoke to the Cameroon Concord News correspondent in Yaoundé, Rita Akana, on condition of anonymity, said that some of the disgruntled women who have lost their shine and charm of yesteryears even challenge the minister to the face, causing him to lose authority among his staff.

The source, a man who will soon be retiring and is terribly bitter about the way his career has gone, is now singing like a canary and he is very willing to lay bare everything happening in a ministry which, in his opinion, has been terribly mismanaged by Prof. Ndongo who has run the ministry for close to 20 years.

Reported by Xinhuanet and Camcordnews

An investigation has been launched into the death of a student who died in military custody in Buea, in the south-west region of Cameroon, and the ongoing detention of his roommate.

Galax Yves Landry Etoga, the minister in charge of the national gendarmerie, has ordered the probe following the death of Ngule Linus Fontec, a fourth-year student at the University of Buea.

Barrister Amungwa Tanyi Nicodemus, the lawyer of the deceased student, said this development comes more than two months after Fontec, a student in the university’s department of international relations, was declared dead on 16 March 2023 while in military custody for alleged terrorist activities.

“We have waited for a long time for this authorisation to investigate the suspicious death of the student. The truth has to prevail,” he told journalists on 29 May.

According to media reports and the university authorities, Fontec and Mboh Giress, a sixth-year student, were taken into custody by SEMIL, a secret service agency of the Cameroonian army, during a raid by the military of the university’s residential area for students.

According to Professor Horace Ngomo Manga, the vice-chancellor of the University of Buea, the two students were apprehended by the forces of law and ordered to assist them in their investigation of some terrorist activities.

“Unfortunately, Linus Ngule died while in custody,” he said.

Allegations of torture

Human rights groups and the lawyer of the deceased student allege they were severely tortured by the military.

“There were signs of torture of both students, [which is the] reason why we requested an autopsy of the deceased,” said human rights lawyer Agbor Balla.

The University of Buea authorities, rights groups and lawyers have all been clamouring for access to and release of Fontec’s roommate.

“We had to write to the ministry of defence to receive the family of the deceased and to open up an investigation into the circumstances of his [Fontec’s] death,” Amungwa said.

A meeting involving the military, the family of the deceased and the legal representative was held. “We insisted on our desire to see light shed on the death of Linus,” Amungwa said.

Internal conflict

According to Balla, since the Anglophone crisis started in 2016, students from the two universities in the English speaking regions, Buea and Bamenda, have been victims of torture and rape, arrest and illegal detention by the military who accuse them of communicating with separatists fighters.

“The abuses of university students during this crisis have been from both sides, the separatist fighters and the regular state army. We condemn these acts and have been calling on government to investigate and punish the perpetrators,” Agbor Balla said.

The abuses have continued to rise, according to a 2022 human rights group report.

The 2022 Human Rights Watch report says the conflict has witnessed some major human rights violations, including killings, torture, kidnappings, illegal arrests and detention.

Most of these incidents are believed to have remained unreported, especially the violations in remote areas where there is no mobile network, nor are there good roads or accessibility.

The group in their report published at least eight incidents with the aid of videos and pictures aimed at documenting abuses committed against civilians by both warring parties in the conflict and to promote human rights and peace.

It revealed verified reports by the above-mentioned parties pertaining to the excessive use of power by the security forces during the student protest at the University of Buea in 2020 leading to the arrest and detention of many.

Activists have called on the international community to intervene in the ongoing crisis and bring a lasting peace.

“We are appealing to the international community to step in and put a stop to the several killings going on in the two Anglophone regions,” said Akem Kelvin Nkwain, rights officer at the Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in Africa, or CHRDA.

English-speaking students go to French-speaking universities

Akem said his life has been threatened several times by the state security for his outspokenness on the crisis and has equally appealed for genuine dialogue between the two fighting groups.

“Only genuine dialogue can bring lasting peace. This is what obtains in other conflicts around the world.”

Amnesty International has also called for dialogue to create an enabling environment for students to study in peace.

In a 2022 report, it called on the warring factions to down their tools and for the government to end threats against activists who expose violations and abuses in the Anglophone regions.

The alleged abuse of students appears to be forcing parents from the English-speaking regions in the country to rather send their children to French-speaking universities for safety reasons because of the security situation in English-speaking regions.

“We are having an influx of English-speaking students in universities in Francophone regions for security reasons. They are bound to cope with the language challenges,” said Dr Essambe Livinus Njume, a lecturer at the University of Yaoundé 1.

The recent incident in the University of Buea is not the first case of student arrest by the military that ended in death while in detention.

In 2020, Human Rights Watch also reported similar cases at the University of Bamenda.

Activists hope the Buea investigation will come up with the truth and the criminals sanctioned. “We look forward to knowing exactly what happened and hope the criminals will face the law,” Balla said.

Source: University World News

Saker Baptist College (henceforth SBC), founded in 1962 by Baptist Missionaries is an All-Girls secondary school in Limbe, of the South West Region of Cameroon. SBC is one of the elite and firebrand highly rated academic institution in Cameroon. The college host a non-profit organization, which is a 501(c)(3) called ExSSA, with chapters installed across the United States. SBC Boston alumni promotes love, unity and sisterhood by fostering and promoting education, development and support to Saker Baptist College.

In November of 2017, Dr Vivienne Yumasi was unanimously elected to office as president of ExSSA Boston chapter. In this year’s edition of Mother’s Day celebration in the United States, on May 13, 2023, the president sat down with Cameroon Concord News US Bureau Chief Etukeni Agbaw-Ebai to x-ray the vision and theme of this year’s celebration of Mother’s Day in the city of Boston, USA.

Cameroon Concord News: Thank you for accepting to speak to us!  Let me begin by throwing the ball in your court, Dr Vivienne Yumasi, what is the meaning of ExSAKER?

Dr Vivienne Yumasi: Thanks for giving me this opportunity as ExSSA Boston Chapter celebrates Mother’s Day. ExSAKER represents former students of Saker Baptist College.  In the United States of America, it is headquartered in the state of Virginia, and its operational goals are love, sisterhood, and unity. In other words, ExSAKER strives to impact and empower the girl child and woman by fund raising and creating partnership to excel in society to become responsible and successful women and leaders wherever they find themselves. And ExSSA Boston is on a forward march to provide that platform.

Cameroon Concord News: What is the theme of this year’s Mother’s Day Come Together and how significant is this celebration?

Dr. Vivienne Yumasi: The theme for the 2023 Mother’s Day event is celebrating the woman and using the family unit to impact the community. By this celebration, Sakerettes in Boston are becoming consciously aware of the struggle to get across a concrete and realistic visionary indicator to empower the woman, in all walks of life, aiming high and building self-confidence and aspirations. In addition, there will be keynote speakers on specific topics to grace the celebration and I am confident and optimistic that all the ExSSA Women out there and beyond will increase pragmatic engagements through partnership to be able to use knowledge acquired gainfully.

Cameroon Concord News: As President of ExSSA Boston chapter, what are your major goals and efforts by your administration to achieve them?

Dr. Vivienne Yumasi: As president, I am deeply committed to step up the membership drive so as to strengthen the association. I would like to see this chapter grow by bringing all in to impact the Saker family and be role models. My team will also continue to put our ideas and resources together, looking at possible options for scholarship funding, including upkeep of the college campus in Limbe. It is a collective task and that is why I am making a tough call for all Sakerettes in Boston to come on board.

Cameroon Concord News: Any Last word to our readers?

Dr. Vivienne Yumasi: It is a great pleasure and honor for me to have this conversation with the Cameroon Concord News Group. I equally want to take this opportunity to make a strong commitment that Sakerettes will love to embark on this new journey with the Cameroon Concord News Group. Once more, a big thank you!

Mbah Javis was in his final year of high school in Batibo in Momo Division in the Northwest Region in 2016 when war broke out in Cameroon’s two English-speaking regions, the Northwest and Southwest.

The war shattered lives, businesses, and institutions; his school was no exception.

Mbah, who was one year away from writing the Cameroon General Certificate of Education Ordinary Level, had to stay home for two years due to battles between the Cameroon military and separatist fighters.

“There were no signs of classes resuming in Batibo, so I moved to Bamenda, the Northwest regional capital, which was relatively calm. I enrolled in Government Bilingual High School Ntamulung, where I obtained my GCE O’Level and GCE Advanced Level,” Mbah explained.

The 20-year-old was later admitted to study computer science at the University of Buea in the Southwest and, while there, started looking for ways to solve the problem he had encountered in 2016.

The outcome was Dimoly, an AI assistance study app.

“My motivation to build Dimoly came from my experience. I couldn’t go to school every day due to insecurities. At the moment, the situation is not any better, and a lot of students are unable to go to school and attend classes, so I was prompted to build something that students can use from anywhere at any time to study and prepare for exams,” said Mbah.

The startup’s name comes from two different words: didactic and moly. Didactic means designed or intended to teach people easily, and moly is a magical herb in Greek mythology). Mbah put the two together to create his startup’s name, Dimoly.

“This means the app is designed to teach people in a way that will make them understand things like magic,” said Mbah.

According to Mbah, Dimoly can provide accurate answers if the user asks a question with enough information, including the specific subject or topic the question are coming from.

“So basically, the more information the user provides, the clearer the answer the AI assistant gives,” he said.

At fourteen, Mbah began teaching himself computer programming in C++. Six years later, he has worked for several companies in Cameroon and abroad as a software engineer, building software products mainly for mobile and the web, with some having artificial intelligence functions.

In 2019/2020, Mbah was a finalist at Africa’s annual Google Code, a programming contest. In 2022, he was also among the winners of the Cameroon ICT Innovation Week challenge, organised by Cameroon’s Ministry of Post and Telecommunications.

It took him four months to build Dimoly.

Since the war is ongoing, the Cameroon government often groups students from schools with unstable security into accommodation centres where security is guaranteed during national exams.

This means that even if a child cannot attend classes with Dimoly, they can still prepare.

“After downloading the app from the Google Play Store, a student needs an email account to complete their registration before using it,” said Mbah.

“Currently, the app has over 6300 registered users. The feedback from them has been great. They say they enjoy using it a lot,” added Mbah.

Keming Thanks Njoko is a secondary teacher in the Northwest, one of Cameroon’s embattled regions. In 2022, he came across Dimoly and was thrilled about the app’s features.

“You know, not everybody is perfect. A student may ask a tricky question when I am teaching, which requires me to do some sensitive thinking. I will give room for other students to answer while I consult Dimoly for an answer.

It has made my teaching so flexible that when a student asks a question, even if I can’t explain instantly, I know I will go to Dimoly, and I will have something to reply to the student and not ask the student to take it as an assignment as some teachers always do,” said Keming.

Aside from using the app to help his students comprehend subjects easily, Keming has since been going to other schools to promote and encourage the use of the app to improve learning.

“When I found the app, I saw something that I had never seen in others. I was so amazed by it, and the thing that caught my attention was the artificial intelligence of the application. When you search for something there, it is highly specific to your level of education, and the response is automatic,” he said.

According to him, his students have also greatly benefited from using Dimoly. He said the app would easily bail them out when they encountered a challenge in class.

Njuabe Favour is one of the users preparing to write the country’s GCE Advanced Level examinations next year.

The 15-year-old said Dimoly provides her with past GCE questions, which she uses to answer and prepare for exams in school.

“What I like most about the app is that it can answer all school-related questions and best simplifies the answers to my question so that I can understand better. The AI assistant is like a home teacher to me,” she said. “I have been using this app for the past three months or so, and it has been of great help to me.”

Dimoly was also able to help her create a study schedule and study flashcards.

Mbah said he was happy to see that Dimoly was already solving real learning problems among Cameroonian students, especially those in conflict-affected areas.

“With Dimoly, learning is much easier,” he said.

Culled from Bellanaija

A group of 21 women are travelling to Dublin to show their appreciation for Irish nuns who taught them in Cameroon during the 1980s.

The women, who are all graduates of Lourdes Secondary School for Girls in Mankon, a town in western Cameroon, will be paying tribute to the Holy Rosary Sisters, who empowered them when they were teenagers.

The group, who called themselves the “Pacesetters”, include members who have worked and travelled the world, some earning PhDs and Masters with careers in engineering, nursing, medicine and more.

They are due to land in Dublin Airport this afternoon.

Dr Claire Minang, one of the students from the class of 1986, said the trip was an opportunity to thank the sisters.

“They gave us everything we needed to excel in the world when we got out. That’s why we’re so grateful,” she told RTÉ News.

During their trip to Dublin, the group will be visiting Sr Mary Neville, 90, who served as their principal.

For Nagella Nwana Nukuna, now a technical manager at DuPont, the multinational chemicals firm, the school, while strict and structured, allowed them to grow.

“They were loving sisters to us. And, as we have grown up, we could all see that that level of structure is sometimes good,” Ms Nakuna said.

Although Sr Mary has long since retired, she remembers her time at the school, and her time with her girls fondly.

She said that each of the women appreciated the opportunity of education, during a time when it was generally the males that went to highs school and further education.

“The girls were anxious to make the best of their opportunity, and they worked very hard. I found them very conscientious and responsible people,” she said.

Sr Mary also applauded their parents who sent them to the school, acknowledging that, for many, it was a big financial sacrifice.

During her time there, she tried to ensure the best learning environment, working closely with the other teachers and prefects, even banning corporal punishment.

“I encouraged them to say what kind of school they want, how are you going to achieve that and having great pride in your own compound, in your school and in your own family” Sr Mary said.

Nogwa Fonjoe, who now works in cloud computing, remembers joining the school. She said that she had initially felt homesick after leaving her parents’ home.

However, despite the often strict curriculum and daily structure, she credits Sr Mary and the rest of the Holy Rosary Sisters for teaching her discipline.

Speaking to RTÉ News, she said it helped the students be more organised.

“It helped us appreciate what a good education is and we’re able to pass that on as well to our children.”

Today, the women are all still in touch with each other, regularly in contact through WhatsApp and supporting each other through their milestones.

For Sr Mary, it is an opportunity to reunite with the girls she once knew and celebrate the heights they have reached.

“Now they’ll be women, some of them grandmothers, well dressed and very mature. I’m so excited to be meeting them again.”

Source: RTE

When the 2022-23 school year resumed in Cameroon’s universities in October 2022, Rose Amandy, a second-year law student at the University of Yaounde 11, Soa, was surprised at the sharp increase in the prices of basic commodities in the local market near campus. This has made life perilous, she said because, unfortunately, the food allowance her parents provided for the semester remained the same.

“The prices of some basic food items have increased by over 50% and this is making life hard for students who depend on our parents. Unfortunately, my allowance from my parents has not changed and this makes it difficult. My semester allowance that was meant to last three months cannot support me for a month,” she complained.

“A tray of eggs that used to sell at XAF1,000 (Central African franc, equal to US$1.62) has gone up to XAF1,500 (US$2.43), while a kilo of rice increased from XAF400 (US$0.65) in 2021 to XAF650 (about US$1) in 2022,” she said.

Like Amandy, University students in the major cities in Cameroon say they are going without food to pay the higher transport fees to school and foregoing social activities in a bid to continue their education in a tough economic environment.

Inflationary pressures on food products have intensified in Cameroon since the start of the Ukraine war.

Difficult global economy

According to the Minister of Trade Luc Magloire Mbarga Atangana, the increase in the prices of mostly imported food items is the consequence of a perilous global economy triggered by the Ukraine war and the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The increase in prices of basic food items is not an isolated situation in Cameroon. It is the consequence of a difficult global economy,” the minister told the press at the end of 2022 to justify the increase in prices.

According to the Cameroon National Institute of Statistics, the country had a general inflation rate of 6.61% in August 2022, which is above the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC) zone inflation threshold of 3%. Compared with the same month in 2021, general inflation in August 2022 increased by 7.4% in Yaoundé and 6.6% in Douala, driven by a 14.5% to 14.9% increase in food prices – in particular oils and fats, bread and cereals, and meats. During this period, prices of locally produced food products in these cities also rose by 13.3% to 14.4%.

Benson Agbor, an economics student at the University of Yaounde 1, says he can barely buy food. “Now I am obliged to draw up a scale of preference when shopping as prices for commodities and services continue to rise,” he said.

Students suffer due to high prices

Students who live off campus had to deal with an increase in urban transport fares from XAF250 to XAF300 (about US$0.35). At the beginning of February 2023, the government, after conferring with the urban transport union, increased taxi fares following an increase in fuel prices from XAF650 to XAF750 a litre.

At the universities of Bamenda and Buea in the Northwest and Southwest regions where armed conflict between government regular soldiers and Anglophone rebels fighting for independence continues, the increase in staple food prices has exacerbated an already challenging situation for university students.

“Access to food has been difficult here for the past five years since the Anglophone crisis began. Now, with inflation characterised by hikes in food prices, we are going to die of hunger,” said Akuro Jane, a student in the faculty of education at the University of Bamenda.

The scarcity in food supply has continued to increase following global and internal crises, experts say.

According to the World Food Programme 2022 report, the onset of the war in Ukraine on 24 February 2022 saw price hikes globally on key commodities exported by both Ukraine and Russia, such as wheat, maize, and also fuel and fertiliser. This has had major implications for food security on the African continent, including in Cameroon, where food commodity prices have been on the rise.

Cameroon should become more independent

Despite proving resilient to shocks, including multiple crises in the northern part of the country, the north-west and south-west regions, Cameroon’s economic growth continues to be hampered by structural factors, including the over-reliance on oil, high debt levels, and limited investment in job-creating sectors, especially agriculture. As a result, Cameroon failed to reach its objective of achieving an average 5.5% annual growth during the 2010-20 time frame of its Growth and Employment Strategy Paper, experts say.

“Cameroon needs to depart from over-reliance on imports and adopt the policy of encouraging local production, especially the transformation of its primary agricultural products,” said Dieudonné Essomba, economist and former director in the ministry of the economy.

Finance Minister Louis-Paul Motaze, however, said the government is not folding its arms in the face of the crises. The government aims to keep public debt below 50% of GDP during the current fiscal year, despite the CEMAC target threshold of about 70%.

Plans to lower prices for students

The government has also announced the intensification of price controls in 2023 on some consumer products, including alcohol, margarine, sugar, refined vegetable oils, pasta and soap, in addition to some goods used in the construction industry, such as cement, tiles, electric cabling and paint.

Following complaints by university authorities, the ministry of commerce has announced a move to bring food items to university communities at lower prices.

“We are seeking to organise some temporal measures with mobile markets through shopping vans around university vicinities, with goods sold at wholesale market prices,” the minister of trade announced recently.

Source: University World News