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