Yaoundé (National Times)-The Paramount Rulers of the Bafaws in the South West Region of Cameroon, and Eldest Member of the Senate, Senator Nfon Victor Esemingsongo Mukete, Friday, April 5, 2019, took Cameroon’s Upper House of Parliament by storm over the plights of the Anglophone community.
This was during a plenary, during which, the draft law on Regional elections was tabled for debate.
Ceasing the floor, the revered Senator warned Government not bodge such a glorious opportunity in implementing effective decentralisation, which he said will give the local people the opportunity to take control of their fates.
According to the Centenarian, the over concentration of power in Yaoundé is responsible for the armed conflict presently rocking the two Anglophone Regions of Cameroon.
He expressed his disdain over what he termed “Yaounde’s unwillingness to effectively transfer powers to local collectivities”, and warned that Cameroon will continue to sink into the abyss of an armed conflict, if the law makers and the executive hurried over the draft law and promulgate it into law without effective scrutiny.
To him, any failure to implement the kind of decentralisation that will empower the local people to manage their own affairs, will be wasting another opportunity to right the wrongs of the country’s history.
“I am speaking with tears in my eyes because of the Crisis in the Northwest and Southwest Regions. The Crisis would not have cropped up had Government truly given decentralisation a chance.”
The Eldest Senator further stated that if Government still allow appointed Governors e to continue calling the shots at the Regional levels, while executives of Regional Council have been elected, then what it would be giving the population will not be decentralisation, but some mirage it is concocting.
“Let the Regional structures have a meaning. Let powers be delegated to the Regional officials to manage their affairs in Agriculture, Education and health among other issues. Let the Central Government handle other issues like security,”he said. Reminding the House that he is over 100 years old, Chief Mukete said Cameroon was initiating a very crucial bend in history.“Let us not make any errors. We should embrace honesty, integrity and an impeccable dispensation of justice”.
He wondered why Cameroon that is endowed with enormous human and natural resources is lagging behind, while other countries withfewer resources are far ahead.
Going by the Senator, the one thing that can arrest Cameroon’s predicament is the kind of decentralisation that will fully empower the masses to manage their own affairs.
The CPDM Senator condemned the predominant use of the French language even in the Anglophone Regions.
Senator Mukete’s outing came almost a year after Hon Joseph Wirba, SDF Member of the Parliament of the Jakiri Special Constituency took the Lower House of Parliament to decry the marginalisation and subjugation of Anglophones by their Francophone counterparts.
