Society

Ice Prince Zamani has been doing a lot of music collaborations with non-Nigerian artists lately and next on his list is Cameroonian rap star and 2014 MAMAs Best New Act winner,Stanley Enow.

The "N-Word" hit maker jumped on his Twitter page to announce his next music move when he posted this:

"Me and the bro @StanleyEnow cooking!"

The untitled song is still in the works but this could be the perfect opportunity for the Nigerian rap star to penetrate the French African market.

Ice Prince recently dropped a video for "N-Word" which featuresAKA from South Africa. He'd also dropped his critically acclaimed hit, "Shots on Shots" which featured Ghanaian rapper Sarkodie.

So, a new song with a Cameroonian rap king is totally on the right track

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Ngwa Bertrand

15.Aug.2014

Hits: 1689

By Theodore Suifon

The late President Ahmadou Ahidjo signed Decree No 77-245 of 15^th July 1977 that organized Fondons and Chiefdoms in the United Republic of Cameroon. The Ahidjo decree inter alia made provisions for first-class, second-class and third-class Chiefs and Fons and defined the modalities for appointment of Fons and Chiefs including the responsibilities and benefits attached to the duties of a Chief and Fon. These all changed after November 6^th 1982 with the coming to power of President Biya and his counterfeit policy of rigour and moralization. Today, overzealousness, greed and dirty CPDM politics have shattered traditional institutions and the pride, personality and the reverence that Anglophone Chiefs and Fons used to have.

Fondoms and Chiefdoms in Cameroon are as old as the history of Cameroon itself. Fons, Nfors, Sultans, Lamidos and Emirs administered their people as natural leaders. Although not elected through popular elections, they were never self-made. Through consultation by kingmakers, succession to the throne was hereditary by members of the royal family who lorded it over the rest of the tribe in an unchallenged and unwritten arrangement. The British colonial administrative policy of Indirect Rule wherein Fons, Emirs, Lamidos and Chiefs served as auxiliaries of the administrations later provided for a House of Chiefs to give tradition its due place in the political scene. The House of Chiefs was more or less an apolitical and advisory body.

After 31 years of bad governance, the clamour for the reestablishment of the House of Chiefs is rife but the current environment or traditional terrain is characterized by CPDM confusion. Fons, Chiefs, Lamidos have more militant in party politics even more than founders of those parties. Such political and personal ambitions have stood on the way of attempts to bring the natural rulers together. CPDM modernism has made North West Fons and South West Chiefs to abandon almost everything that makes them worth the name. Fons, Lamidos and Chiefs drink and get drunk in bars, rub shoulders and chests with women, shake hands with anybody, move capless and dress like pop stairs, fight over trivial issues and most of the times over girlfriends with their sons. The mystical and overwhelming powers of Anglophone Chiefs and Fons have fled.

Almost anybody can become a Chief in CPDM Cameroon provided the financial resources and CPDM backing are there. Chieftaincy wrangles and fight for succession have torn tribes apart and heads have even rolled. This goes contrary to what the late President Ahmadou Ahidjo. Chiefs and Fons have taken turns at the Kondengui high security prison. Cameroon is in need of a strong revival.

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Ngwa Bertrand

13.Aug.2014

Hits: 11535

              By Arrey Echi Agbor-Ndakaw

It is a weekend and you are home relaxing with your family after a busy week. Your favorite tv or radio programme is on and it is a particular episode you have been anticipating. Your eyes are glued to the big screen and your ears are perked up listening to every word, when suddenly, in the middle of that climaxing moment, there is pitch blackness and grave yard silence! Electricity is gone off!!!! It may happen just in a twinkling of an eye. This is the normal day-to-day life in Cameroon, the giant of the CEMAC zone. Correspondingly, in the early hours of the morning or late in the evening, the sight that greets many people are those of throngs of individuals from primary school pupils to grandparents carrying buckets of all shapes and colours trekking distances to fetch water. Some of these people have been for month’s ohne ende without water. Meals are served late; children and parents arrive late at school and at work.

Blessed with a rich variety of flora, fauna and aquatic life with an impressive number of streams and rivers and even the sea passing through this cursed triangular call Cameroon, it is not surprising to hear its nickname - ‘Africa in miniature’. With this richness in natural resources and a steady and regular rainy season, energy and water should not be a part of our Cameroonian problems. However, even with the vast supply of natural and mineral resources that God in his infinite image created and planted in Cameroon and an active ministerial department in charge of water and energy, these crises have become the rule rather than the exception. Many find it very normal nowadays that lights and water must go off so much so that staying even one month without this happening is considered a miracle. Appliances and food stuff have been known to get bad again and again.

 Cameroonians have derived new methods of going about their daily lives. Kerosene and solar lamps and candles are always on the ready. Meanwhile, those who can afford readily buy standby generators and construct bore holes which ensure a regular supply of water and light. The vast majority of the population however, continue to trek in search of water. Others have the good sense to buy storage cans which must be filled in the wee hours of dawn. This has in a way created jobs for some industrious individuals. However, people suffer from the brunt of excruciating prices as some of these water storage containers cost an arm and a leg. And as if to say the Cameroonian people can do nothing, the concerned sectors and their workers most often lazy away in their offices. Bills are deliberately delivered late and sometimes never and they muster the courage to penalize those who delay to pay bills they never saw. This has created a new trend in which consumers chase bills to avoid being penalized.

Despite having all these resources and even the ability to develop others and improve on the wellbeing of citizens and neighboring countries by being a supplier, many concerned and observant citizens have voiced their worries as to why these two sectors which are so vital to human life are not fully utilized? Or could it be that unscrupulous individuals make away with resources put in place for such projects? Whatever the situation may be, one thing remains sure, until these matters are addressed and possible redresses reached, water and energy crises will continue to be amongst others; a cancer plaguing this beautiful “cursed” triangular country in Africa.

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Ngwa Bertrand

05.Aug.2014

Hits: 2083

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Ngwa Bertrand

01.Aug.2014

Hits: 2520

By Arrey Echi Agbor-Ndakaw

Any nation that its youth population leave either the classroom or working place and go straight into a bar can never prosper. This is the attitude encouraged by the New Deal government for the last 31 years- that of the Cameroonian youth frequenting bars and other drinking places instead of trying to figure out a future.

The political leadership supported by a corrupt class of elites so to speak has deliberately or accidentally created a lazy and uncreative atmosphere in the country where the younger generation prefers an easy life through which everything could be handed to them on a silver platter while they hide behind beer as a means to escape boredom.

Some have opined that the reason many younger people frequent such alcohol consumption places instead of reflecting on the way forward was largely due to the absence of recreational facilities and other social amenities to challenge their intellect while daring them to be different.

There is no doubt that excessive consumption of alcohol and hard stuff dulls the mental prowess and the ability to reason things well and when people frequent bars from as early as 6 am, one wonders when exactly the government think tanks get to work? And when they actually find themselves at work place be it at the Ministry of the Economy and Finance or the presidency of the republic, the tank they think from becomes very shallow. To be sure alcohol consumption adds a certain flare in the overall ‘joie de vivre’ and in the case of Cameroon encourages low productivity both in the government and private sectors. However, when it is done excessively usually with little or no control it becomes a social nuisance.

Alcohol consumption has become a normal everyday occurrence that longtime friends reuniting after a spell usually have to rebaptise their friendship over a few beers without which the reunion doesn’t seem to have much appeal. Furthermore, it has become so ingrained into the everyday lives of the majority of citizens that nothing meets a protest more than the increased price of beer in which the powers that be are always quick to redress and appease the masses.

Cameroonians drink because they have unlimited access to beer. There is no longer any difference between on and off license bars. No government policy encouraging Cameroonians to drink responsibly. Families have broken up and the health and education of kids tampered with because some parents could rather deal with their beer addiction than take care of their off springs. Don’t our leaders think providing social amenities and distractions will help to curb the excessive drinking prevalent in Cameroon today! Even with the poor transport network in the yesteryears, the Ahidjo regime had vacation camps!! A stitch in time saves nine

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Ngwa Bertrand

01.Aug.2014

Hits: 2642

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Ngwa Bertrand

31.Jul.2014

Hits: 2967