A Keynote address delivered by Ni John Fru Ndi, National Chairman of the Social Democratic Front, to the United States Institute of Peace, Washington, D.C. September 12, 1996

Dr Little,
Distinguished Guests,

It gives me great pleasure to be with you here this morning. I am most grateful to Dr Little and his associates for affording this opportunity to share with this very knowledgeable group of people some of the obstacles that threaten to derail the democratisation process in Cameroon. Of course as a leader of a political party, I do have my biases; and my comments and observations could easily be dismissed as self-serving. But I ask you not to be too quick to reach this judgement, for much of what I shall here this morning is already in the public record.

The Institute of Peace, as I have been made to understand is an independent non-partisan federal institute created and funded by Congress to strengthen America's capacity to promote peaceful resolution of international conflicts. To my mind, most international conflicts are a consequence of domestic disturbances that subsequently escalate because of they are ignored in the first place by the international community.

While the Institute is primarily interested in the promotion of the peaceful resolution of global conflicts, I do not imagine that this mandate does not encompass the prevention or pre-emption of local conflicts while still in their infancy; particularly if they potentially can become messy and uncontrollable regional conflicts. It is with this consideration in mind that I took the liberty of tailoring my discussion to fit into the Institute's agenda.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Permit me to draw your attention to recent developments in Cameroon which if not carefully monitored might degenerate into the kind of conflict that calls for the expertise of Dr Little and his Institute staff!

One of the most frightening developments has been the exploitation by the state of ethnic and sectional differences to divide Cameroonians. So explosive has this issue become that even the churches have felt compelled to speak out. In a recent statement of the Synod Committee of the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon which was read in all congregations in the country, the church condemned tribalism and sectionalism as:

"Among our national woes which militate against national cohesion and economic revival"

It noted with deep regret the fact that tribalism has now been institutionalised; and that some unpatriotic Cameroonians were exploiting the advent of multiparty politics to invoke tribal and sectional sentiments.

Cameroon, like much of Africa, is a hodgepodge of approximately 200 ethnic groups. This ethnic diversity is further complicated by our dual colonial French and British heritage. Peace, stability and social tranquillity in our country hinge precariously on how social tensions are managed and diffused. The one thing Cameroon does not want in the legalisation of ethnic inequality. But regrettably, Ladies and Gentlemen, those who control our destiny do not seem to appreciate the damage that can result from a policy which encourages invidious distinctions between and among ethnic groups.

Opportunistic politicians joined by some tribal rulers have been enthusiastically promoting the cultural greatness of one tribe over other tribes and encouraging savage attacks on the less fortunate groups. They have found the Government itself which is pursuing a systematic, methodical and predetermined plan, complete with persuasive evangelists ready and willing to spread the gospel of ethnic discord. The Government plan consists of demonising certain ethnic groups while beatifying others, and as a consequence, reinforcing and heightening feelings of ethnic superiority in some while fostering a resurgence of old cruelties and tribal prejudices in others. Many observers in the country, including religious organisations as I mentioned earlier, have found it difficult to explain the contradictory role the government is playing on this question: pursuing national integration as a national goal, on the one hand, and at the same time, condoning

"State authorities who use inflammatory divisive language to incite people."

These mean and petty policies of divide-and-rule threaten to splinter Cameroon into multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, and multi-religious confusions. Against this background, the ethnic carnage that now consumes Burundi, Rwanda and Somalia is only a harbinger of things yet to come. I do not wish to sound alarmist but if the community of nations chooses to remain silent and passive then by the dawn of the next century, Cameroon like much of Africa will dissolve into chaos and anarchy. To avert this imminent apocalypse, something has to be done now!!! Friends of Cameroon must now throw their support behind leaders with vision and progressive movements imbued with a redemptive mission.

A second area of concern is the slow pace of democratisation. The mass of Cameroonians have waited patiently for too long to allowed a meaningful say in the shaping of their political destiny. But they are becoming quite restless at the cavalier manner in which the government is proceeding with the democratisation exercise. By way of background:

In 1990, Cameroon, like many sub-Saharan African countries, bowed to external and domestic pressures to open up the political process and for the second time in its post-colonial history, allowed for multiparty competitive politics. Our party, the Social Democratic Front, was officially launched in May 1990; and the history of that very violent birth has been recounted so many times over that it has now become part of Cameroonian folklore. But the official harassment and persecution of the SDF and other opposition parties continue unabated; that properly registered political parties must be made to endure this type of treatment, merely goes to expose the elaborate charade that passes for democratic governance in Cameroon. In any case, as part of the this so-called new political dispensation, the Biya government hastily put together a new press law, an electoral code and a revised constitution.

But as one reviews these documents, one is struck by the fact that the lurch toward democratisation and liberalisation has been nothing more than an attempt by Mr Biya and his advisers to buy time by appeasing international financial institutions and donor countries. Democratisation and liberalisation were never intended to address the yearnings of Cameroonians for greater control over their political destiny. As a consequence, the Biya government has been quick to seize every available opportunity to turn the clock back to the days of authoritarian, one party rule. The evidence is abundant and irrefutable. Let me comment on just the framework for elections put in place by Mr Biya's government.

As the leader of a social democratic party, I subscribe to the proposition that political change must be pursued through democratic and constitutional means. In this respect, the rules governing the conduct of elections beginning with registration of voters right down to the actual voting itself, are of crucial importance. When these rules are operated to frustrate the electorate and to render their votes useless, then they make the resort to violence appealing, as the only means to user-in change. Three elections have been conducted under the Biya electoral code:

The March 1992 legislative elections,
The October 1992 Presidential elections, and
The January 1996 municipal elections.

In the first of these three elections, the Social Democratic Front chose not to participate in protest for the flawed electoral code. However, in the presidential elections that followed on the heels of the legislative, following assurances from external observers of a fair fight, we agreed to contest the elections. I stood as the candidate for the progressive forces in the country. Due to massive rigging we were robbed of our victory. The rest, as they say, is history.

As a result of the government's highhanded tactics in the wake of these two elections, the Cameroonian society was torn apart and came quite close to disintegrating. In the most recent municipal elections, the government tried again to thwart the will of the majority. My party fielded candidate lists in some 250 municipal councils. The government summarily dismissed more than half of our lists on the eve of the elections. Despite this setback we went to the polls and succeeded in winning over 60 local councils; in the process sweeping all the major urban councils including those of Douala, the economic capital, Bafoussam, Nkongsamba, Limbe, Kumba and even Yaounde, the political and administrative capital. Stunned by my party's impressive performance, the government set about to seize power after having been rebuffed by the electorate. It appointed Government Delegates to run each of the major Urban Councils that the SDF won.

This is also true of the major urban Councils won by the National Union for Democracy and Progress (NUDP) led by Bello Bouba Maigari. In each case the appointed government delegate came from Mr Biya's party, the Cameroon Peoples Democratic Movement (CPDM). And worst still, many of these appointees had headed their party's lists that lost to the opposition parties or had served as campaign managers for the losing CPDM.

Imagine if you will, the municipal elections of a couple of years ago when Mr Rudolph Guilliani, a Republican, defeated Mr David Dinkins, a Democrat, to become Mayor of New York City. Imagine that not only did Mr Guilliani unseat the incumbent mayor but that the entire New York City Council also came under the control of the Republicans. Unhappy with these results, President Clinton, a Democrat, invokes an old law abrogated by a new Constitution he has just promulgated, which law permits him to appoint federal tsars, let us call the 'government delegates' in major city councils, New York being one of them. Using this antiquated law, the President appoints a fellow Democrat, the defeated Mr David Dinkins, as the Government Delegate for New York City, to lord it over elected Mr Rudolph Guilliani and the entire New York City Council.

To a United States audience, what I have just described will certainly be dismissed as fiction of a particular bad taste! Sadly this is not fiction but the painful reality in Cameroon. Even as I speak, popularly elected mayors in Bafoussam, Bamenda, Douala, Garoua, Kumba, Maroua, Nkongsamba and Limbe have been disabled by a council law that vests all powers in un-elected government delegates. The irony must not be lost on anybody:

In March 1992, the SDF decided to boycott the parliamentary elections and was criticised from within and outside Cameroon for being poor sportsmen; In October of the same year I contested the presidential elections and defeated Mr Biya handily, only to watch with horror as my victory was being stolen right before our own eyes; Four years later having prevailed in the municipal elections, our valiant efforts have been reduced to nought. What a pyrrhic victory! Can you now blame me for asking how much more can Cameroonians stomach?! How much of a bell needs to be rung before the international community does something to ensure that Mr Biya and his cronies pursue faithfully the democratisation process?! What do I tell our peace-loving supporters whom we asked to place their faith in the ballot box and who now see their trust and patience brusquely pushed aside by a government bent on hanging on to power even if it means destroying the country in the process?! Must we continue to fold our hands and do nothing while a part of our world goes up in flames? Please give me some re-assuring answers to take back to my people.

Thank you!

The end