It’s not often that I have the opportunity to report a feel-good story from Cameroon, a story that lifts the heart and allows hope for the future of one of Africa’s most troubled countries. This story has to do with the courage of young poets who are contesting the dictatorship of Paul Biya.
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Since independence from joint British and French rule in 1960, Cameroon has been governed by two dictators, Ahmadou Ahidjo and Paul Biya. The latter has been in power for 42 years.
Now, at 92 years old and having just spent time in a hospital in Switzerland having a pacemaker fitted, he is seeking re-election for a further seven-year term in a country torn apart by his tyranny.
A primary cause for concern is his regime’s brutal oppression of the Anglophone South-West and North-West regions of the country, igniting a crisis that has cost thousands of lives. A resistance group has been fighting for independence or, at least, autonomy for a region they call Ambazonia.
So what have Cameroon’s writers been saying about Biya and his mob? Your favourite columnist has Cameroon as one of his specialist research areas and so can tell a bit about this.
The early novels of Ferdinand Oyono and Mongo Beti are studied all over the world as classics of anti-colonial writing; Oyono went on to become a lackey of the regime, but Beti tore into the dictatorship in a long series of works written from exile in France.
In 1988 I published a piece on Beti that got me banned from Cameroon, a ban that still holds today.
I took up the cudgels again in 2013, writing reports for Amnesty International and for newspapers in the UK and South Africa on the plight of Enoh Meyomesse, a poet and anti-Biya activist who was jailed in the appalling Kondengui prison on what were trumped-up charges.
Meyomesse’s Poème carcéral has been published in an English translation as Jail Verse and is highly recommended. (From Nigeria to Kenya to South Africa, it is distressing that prison poetry and memoirs form such an important branch of African Literature).
Another writer I should mention is Patrice Nganang who lives in exile in the USA. In 2017 he was kidnapped by the regime at the country’s international airport, Douala, and imprisoned. If this sounds to my readers far-fetched, I should point out that the Cameroonian regime has a track record of hunting down opponents and killing them, even in highly secure countries such as Switzerland.
A judge had Nganang released after three weeks; one can only wonder what fate befell the judge. Now for the new development, I led this piece with. Readers will remember my enthusiasm for a weekly online journal of African affairs that bears the ironic title Africa is a Country.
This is edited by the excellent South African political correspondent, Will Shoki. Only on July 22nd did they publish a piece by Shulmo Trust Dohyee entitled Speaking Poetry to Power, a title that takes off from John Milton’s observation that, faced with tyrannical government, we have a responsibility to “speak truth to power.”
This article is on the initiative of young Cameroonian performance poets, male and female, who have had the imagination and courage to give recitals of poems contesting the regime.
Dohyee focusses especially on the work of 23-year-old Taleabong Boris Alemnge (stage name PenBoy) and the article carries wonderful photos of him.
You can also check him out on Google for more pictures and details of recordings of his performances. Dohyee writes: “Imagine a dimly lit room in Buea [the administrative centre of Cameroun’s South-West] – a town where people have become used to going about their business with gunshots echoing far and wide like waves across a rocky shore”.
A young spoken-word artist takes the stage, topless, with his face and body painted white with various African symbols as if to hide his pain. With words as sharp as a double-edged sword, he weaves a tale of pain, hope, and resilience; his voice carries the weight of a people silenced for too long, a people yearning for peace and justice.”
Yes, that’s how things are done.
Dohyee continues: “spoken-word artists like Penboy use their craft to instil faith in a new future. Through their artistry they offer a glimmer of hope to a population in despair and, through their powerful performances, they inspire empathy, compassion, and a shared sense of humanity.”
He concludes: “As long as the spoken-word warriors continue to fight on their front lines, a united Cameroon rich in cultural diversity remains a future worth fighting for.”
Young poets and other performance artistes in Lesotho take heed and take the initiative.
In a country groaning under misgovernance, endless internecine squabbles within the political parties, mass unemployment and the prospect of starvation, artistes following the example of PenBoy would have a real role to fulfill.
Chris Dunton is a former Professor of English and Dean of Humanities at the National University of Lesotho.
