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Late Mola Njoh Litumbe, Minority Anglophone rights campaigner,
who died at the age of 94 in Douala ,Cameroon
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By Christopher Ambe
Mola Njoh Litumbe was not
the president of the putative Republic of Ambazonia-even as many people had
wished that he should be with his enormous political wisdom and fearless determination
to defend the rights of minority English-speaking Cameroonians.
This patriarch and
prominent elite of Buea, generally known as a principled man, died on May 26 in
a clinic in Douala at the advanced age of 94. His body is at the Buea Regional
Mortuary.
Litumbe will be given a befitting burial by
mid-June, according to his cousin, Senator Mbella Moki, who helped mobilize for
the reception of the patriarch’s corpse in Buea the same day he died.
There is no doubt that Litumbe
died without achieving his greatest wish of getting the Biya government correct the injustices purportedly slammed by
the majority Francophone-led administration against minority English-speakers
(Anglophones) who on 1st October 1961 then known as Southern
Cameroons, a UN trust territory ,gained independence by joining La Republigue du
Cameroun.
But many critical
observers are agreed that he set the pace, for others to follow in his
footsteps in the domain of minority rights claims.
Litumbe’s continued
advocacy, against all odds, for Anglophones’ rights-and equality of status for
both English-and French-speaking Cameroonians, projected him more as an engine for Anglophone resistance
against perceived marginalization and discrimination by the majority Francophones.
On more than two occasions,
he was put under “house arrest” in his Membea House-Buea because of his
political activism, which was sharpening the consciousness of the Anglophone
Community about their plight. He would tell truth to power, without blinking.
For example in March 2013, acting in his
capacity as Chairman of Liberal Democratic Alliance (LDA),a political party, Litumbe convened a press conference but it was banned by the then Divisional officer(DO)
for Buea, Chekem M. Abraham who ordered
troops to surround the political rights activist’s residence.
An irate Litumbe dragged
the DO to the Fako High Court in Buea and won the case, reiterating the principle
that nobody is above the law.
To encourage Anglophones
to claim their rights, Litumbe even wrote a book on the annexation of Southern Cameroons,
titled “Case of the Annexation of the UN
British Administered Territory of Southern Cameroons”, in addition to his
extensive mass media campaigns to justify that there was no legal reunification
between British Southern Cameroons and La Republique du Cameroun; that there is
no documentary evidence at the UNO showing that Southern Cameroons and La
Republique du Cameroun legally joined. He likened the union between the two
entities as mere cohabitation.
In 2014, Litumbe’s
knowleagibility of Cameroon’s political realities pushed the Cameroon
Government to invite him as a speaker at a colloquium, which was part of
activities marking Cameroon’s Reunification. The colloquium had as theme “From
Reunification to Integration”
At the colloquium that
held at the University of Buea, chaired by then Prime Minister Philemon Yang, a
fearless Litumbe in his presentation, stubbornly went beyond his scheduled time(until
the microphone was disconnected) and fed the large audience with the bitter
historical facts ;for example, that there is no documentary evidence at the UNO
proving that Southern Cameroons and La Republique du Cameroun signed a union
treaty to become one country.
Even though Litumbe was a
key speaker at the colloquium and a political party leader, the Biya
administration did not formally invite him as one of dignitaries to be seated
at the Buea presidential tribune for the Golden Jubilee Celebration in 2014,
which was presided at by President Paul Biya.
The non-invitation of
Litumbe fuelled speculation that the Yaounde establishment was not happy with
his colloquium paper, which was greeted with thunderous applause.
Among other points,
Litumbe said at the colloquium: “To argue, as some misguided proponents say,
that an association of a UN member state with another territory could be deemed
valid, is to say that while the constitution of a country defines the prescriptions
to establish a marriage, parties who cohabit without going through the
statutory and legal steps to construct a legal marriage, could be deemed
nevertheless to be ‘married.’ The statute would first have to be amended, to
permit of such an interpretation.”
On October 1, 2011, as hundreds of Anglophones
assembled at Buea Mile 17 Motor Park to celebrate the 50th
anniversary of the independence of Southern Cameroons, Litumbe, who was then
the Home Front Leader of the Patriotic Coalition Front, which had mobilized the
activists for the peaceful march, was put under house arrest for the whole day with
heavily armed police on guard.
“The armed forces sealed
my gate so that I could not go out. I asked them who gave them the orders to do
that, and one said it was the governor and another said hierarchy. Nobody could
enter my premises all day; no domestic help to even give me food,” Litumbe told
reporters then.
Armed police then swooped
on the assembled activists at the motor park and arrested over 250 of them, while
over 60 activists escaped into the residence of Nigeria Consul-General in Buea
for protection.
In January 2012, President
Paul Biya and wife sent an SMS via MTN and Orange companies to millions of
Cameroonians, wishing them a happy new year 2012. But unable to text back to the
president, Litumbe issued a press release as his reply to the presidential SMS
in which he urged Biya to rather dialogue with Southern Cameroons, if he (Biya)
must have happiness that year.
Litumbe, using his private
funds embarked on a diplomatic offensive abroad, visiting the UN, the African
Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights,and other diplomatic services pleading
with them to help resolve the Anglophone crisis in Cameroon.
He was highly loved and
hailed by separatist leaders for his commitment to the Anglophone cause despite
his advanced age. Litumbe’s demise has been described by separatist leaders and
rights activists as a huge loss for their struggle for self-determination.
While Litumbe’s death has
created a vaccum in the rights claim struggle, many people think he had
emboldened many others to follow in his footsteps their efforts to right
wrongs.
Litumbe ,whose wife had
died died many years for him, leaves behind four children, relations and
friends to mourn and remember him.
( Also published in The HORIZON Newspaper,Cameroon,of June 1,2020)
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