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Anglophone Secessionist Movements in Cameroon

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Book cover Secessionism in African Politics

Part of the book series: Palgrave Series in African Borderlands Studies ((PSABS))

Abstract

The deep roots of current Anglophone secessionist claims can be found in what is called the “Anglophone problem.” Anglophone Cameroonians feel that reunification with Francophone Cameroon in 1961 has marginalized the Anglophone minority—endangering Anglophone cultural heritage and identity—in a post-colonial nation-state controlled by a Francophone political elite. Anglophone resistance has been a permanent feature of Cameroon’s post-colonial biography. Yet only in the early 1990s did Anglophone elites mobilize the regional population, claiming self-determination, autonomy, and later outright secession. The prospects for secession appear bleak, owing to heavy-handed state repression, internal divisions within the main secessionist organization, an international and regional political architecture with a default commitment to state sovereignty and territorial integrity, and diverging views among Anglophone Cameroonians on the appropriate way forward.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003).

  2. 2.

    Anyangwe (2008, 2009) and Ndi (2014a, b).

  3. 3.

    Gwaibi (2016).

  4. 4.

    See, for example, http://www.iuaes.org/statement/letter_on_%20Cameroon.pdf, and http://www.rfi.fr/emission/20170219-comprendre-question-anglophone-cameroun (last accessed April 15, 2017).

  5. 5.

    Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium, https://www.ca-csc.org (last accessed April 14, 2017).

  6. 6.

    cf. Konings and Nyamnjoh (1997, 2003), Eyoh (1998), Jua (2003), Anyangwe (2008, 2009), and Ndi (2014a, b).

  7. 7.

    For the history of Northern Cameroons, see Le Vine (1964) and Welch (1966). Northern Cameroons voted in the 1961 plebiscite for integration into the Federation of Nigeria.

  8. 8.

    Konings (2005a).

  9. 9.

    Awasom (1998).

  10. 10.

    Amazee (1990).

  11. 11.

    Ngoh (2001).

  12. 12.

    Welch (1966: 158–88) and Johnson (1970: 42).

  13. 13.

    Ardener (1967), Chem-Langhëë and Njeuma (1980), and Ebai (2009).

  14. 14.

    Kofele-Kale (1980).

  15. 15.

    Awasom (2000).

  16. 16.

    Joseph (1977) and Mbembe (1996).

  17. 17.

    Amazee (1994) and Njeuma (1995).

  18. 18.

    Awasom (2000) and Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003).

  19. 19.

    Percival (2008).

  20. 20.

    The British had informed the United Nations that the Southern Cameroons would not be economically viable as an independent state. This was based on the Phillipson Report (1959) commissioned by the Foncha government in 1959.

  21. 21.

    Ngoh (1990: 179–80).

  22. 22.

    Joseph (1977).

  23. 23.

    Susungi (1991); For similar ideas, see Victor Epie Ngome’s excellent novel What God Has Put Asunder (1992).

  24. 24.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003).

  25. 25.

    Awasom (2000), Milne (1999: 432–48), and Gaillard (1994).

  26. 26.

    Messmer (1998: 134–35).

  27. 27.

    Anyangwe (2009).

  28. 28.

    All Anglophone Conference (1993: 12).

  29. 29.

    Ardener (1967) and Stark (1976).

  30. 30.

    Stark (1976).

  31. 31.

    Benjamin (1972).

  32. 32.

    Eyoh (1998).

  33. 33.

    Kofele-Kale (1986) and Takougang and Krieger (1998).

  34. 34.

    Bayart (1989).

  35. 35.

    Kofele-Kale (1981) and Rowlands (1993).

  36. 36.

    Konings (2001).

  37. 37.

    Takougang and Krieger (1998).

  38. 38.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003).

  39. 39.

    Biya (1987), Nyamnjoh and Akum (2008).

  40. 40.

    Reference to the incumbent regime as the government of La République du Cameroun, the name adopted by Francophone Cameroon at independence, has become a key signifier in the replotting of the nation’s constitutional history as a progressive consolidation of the recolonization of Anglophone Cameroon by the post-colonial Francophone-dominated state. See Eyoh (1998: 264).

  41. 41.

    Anyangwe (2008).

  42. 42.

    “The New Social Order” by Fon Gorji Dinka, March 20, 1985, reproduced in Mukong (1990: 98–99).

  43. 43.

    The name is derived from Ambas Bay at the foot of Mount Cameroon, which was the area of permanent British settlement in the present-day Anglophone region. In 1858, the British Baptist missionary, Alfred Saker, purchased land from the King of Bimbia and became the de facto governor of the small colony of Victoria that was named after the British Queen. See Ardener (1968).

  44. 44.

    Krieger (2008).

  45. 45.

    Nyamnjoh (2005).

  46. 46.

    Konings (2002).

  47. 47.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003: 77–78).

  48. 48.

    Mbu (1993).

  49. 49.

    Konings (2004).

  50. 50.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003: 142–48).

  51. 51.

    All Anglophone Conference (1993: 8).

  52. 52.

    Konings (1999).

  53. 53.

    All Anglophone Conference (1994).

  54. 54.

    See SCNC press release reprinted in Cameroon Post, August 16–23, 1994: 3. See also Anyangwe (2008).

  55. 55.

    Cameroon Post, October 8–14, 1996 and The Witness, November 12–18, 1996.

  56. 56.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003) and Anyefru 2010).

  57. 57.

    See SCNC, “Petition against the Annexation of the Southern Cameroons.” Buea, May 1995 (mimeo).

  58. 58.

    SCNC, “The London Communiqué.” London, June 22, 1995 (mimeo).

  59. 59.

    See “Annan Ends African Tour, Seeks Cameroon Dialogue” on scncforum website, May 4, 2000.

  60. 60.

    See http://www.unpo.org

  61. 61.

    Anyefru (2010: 94–99) and Nfor (2016).

  62. 62.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003: 96–99).

  63. 63.

    Jua and Konings (2004), Gumne (2006), and Anyefru (2010).

  64. 64.

    Kinni (2013).

  65. 65.

    Jua and Konings (2004: 624).

  66. 66.

    Jua and Konings (2004: 624–25).

  67. 67.

    Dicklitch (2010).

  68. 68.

    Ebai (2009).

  69. 69.

    Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003: 99–101).

  70. 70.

    See Star Headlines, 19 March 2006, “The British Government Condemns Anglophone Secession.”

  71. 71.

    Jua and Konings (2004).

  72. 72.

    Konings (2005b: 176).

  73. 73.

    The Post, November 13, 2000: 3.

  74. 74.

    SCARM was the successor of the Cameroon Anglophone Movement (CAM), which was originally the most important Anglophone movement.

  75. 75.

    See “British Southern Cameroons Summit, Resolutions.” Washington, June 17, 2001 (mimeo); and “Washington Proclamation of the Statehood of Ex-British Southern Cameroons.” Washington, June 17, 2001 (mimeo).

  76. 76.

    Nfor (2016).

  77. 77.

    See http://bamendaonline.net/blog/hon-ayah-speaks-out-after-supreme-court-appointment/ (last accessed April 2015).

  78. 78.

    See http://www.cameroonvoice.com/news/article-news-18398.html (last accessed April 15, 2017).

  79. 79.

    Nfor (2016).

  80. 80.

    January 2017.

  81. 81.

    See https://www.facebook.com/scncsoutherncameroonsnationalcouncil/posts/592013517662909 (last accessed April 2015).

  82. 82.

    Jua and Konings (2004), Nyamnjoh (2005), and Anyefru (2008).

  83. 83.

    Nyamnjoh and Rowlands (1998).

  84. 84.

    Eyoh (1998), Mbile (2000), and Fonchingong (2005).

  85. 85.

    Geschiere and Nyamnjoh (2000), Konings and Nyamnjoh (2003).

  86. 86.

    Awoh and Nkwi (2015).

  87. 87.

    Anyefru (2010), and Nfor (2016).

  88. 88.

    See Cameroon Concord, http://cameroon-concord.com/headlines/item/7265-cameroon-lawyers-protest-police-injure-dozens-raid-law-offices-american-diplomat-steps-in (last accessed April 14, 2017).

  89. 89.

    See https://www.ca-csc.org (last accessed April 2017).

  90. 90.

    Owono (2010).

  91. 91.

    Owono 2010).

  92. 92.

    Sindjoun (1995), Ndjana (1996), Nkoum-Me-Ntseny (1999), and Owono (2010).

  93. 93.

    Konings (1999).

  94. 94.

    See Bernard Fonlon, http://www.alafnet.com/cameroon-a-secret-memo-by-bernard-fonlon-to-ahmadou-ahidjo/ (last accessed April 2017).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. African Studies Centre, University of Leiden, Leiden, The Netherlands

    Piet Konings

  2. University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa

    Francis B. Nyamnjoh

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  1. Wageningen University & Research, De Bilt, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Lotje de Vries

  2. Pomona College, Claremont, CA, USA

    Pierre Englebert

  3. Overseas Development Institute, London, UK

    Mareike Schomerus

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Konings, P., Nyamnjoh, F.B. (2019). Anglophone Secessionist Movements in Cameroon. In: de Vries, L., Englebert, P., Schomerus, M. (eds) Secessionism in African Politics. Palgrave Series in African Borderlands Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90206-7_3

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