Reunification: 52 Years Of Boom Or Doom?

A feverish dream for a brilliant, prosperous future sprung from the conclusions of the Foumban Talks in 1961. 52 years later, memorable pieces of the past and yields of reunification hauntingly dog the reunified nations, particularly the Southern Cameroons. 
By Azore Opio
The “promised land” of reunification is reeling from scandal, corruption and sleaze. The country may be buzzing with development slogans, but a number of high-profile, ugly affairs among its supposedly leading policies have shown that the soul of reunification is in crisis. 
The pace of economic development in the “Ceylon” of West Africa with its vast diversification of resources, rich and fertile soil, which increased tremendously in the mid-1950s, has been reduced to mere actuality.
The most important factor in the economy of Southern Cameroons was the Cameroons Development Corporation, although up to late 1950s the administering authority of the Trust Territory of Southern Cameroons had no knowledge of mineral resources of commercial value existing in the territory.
After the constitutional reorganisation in 1953, Southern Cameroons had an Agriculture Department headquartered in Barombi-Kang, some eight kilometres from Kumba with an experimental farm of 800 acres. Bambui in Bamenda Division was doing good work in the same line and demonstration farms were scattered throughout the territory. In the North Production Officers were stationed at Mbui and on the Mambila Plateau. Irrigation engineers worked at Wulgo. Meanwhile, the road system was linked to French Cameroun at Tombel and Santa; the Public Works Department maintained the road system. And there was a ferry across the Mungo River. A bridge at this point was envisaged.
Colonial administration justified the “inevitability and desirability” of “good roads” in Cameroon Province and Bamenda Province. To them, the Federal Trunk Road A4 which ran from Victoria to Bamenda was the “spinal cord” of all land communication in the southern part of the Trust Territory. Thus, in 1953, the road from Victoria to Bamenda was tarred as far as Kumba with bridges. From Kumba onwards, one way traffic only was allowed up and down on alternate days in the rainy season. Beyond Mamfe, it was three days a week only.
The Bamenda ring-road and the road west from Kumba produced encouraging responses by plantations, peasants and traders. The tarred road from Victoria to Kumba made Kumba the fastest growing town from 10,000 to about 30,000 persons in five years, permitting increased timber export. And in 1960, Kenneth Berrill would warn about overlooking the important role a good road system would play in the development of the Southern Cameroons, “There is no doubt that road construction and maintenance should be the biggest single enhancer of economic development. It would indeed be a tragedy if, for any reason, uncertainty in this transitional period (1961 plebiscite) caused a slowdown of the effort for a road programme.” 
Berrill would be absolutely vindicated by the happenings after the 1961 plebiscite.
If roads were an important factor in the economy of the Southern Cameroons, education and environment sanitation were of equal importance. Curriculum of all schools included physical training and organised games based on African songs and dances. Children did Rural Science, practical farm work and learnt the use of better tools; they kept accurate farm accounts. In junior schools, children grew flowers, vegetables, raised annuals from seeds and learnt different methods of propagating herbaceous plants and shrubs and the correct use of manure.
In environmental sanitation, human and animal excreta was disposed of in shallow trenches, Otway pits, septic tanks and composting was done in some towns. Streets were adequately drained and there were incinerators for rubbish. Elementary sanitation was taught in schools. Markets had public latrines. In Bamenda Division, all principle markets had slaga latrines. In Victoria Buea and Bamenda, there was regular pipe-borne water. In urban areas, stagnant pools were drained or filled in or oiled. In some cases they were treated with a substance called Paris Green. Measures were taken too to eliminate the breeding places of mosquitoes by oiling and proper drainage and the control of flies by the proper disposal of excrement or refuse or residual spraying with D.D.T components.
CDC
The Cameroons Development Corporation (CDC) was formed in Nigeria in 1947 to take over the German plantations. The ordinance required the corporation to secure the development of such land as might have come under its control by means of leases. The CDC was given powers to drain, clear and develop resources of the land in consonance with development of the land such as the constriction of buildings, roads, waterways, railways and wharves. The corporation was also empowered to ship, tug, exercise the task of lighter age owners, carriers, shipper and customs agents, wharfingers, warehousemen, manufacturers, builders, fishermen, dealers in livestock, stockbreeders and farmers generally as well as carry out the business of exporter, importer and to buy and sell merchandise of all descriptions, all in so far as it was consistent with the promotion of the common benefit of the Southern Cameroons people. CDC was charged with providing for religious, educational and general social welfare of its employees by providing housing, factories, churches, hospitals, dispensaries, schools, etc.
Co-operatives
The need for co-operatives arose after the rehabilitation of the ex-German plantations by CDC. Local Bakweri farmers belonging to the Bakweri Union of Farmers began agitating to join the industry. Thus, on December 18, 1951, the union held its first meeting with the Assistant Registrar of Co-operatives. They wanted to be registered as a co-operative society with the main objective of marketing bananas. The Premier of the Southern Cameroons, Dr. E.M.L Endeley, who was also the President of the Bakweri Union of Farmers, P. M. Kale, Ngando and Naptheal Ligbea, leading members of the union, attended the meeting. On June 12, the union was registered as a co-operative society with 73 members with Chief Molombe Ngomba as President and M.L. Eliva, Secretary. On August 30, the union signed an agreement with CDC and on September 5, the first shipment of 898 stems was made. 
The co-operative movement had been born and it would have far-reaching repercussions upon the population and the economic development of the Division. The co-operatives were to mobilise all household savings for development purposes in order to increase productivity of peasant farmers and the turnover of small businessmen, the craftsman, etc. At one moment, there were 15 banana co-operatives in Southern Cameroons, which included the Santa Coffee Estate, Nso Area Co-operative, Bamenda Cooperative Marketing Association.  By July 1958, 2.375.000 tons of banana stems had been shipped, representing cash payments of over a million pounds sterling. Then the union had 14 member societies with 2,080 members, a fleet of 50 fruit-carrying vehicles under the Cameroons Co-operative Engineering and Transport Union Limited complete with well equipped garages at Dibanda.
No account of co-operatives would be complete without mention of banking and marketing. Before the Bank of West Africa arrived, the only bank operating in the British Cameroons was known as the Barclays Bank D.C.O. Branches were later established in Tiko and Buea. Meanwhile, the Southern Cameroons Marketing Board was established on January 1, 1955. Hitherto, Southern Cameroons cocoa and oil palm had been marketed through the Nigeria Cocoa Marketing Board. 
The Southern Cameroons Marketing Board was charged with the duty of “securing the most favourable arrangements for the purchasing and evacuation to a port of shipment of produce intended for export, promoting the development of the producing industries and the benefits and prosperity for the producers and the areas of production.” 
The most important powers of the Board were to “fix prices to be paid to producers of produce intended for export at any place within the Southern Cameroons and to support and stabilise the price of produce from time to time in accordance with such a policy as the Board may determine.”
The Cameroon Bank Ltd. was incorporated in 1961 through the initiative of the West Cameroon Government. The raison d’être for the creation of the bank were six-fold – to mobilize savings, assist indigenous businessmen who were often refused loans by other banks, finance ventures and activities in the interest of the country, assist in economic development of West Cameroon in particular and the Federation as a whole and lastly, justify its existence in the economic and business sense by making profits.
In the first decade of reunification from June 1963 to June 1971, the Bank achieved some of its objectives. Its balances on savings and fixed deposit accounts rose from 160 million frs cfa to about 600 million frs cfa. Loans and advances increased from 320 million to more than 1.080 million while fixed assets increased from 20 million to over 100 million. Unfortunately, profits did not keep pace with increased business. The loss incurred by June 1971 increased to 269 million as against 12 million in June 1963. That was a bad omen for, in 1966, the Bank began its steep downturn accelerated by several hideous circumstances.
First, the West Cameroon Government accounts were transferred to ‘Banque Centrale’, imposing a very large withdrawal of deposits running up to about 800 million frs cfa. Then civil servants’ salaries were withheld on the instruction of the First Managing Director of the Bank, A.S. Ngwana around February 1966. This precipitated a run on the Bank followed quickly by virtual depletion of the Bank’s working capital by ill-considered lending. Unhealthy competition from expatriate banks and the involvement of the Managing Director in political party activities and patronage drove the last nails on Cameroon Bank’s coffin.