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77 12 The Beginning of the End1 ‘When you see the disastrous abomination, of which the prophet Daniel spoke, standing in the Holy Place (let the reader understand)...” Matthew 24:15 W ell, before you mistake me for a preacher, let me own up and introduce myself as a University teacher by deliberate choice and training, although, in my youth, I did, like Paul Biya, more than toy around with the idea of becoming a priest. I should be teaching Philosophy of the Social Sciences right now: 15H 30 Mins, Wednesday, 06-05-92, to a mixed class of about 100 students in Uniyao. But, today, I dare not venture into the University campus. Since last week, the University Students had given notice that they would be celebrating, or rather, commemorating the first anniversary of the occupation of the University campus by the armed forces and the “zero mort” deaths which occurred during that historic event as can, indeed, be testified to by His Royal Highness, the Paramount Chief of Buea. I have, of course, received the very stylish anonymous tract entitled “OPERATION PAIX SUR LE CAMPUS,” addressed to all lecturers, students, and administrative personnel of the University. The tract promises me protection against what it describes as “irresponsible liars and adventurers” called “Students’ parliament and their paymasters” who want to disrupt activities in our “noble institution” especially on 06 May 1992, the “historic date when the Auto-Defense liquidated the forces of evil, a diabolic and murderous student parliament.” The tract further warns that any absence from campus would be taken as a tacit and flagrant sign of complicity with “illusory- intimidations of rascals and their paymasters.” But I am not assured. The terroristic vocabulary conjures visions of fanatical fundamentalism somewhere round the “Fertile Crescent.” In fact, I feel more scared of these faceless “protectors” than of the real or imagined dangers from which they purport to be protecting me. 78 Road Companion to Democracy and Meritocracy I have learned to be on my guard whenever anyone starts assuring me safety and protection. Since May last year, the University campus has been like a permanent temporary operational military base. A very odd thing which greatly surprises foreign visitors from comparable academic institutions abroad. The University end-ofyear for last session were conducted (against all professional advice) in an atmosphere of great tension and turbulence, with soldiers, armed as if for war surrounding all the exam halls. On three occasions I was harassed while going about my legitimate duties by these “protectors” who consistently mistook me for a student. On one occasion, as I was going to supervise the ill-advised exams in one of the halls, they closed in on me, like hunters on a game, with guns and all, under the erroneous conviction that I must be one of the students disrupting the exams. My calm explanation that I was a teacher going to invigilate the exams was not convincing to them and they were about dragging me away when a more convincinglooking colleague, Dr. Chiabi, arrived on the scene and saved me. In spite of assurances of protection and safety, many lecturers have been attacked in the past 12 months and some have had their cars smashed. The occupational hazards of this once so-called ivorytower profession are such that any prudent insurance man would surely think twice before insuring the life or property of any University teacher in this country today. You would therefore understand why; when the Association of University Teachers met to discuss the insecurity on the Yaounde University campus, I moved a motion to the effect that the authorities concerned should be told that the “protectors” they had brought to protect us were protecting us by force against our own will and better judgement and that there were rational means and measures not involving soldiers which could be taken to ensure security on the campus. Red caps and guns on the campus, far from being a sign of protection and security are, in fact, the surest sign of abnormality and insecurity. So this 6th May, no one can convince me to go to the University campus, not even my own Calpurnia. No way! Not again to be caught between the hammer and the anvil. No. Not on the 6th and definitely not in May. I am no clairvoyant, but if the protection, peace and tranquillity that has been promised reigns on campus today, I will put in my resignation, as being too dull...

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