Snapshots: An X-ray of Cameroon�s Democracy, Governance and Unification

73. Had Barack Obama Been Born a Cameroonian

299 73 Had Barack Obama Been Born a Cameroonian Friday, 29 August 2008 When one observes the meteoric rise to political stardom of Barack Obama, one must admit that the phenomenon could not have occurred elsewhere in the world than in the United States. For this offspring of an African (not African American) father and a white woman who is barely rounding up his first term in the American Senate, and who, prior to becoming senator was little known out of his Chicago constituency; for him to have won the admiration of Americans and the international community and to have obtained the ticket of the Democratic party to run for next November presidential elections is a most extraordinary feat that could only be achieved in America, the land of opportunities, even if these opportunities are not always equal. The manner in which Obama has succeeded in articulating his vision for change and rekindling faith in the American dream, the candidness of his speech, the sincerity of his winsome smile, his ability to connect and identify with the preoccupations of the ordinary man-in-the-street and his ability to deflect below-the-belt punches have combined to make him the wonder-boy of the 21st century. As the 20th century rounded up with the world paying homage to an ageing political colossus, South African freedom fighter, Nelson Mandela, the 21st century seems to have been ushered by the emergence of a youthful visionary who has succeeded in electrifying the collective imagination of the world; a world that has begun to lose faith in man’s humanity. In trying to fathom the Obama phenomenon, I have on several occasions tried to imagine what could have become of him if he had 300 been born a Cameroonian or just an African, living in Africa, especially when, we recall the fate of similar visionaries like Thomas Sankara of Burkina Faso and the Steve Bikos. He would simply have been shot to death, maimed or vilified and imprisoned or, if possible bribed to shut up. The fate of Africa’s heroes and fledging leaders is a tale of tragic proportion that has set the continent back to the Dark Ages when barbarism was the order of the day in Europe, while Africa held high the torch of enlightenment. Had Obama been born a Cameroonian, let alone a second class citizen of Cameroon, such as the Anglophones have been honoured with, he would have been flogged, humiliated, thrown in prison for trying to assert his human right and dignity. The authorities would have banned his political rallies, brutalised his followers and sympathisers, and ordered to toe the line. When John Fru Ndi of the Social Democratic Front, SDF, began spearheading the movement for change in Cameroon in 1990, the regime went on a collision course to break down the man in headlong confrontational attitudes and bloody clashes which made rubbish of genuine efforts to install a healthy democratic culture in the country. Today, 18 years after his charismatic rise to the front line of social change, he is standing trial on cooked-up charges, after having been scathed by compromising allegations of accommodation with the very regime he initially set out to replace. The regime has so very well excelled in the art of denigration, vilification, and personality destruction that even members of the civil society and intelligentsia have adopted its modus operandi as a means of survival. Members of the professional class have also been constrained to throw ethics to the dogs and are actively engaged in the game of dog eat dog, under the pretext of “survivalism.” This is in no way suggesting that even in America, the land of opportunity, Obama has been spared the cloak and dagger tactics of detractors and the hidden hand of the degenerate white racist sentiment of the Ku Klux Klan or what remains of it. This is not to 301 suggest that Obama has not been badmouthed by self-seeking detractors, underachievers and the dregs of society. Somehow, he has been able to rise above pettiness and mudslinging and has charmed the devil in its lion’s den because, irrespective of deep seated racial, religious and social prejudices, the American mainstream are united under a common denominator that is: “give opportunity a chance.” It is not uncommon in Cameroon to hear remarks such as “who does he think he is?”, “Look at that one...