Editorial: NW, SW; Effective school resumption timid, hopes high.

Before the 2024/25 academic year kicked off yesterday, various initiatives had been taken by stakeholders and The Guardian Post, to ensure hitch-free resumption.

At this daily newspaper, we have launched, at our expense, a media campaign to convince the separatists to see the reason school shouldn't be their target.

In Manyu, the Mayor of Mamfe Council, Robertson Tabenchong Ashu, also used the “Manyu Unity Football Tournament” and other sporting activities such as the Manyu Unity Sport Walk and the Manyu Women and Girls Marathon, which he has initiated and is bankrolling, to drum the need for children to be allowed to freely go to school.

In Fako Division, Hon Fritz Ekoke, proprietor of Ekoke Sports Academy and Etoke High School in Mutengene, offered scholarships worth 750,000 FCFA and didactics to 10 disadvantaged students. This was at a ceremony in CBC School field that was glossed with the final of Etoke inter-quarter football tournament. 

The competition started with 10 teams from the Tiko Municipality to promote unity and school resumption.

The tournament and other peace-building efforts by the former CPDM parliamentarian, who later decamped to the SDF, was launched at the start of the conflict in the North West and South West Regions.

In the North West Region, Senator Nebah Bridget of Mezam, awarded academic excellence to boost effective schooling in the Region. 

During the heavily attended occasion, she gave awards in cash and donations of didactics to 50 laureates of Mezam Division, who distinguished themselves at the 2024 session of the General Certificate of Education, GCE Ordinary and Advanced Levels; both for the general and technical education.

Following threats from separatists calling for school boycotts and ghost town, Governor Adolphe Lélé Lafrique of the North West Region, used the ceremony to call on parents to shun fear and send their children to school, assuring them that all necessary security measures have been put in place to stamp out the threats from separatists.

It was an identical message from his South West counterpart, Bernard Okalia Bilai, at a school resumption preparatory meeting in Buea, who said: “We cannot afford to allow others to disturb the education of our children. Education involves every elected official from senators, parliamentarians, members of the Regional Assembly, and councillors... because it is too important to be left in the hands of education administrators alone...”

"We have to ensure effective functioning of our schools and colleges in which our children are allowed to acquire useful knowledge and skills necessary to prepare a bright future for themselves and begin equipping themselves for their role as the leaders of tomorrow,” Okalia stated.

The South West governor called on the elected local officials and traditional rulers to lead the population in denouncing school boycotts, irresponsible calls for lockdowns and ghost towns and the prolonged killings and suffering of the population.

“To have peace for ourselves and our children, we must ‘terrorise the terrorists’ because we know most of them and where they live amongst us,” he continued.

Such fancy phases have been fretted for eight years and as the governor addressed his audience, the statistics defy any propaganda. 

He was informed by the South West Regional Delegate of Basic Education, Elangwe Rose Bume, that in her sector, of the 3,564 schools in the Region, only 1,847 are operational, while 746 are shut.

In the secondary education sector, there are 478 secondary schools, 304 operational and 139 not operational. The University of Buea does not operate on Mondays.

The situation in the North West Region is not better, given its larger population and the spike of separatist activities.

Truth be told. For eight years, school resumption in the two Regions has not been "effective". At best it has been timid.

The consequence is that the report of a research carried out by Bamnjo Herman Yenika of the University of Bamenda, Faculty of Law and Political Science, indicates that "the most recent statistics available indicate that 39% of Cameroonian children, between the ages of five and 17, are used as child labour because of school dropout". 

The World Bank, in its own findings, indicates that: "Teacher absenteeism rates in the North West and South West Regions are as high as 50%. In the North West Region alone, approximately 70% of teachers have fled, due to the crisis".

According to the United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, the crisis has led to a 45% increase in the number of teenage pregnancies in the North West Region.

As a result, children boycott school, while others prefer to seek employment as a quick source of income, which have resulted in children in the North West Region engaging in cyber theft and armed robbery.

There has been an increased rate of drug use among children.

 In addition, many girls have become pregnant at a young age, which has, in turn, led to an increase in deaths during childbirth due to unsafe abortions.

The failure for schools to effectively resume in the two Regions has had a heinous effect, not only in the education of children but on the Cameroon society and even abroad, with Cameroonian refugees.

 All laudable initiatives by the government and even weird ones like "terrorise the terrorists" have failed.

What next? Only President Biya has the magic wand, which he has used in other less serious conflicts like teachers' strike and just recently, the Cameroon Football Federation, FECAFOOT, conundrum; not administrators, military, politicians or parents.

This article was first published in The Guardian Post issue N0:3225 of Tuesday September 10, 2024