Artiste laments over Akwaya's underdevelopment in new song.

The artiste says the raging armed conflict has made a bad situation worse. 

DJ A-Cube unveiled the song titled: "The Cry of Akwaya", recently on some social media platforms, including TikTok and YouTube. 

In a chat with The Guardian Post, the singer said he felt compelled to highlight the travails of the people of a Subdivision that was created more than six decades ago, but which remains among the least developed in the country. 

Though born in Akwaya, where he grew up and earned his GCE Advanced Level, he had to flee to Nigeria when the armed conflict rocking the two English-speaking regions broke out.

"You cannot imagine that Akwaya has been a Subdivision since 1963, yet we have no roads, no hospitals, no electricity, no stable telephone network, and no banks. To make matters worse, the crisis came, and the council can no longer operate properly in Akwaya. They have had to relocate to Mamfe, and the treasury is no longer in Akwaya," A-Cube said.

"Take the situation of a patient being carried from a village to the Subdivisional headquarters in Akwaya town on a stretcher, sometimes through difficult terrain crossing fast-flowing streams and rivers. When you arrive at the Akwaya District Hospital, you may be told that the doctor has travelled. You then start thinking about how to relocate the patient and continue the journey to Nigeria. In some cases, people have to carry motorbikes on their heads across rivers," he added. 

The artiste then asks a series of rhetorical questions: "How can people access money in Akwaya? The military has been deployed there, and the personnel have money to spend, but there is no way for them to withdraw it. The only way they can get money is when a helicopter flies in from Bamenda to bring it to them. You can imagine the pain. What about the local population?"

Armed conflict adds salt to injury

To the artiste, the suffering of the people, which has also been characterised by some inter-tribal conflicts in the last few years, has become worse since the outbreak of the armed conflict in late 2016.

"This has been very troubling to me. When you consider our underdeveloped and enclaved situation, it is painful that, when the crisis came, we were among the first people to embrace it. We made things even more difficult for ourselves. We are the cause of some of our own problems," he bemoaned.

He added that: "When people talk about ghost towns in other parts of the region, residents at least have weekends when they can move around. But in Akwaya, the situation is horrible. When a shutdown is declared for two months, nobody goes out. You cannot even touch your motorbike. You cannot use a car to go anywhere".

Through the song, A-Cube says his intention is to add his voice to all those, including political elite, who have been speaking about the need for the government to pay more attention to the area.

"Let the government and the elites of Akwaya stand up for Akwaya," he appealed, citing the huge agricultural and other economic potentials of the Subdivision. 

This, he says, could be unlocked with the construction of a road to Akwaya town from Mamfe, and the establishment of other vital public infrastructure which would make life worth living for the people. A-Cube says he is pained by the snail-paced nature of development in Akwaya. 

This article was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3912 of Thursday September 17, 2026