Governor Oben Peter Ashu (RIP):

‘Come no go’ and ‘15 days renewable’

-What a eulogious legacy!

By Franklin SoneBayen

Last weekend, the body of former Governor Oben Peter Ashu  leftBuea where he settled after retirement, to Manyu, the land of his ancestors. Oben will obviously be remembered for “come no go” and “15 days renewable”. He will also be remembered for “Obey Peter I shoot”, a distortion of his name referring to him as a trigger-happy civil administrator who could easily give orders for forces of law and order to open fire on demonstrators.

                “Come no go” was a sarcasm  for non-South West region natives, mainly people from the North West region with a massive population that left mainly South West elite jittery over the socio-political impact this non-South West population could have in one-man one- vote reality of multiparty politics. No one can say how the name originated, but that was it, everyone used it.

                Oben Peter Ashu, South West governor in the most sensational and turbulent of the multiparty early 1990s, was the one executing actions that showed an acknowledgement of “Come no go”. What with the fact that political parties and other political entities in the South West have been led by people from the North West and some have been mayors in parts of the South West, but the reverse has not been true.

                The answer may lie in the electoral requirement of respecting the “socio-cultural realities”. Some Bakweri elite have told me they will forever be grateful to Oben Peter Ashu for emboldening their hitherto meek tribe to beginning occupying its space on the socio-political and economic stage.

                The political link was that both the leading opposition party, SDF whose members in the South West were rightly or wrongly seen to be mainly people of North West origin and the pro-Anglophone Southern Cameroons National Council (SCNC), whom many elite said were mainly people originating from the North West, all fell within Oben Peter Ashu’s “Come no go” bracket.

                “Fifteen days renewable” was a codename for the provision in administrative law for those considered a threat to public order to be held in custody for up to a fortnight, renewable, which could mean indefinite administrative detentions without trial. It was common knowledge that Governor Oben Peter Ashu used the “15 days renewable” fiat much more than other civil administrators to contain “Come no gos” in the South West.

It was sometimes ruthless!

                In counter-sarcasm, a local football promoter, Bonu Innocent (RIP) of North West origin, created a football club, Victoria Shooting Stars in 1998/99 and nicknamed it “Come No Go”, after Bonu quit his post as executive president of Victoria United alias OPOPO (one people one power) following personality clashes between club officials from the South West on the one hand like Henry NjallaQuan (RIP, general president or board chairman), and those from the North West like Bonu.

But before Bonu quit OPOPO, he had led the club to qualify for elite football for the first time in its history at the 1996 Interpools tournament played in Ngaoundere. Ahead of and during the competition, there were signs of fissures among the club’s topnotch along the lines seen as another face of the North West/South West divide.

                What I witnessed during the Ngaoundere expedition and what Governor Oben Peter Ashu said later were telling. In Ngaoundere, Bonu’s connections with local Anglophone elite, most of them from the North West, opened doors for OPOPO. Many of them, including a military colonel, facilitated logistics and other things for OPOPO and their role was unanimously considered to have been an important factor in OPOPO’s success in Ngaoundere.

                Smarting with some journalism I was acquiring at JMC-UB and with my cousin Emerson Tabi having a video camera, I reached a deal with my childhood friend, Sammy Tita who, back from Canada, had opened a cinema hall somewhere at the corner between former City Hotel and the old Victoria park. We would produce videos of OPOPO’s Interpools matches and ship them to Limbe overnight to be viewed in the cinema hall the next evening. Off Emerson and I left for Ngaoundere with a stopover in Yaounde to talk another cousin to agree to be the transit link for our videos’ travels by the 6.3pm train that arrived in Yaounde at dawn and the morning Guarantee bus to Limbe the next day that arrived early afternoon. It worked perfectly! Emerson fimed, I ran the commentaries.

                (It was during that tournament, some September 1996 day, the day OPOPO defeated, I think Kohi of Maroua, that Peter MafanyMusonge was appointed prime minister. It was called a day of double victories for the South West.)

                So, back in Limbe after the sweet victory, at an evaluation meeting at the Limbe Chamber of Commerce, Oben Peter Ashu expressed gratitude to all who gave OPOPO the support they needed in Ngaoundere, especially those people of North West origin. He said the club succeeded because people worked together as brothers without looking at whether the club or the officials came from the South West or the North West. Many in the hall could not believe their ears, that coming from Oben Peter Ashu, father of “Come no go”. (I reported this story in Cameroon Post in 1996.)

Last line on:

 15 Days Renewable

I was a young reporter for The Post newspaper, assigned to cover the golden jubilee (50th anniversary) of CDC in Limbe. During the tour of the exhibition stands by dignitaries, I walked right behind them. Reaching a stand of Tole Tea, Oben Peter Ashu attempted a joke with a young lady at the stand. He asked her if she could prepare him some nice tea soup or something like that. My curiosity increased. This was Oben Peter Ashu trying some humour. I expected her to run the usual courties of “At your service, Sir.” or “How shall I serve it sir?” or in earnest, since Oben’s demand was pretty confusing, perhaps “How do you mean, Sir?” The young lady was rather terrified. It must have crossed her mind that Oben was setting a trap or maybe she just didn’t believe he was speaking to her. How could he? Such a big man, such a dreaded man? She stayed numb and dumb. The great governor waited in vain for her the pick the cue of his joke. She didn’t. He walked on. I felt bad for him, but I understood the young lady’s embarrassment too. (I reported this story in my tidbits on the CDC jubilee in The Post newspaper.)

 Come No Go

                The story goes that as civil administrator in parts of the North West where, in the view of many, his firmness had grown horns, Oben Peter Ashu once suffered an ailment. He got remedy from the Fon of Babungo in Ngokentungjia Division, North West who linked Oben to his relative who treated the ailment. Many years later, the son of that Fon’s relative, after completing his training in journalism and mass communication, needed a job. Oben Peter Ashu recommended him to then Communication Minister Rene ZeNguelle who in turn recommended the younger journalist to CRTV boss, Gervais MendoZe, who offered the young man a job.

Pic

Oben Peter Ashu