Celebrating 25 years

25 deeds and misdeeds of the SDF
By Franklin Sone Bayen

1. Embracing Wind of Change
    The SDF must be credited for bravely embracing of the “Wind of Change” that blew from Gobachev’s Soviet Union in the late 1980s, through its eastern European satellite states, and on to Africa. The government might have succeeded to contain the wind with the arrest in 1989 of Barrister Yondo Black and his group of ten that included Albert Mukong, Ekane Anicet and Henriette Ekwe who were pushing for a restoration of multiparty politics and other political reforms. The government said in a statement that they were not arrested because of their call for a return to multiparty politics after all, the government statement said Cameroon is still officially a multiparty system. That was true. Although former President Ahidjo had cajoled his political peers into merging their parties into the CNU in 1966, there was no law prohibiting other parties to function. So, the move by Ni John Fru Ndi, Siga Asanga and co to announce the imminent creation of a political party was well calculated to take advantage of that window.

2.    Bravery Amidst Intimidation
    The announcement of the creation of the SDF made in late 1989, may have been a dead letter had the party’s leaders not braved the odds, faced with government intimidation including heavily armed soldiers to launch the party. Extra troops moved into Bamenda ahead of the SDF scheduled launch day, did not stop Fru Ndi and co. Troops opened fire on unarmed supporters demonstrating on the streets of Bamenda, yet the SDF had been launched, thus forcing open the door for a resumption of multiparty politics in Cameroon. Not even the campaign of lies against the party stood in its way. CRTV news reported that those shot dead had rather been killed in a stampede and that the party’s sympathizers who marched in Yaounde in support of the event in Bamenda, sang the Nigerian anthem, as if to say the SDF was championed by unpatriotic people.

3.    Forcing Political Reforms
    There can be no denying that the SDF fast-tracked political reforms in Cameroon which may have been back-tracked by CPDM conservatives. There can equally be no denying that President Biya, in power since November 1982, had already undertaken some reforms. There was marked political opening, a break from the heavy-handed system under former President Ahidjo. The private press began to blossom. Government media enjoyed the latitude to do more critical reporting. Political opponents expressed themselves more freely. That is the period when Albert Mukong published his prison testimonies in “Prisoner Without a Crime” which was sold freely. Yet, regime conservatives who held demonstrations and campaigned against calls for a return to multipartyism were shocked when President Biya gave in to pressure for political competition at the June 1990 congress of the ruling CPDM in Yaounde. This may never have happened had the SDF not been launched. Biya’s political reforms may have continued at snail pace or been back-tracked had the conservatives, fearful of the “Wind of Change”, not been beaten to the game by SDF’s steadfastness.

4.    “Power to the People”
    Masses saw themselves at the centre of decision-making within the SDF. “Power to the People” was more than a mere slogan. If nothing else, SDF supporters found the government catching a cold once they sneezed with street mobilization.  For example, the SDF called for use of transparent ballot boxes and later computerization of the electoral process and marched on 20th May with transparent boxes and computers to press the point and the government caved in.


5.    Grassroots Fundraising
    There have been stories that the party had financiers abroad like Dr. Mal Fobi based in the United States, but grassroots supporters also made a huge financial contribution to the party through widow’s mite donations that swelled the party’s war chest. At weekly party rallies, party supporters dropped coins into trays passed around for contributions. It gave them a sense of belonging and ownership of the party, where for other parties, especially the ruling CPDM, party activities are bankrolled by members of government using state funds and business magnates seeking or securing windfalls from government contracts.

6.    Funding from Mayors, MPs
    Today, the story is different. That initial enthusiasm by militants to offer their blood, their lives, their jobs, their time and their money to uplift the party has waned as the road to the end of the dark tunnel prolonged, after “stolen victory” (1992 presidential election) and “rigged elections” through the years. Supporters are no longer doling out as they did back then. The big financiers have reportedly shut the taps. Now, the party survives on “taxes” from party members holding public office, that is, Members of Parliament, Mayors and Councilors. The party has been receiving a huge amount annually from the official funding for political parties and election campaign funds. That is besides officious “donations” from President Biya, which have remained a contentious issue between Fru Ndi loyalists and his critics within the party.

7.      Article 8.2
    Such critics have often come under the sledgehammer of the dreaded Article 8 sub 2 (8.2) that has shown grave intolerance towards critics and dissidents. It excludes members under claims they carried out anti-party activities. Dr Siga Asanga, a Founding Father and party henchman, who claimed to have played the vital moral role at the party’s launch, being the one who urged a “cowed” Fru Ndi (his nephew) to march on in the face of heavy military intimidation that famous 26 May 1990 in Bamenda, became one of the very early victims of 8.2. Other high-profile officials like Hon. Andrew Akonteh, Tazoacha Asonganyi and Ben Muna later came under that hammer for holding what analysts have held through the years as progressive ideas or for standing out of the pack of corrupt, obscure or derailed officials of the party.

8.    Party Positions for Sale?
    Eight-two (8.2) has not always spelled doom permanently. One man had a way of going around 8.2. More than once, Hon. Pierre Kwemo got rehabilitated after coming under 8.2. Many in the party believed he knew how to use his money to buy his way out of the sanction. He later became vice speaker of the national assembly, though he has now left the SDF and created his own political party through which he won the Bafang council and is now mayor. The Kwemo syndrome, replicated in many other cases, has since eroded the belief that power in the SDF rest with the people. Today, supporters choose candidates for public office (MPs, Mayors, Councilors) through primaries, but the National Investiture Committee (NIC) validates others and the belief is that investiture is sold and bought.

9.    Anglo-Bami Party
    After the initial euphoria that swept the country and drew support from those against the failures of the Biya regime, a feeling began to set in that the SDF was a “graffi” party. The most influential party positions have been held by Anglophones and Bamileke such as Fru Ndi (NW, Chairman), Augustin Mbami (West, Treasurer for many years until his death some years back), Ben Muna (NW, pioneer Campaign Manager), Mbah Ndam (NW, former Parliamentary Group Leader, now National Assembly vice speaker), Pierre Kwemo (West, former National Assembly vice speaker), Jean Michel Nintcheu (West, National Assembly Vice Group Leader) Joshua Osih (SW, party VP), Siga Asanga (NW, pioneer SG), Tazoacha Asonganyi (SW, former SG)…

10. Anglo against Bami
    However, the Bamileke, major financiers of the party, have been viewed with suspicion and kept at safe distance from strategic party positions. When in the mid-1990s elections were held in NEC to replace Siga Asanga as SG, the vote between Asonganyi (Anglophone) and Kandoum Basile (Bamileke) showed a divide between Anglophones and Bamileke, with the Anglos preferring their “brother” Asonganyi.

11. Bamenda Party
    When Asonganyi was sacked from the party in 2005, his Lebialem “brother” and fellow party official, Martin Nkemngu (deputy Communication Secretary) cried foul against Northwest victimization of Southwesterners in the party. That was only the voicing of an opinion held for a long time, dating to the early days of the SDF when a purported memo by Meta elite in the Southwest said they would use “their” party (SDF) to dominate Southwest politics. That since sent shockwaves down the spine of some Southwesterners and left them suspicious of the SDF. The leadership outlook of the SDF has seemed to confirm their worst fears that with the exception of Dr Martin Luma (former party Vice Chairman), Asonganyi and Osih, the SDF has maintained its Northwest coloration. Election results that give the SDF its best results and most seats in the Northwest only go to comfort those Southwest fears.

12. Diboule Saga
    The death in May 2006 of Gregoire Diboule, a key member of the SDF in the Centre Region who had switched allegiance to Fru Ndi’s rival Ben Muna, exposed a very ugly side of the SDF. He was found dead, allegedly murdered on the eve of a dissident convention staged on 26 May 2006 by Muna in Yaounde. Diboule’s death was believed to have been the handiwork of Fru Ndi loyalists on a mission to foil the Muna Yaounde show at all cost. It came after Muna who had been barred by the National Executive Committee (NEC) under Fru Ndi, from taking part in the party’s convention in Bamenda because of his declared intention to run for party chairman, gained the support of a majority of the party’s National Advisory Council (NAC) led by Professor Clement Ngwasiri to convene the rival convention. NEC had been dragging its feet about convening an elective convention, overdue by several years. And NEC’s own mandate ahd expired, so an interpretation of SDF by-laws showed NAC should be in charge until after a new NEC was elected. The brutal murder of Diboule was believed to have been carried out by a death squad and brought to light a hitherto unknown blood-letting side of the SDF.

13.    Souleymane, Takoudjou, 1st Dissident Convention
    Those surprised at the Diboule murder ought to have seen it coming when in 1998, an attempt by former vice chairman, Mahamat Souleymane under similar circumstances as the 2006 show, was brutally quelled by Fru Ndi loyalists.

14. list For Appointed Senators
    After the Senatorial elections which the SDF had threatened to boycott and even disrupt violently “with sharp machetes” if SDF calls for electoral safeguards were not heeded to, Fru Ndi said he had submitted a shortlist of SDF members to President Biya for appointment as Senators. Biya’s Senate appointments ignored Fru Ndi’s list. That looked like the most ridiculous political action by the SDF!

15. Boko Haram Donation
    The visit by Fru Ndi to Boko Haram war victims interned at the Yaounde Military Hospital and his donation of a huge calf (cow, said to be the biggest from his ranch) among other food items, scored big points for the Chairman and his party, especially coming at the time of the questionable absence of Commander-in-Chief, President Paul Biya at the ceremony for military honours to the victims. Coming after the visit of the Chadian victims interned at the same medical facility by Chadian president Idriss Deby, Fru Ndi’s looked like that of a “Shadow Commander-in-Chief” and may have urged Biya to make his own donations weeks later.

To be continued

16.    NAC
17.    NIC
18.    NEC
19.    Ben Muna
20.    Siga Asanga
21.    Asonganyi
22.    Union for Change
23.    Opposition Coalition
24.    Boycott of 1992 parliamentary elections
25.    Secret Biya-Fru Ndi Financial Deals