Ambazonia as New Religion or Why Christians Should Reject Ambazonia

It was the theologian Paul Tillich who declared that religion should be understood as ultimate concern, as that to which people pay ultimate allegiance or loyalty. Even though this view has been critiqued for being to amorphous to capture the complexity of what might be called "religion", there is hardly denying the fact that religions demand allegiance and loyalty from its adherents. It is because of this demand for loyalty that the theologian William Cavanaugh has seen the state as the new religion in that it demands ultimate loyalty. Like religions that require adherents to sacrifice themselves for the cause, the state also requires adherents to offer themselves in defending it. Not only does the state demand loyalty, it also gives those it claims a new identity. Ambazonia is attempting to create a new identity for people who once knew themselves differently, all the while claiming that it is only attempting to go back to an older identity. It is now demanding loyalty. It is also requiring people, especially the young, to sacrifice themselves for its cause.

Most people in southern Cameroons have understood themselves as Bakweri, Bayangi, Santa, Bafut, Babalang, etc. In addition to these, they have also known themselves as Christians, Muslims, traditionalists, or as belonging to other religious traditions. In the last sixty years, they have understood themselves as being part of what is now known as Anglophone Cameroon and the state called Cameroon has demanded their loyalty. Now Ambazonia is the new game in town, working on constructing a new way for the people to think about themselves - as belonging to a thing called The Federal Republic of Ambazonia, complete with a state house, a president, ministers, and spokespeople. Every day videos are posted on YouTube or WhatsApp purportedly containing statements from a minister of this or that, bringing a message of liberation to "fellow Ambazonians." Just like every state, they are imposing a new identity on people who once did not think of themselves in those terms, demanding the ultimate loyalty and sacrifice - just like religions do. Thus, young men and women are called upon to pay the ultimate prize to serve an ultimate purpose that is hardly clear.

In order to create this new system, like some religions, it needs a new enemy or a new past that it opposes. Thus, La Republic du Cameroun (instead of the government) has been cast as this new enemy and the people are promised that they are moving to a new promised land. Thus, a people who used to interact with each other without animosity are now taught to hate each other. And while churches in Anglophone Cameroon are addressing the matter daily - largely because they have to - churches in Francophone Cameroon are largely silent.

And here is why Christians in Anglophone Cameroon ought to reject the pretensions of Ambazonia. First, it teaches Christians to hate each other as states often do. Christians living in different states tend to see each other as foreigners, contrary to the vision of Jesus Christ. Christians are people who should be united and should care about each other rather than seeing each other as enemies. Christians should not be warring against each other as Ambazonia is calling on Anglophone Christians to do, and as states do. Ambazonia is giving Christians the impression that the problem with Cameroon is the marginalization of Anglophones without seeing the bigger context in which this problem is situated - the context of criminality in government. Leaders of Ambazonia are themselves people of very doubtful character. Thus, Ambazonia has instead chosen to contribute in making Cameroon a crime scene characterized not only by economic criminality but also the murder of the innocent. As people whose ultimate loyalty is in the God of Jesus Christ rather than to a state, Christians should refuse to shed blood as the Biya junta and Ambazonia is calling on them to do. There are better alternatives to challenging the rapacity of the Biya regime than to contribute in making the country a crime scene.

Why Ambazonia And the Biya Regime Should Be Rejected

Ambazonia and the Biya regime should be rejected by all peace-loving Cameroonians. By Ambazonia I mean those who have been described as secessionists and who are currently waging a kind of gorilla warfare in the English speaking region of Cameroon. We speak of Ambazonia and the Biya regime in the same breath because both have chosen the road to violence. Biya's violence against Cameroonians has been going on for over 35 years and can be seen to be the root cause of the emergence of the violent impulses which Ambazonia has mimicked. In a sense, therefore, the violence of Ambazonia may be justified. However, such justification would not carry weight because there are many ways to resist oppression - violence being just one of them.

Of all the African countries that have been involved in civil war, I can find none that has led to the peace and prosperity of the people. This is especially the case given that those who often mount these wars are hardly fighting for the people they claim to be representing. At the end of the day, they are found to be just as rapacious as the group they were fighting to throw out of power. The case of South Sudan is a very recent example. Ambazonia's case is made even more frightful by the fact that the leadership is mired in dispute and there is no clear vision of what will happen to Southern Cameroons if their fight is successful. Their activities so far have been so amateurish that one finds it hard to see how this group can lead a people. The recent arrest of the leadership of the group in Nigeria is an example of this amateurism. Any group mounting such operation should know that the leadership of the group should never gather in one place at the same time.

Further, Ambazonia is fighting for a cause that should be national (or even continental) rather than regional. It is true that Anglophones have been marginalized in the experiment that is Cameroon. I am among those who was educated from primary to high school in the English-speaking region but had to go to the university in French-speaking Yaoundé and mostly taught in French. We spent most of our time in Yaoundé protesting, leading to the establishment of the University of Buea. However, Cameroon as a whole is in a state of dilapidation. Francophones fare no better than Anglophones, In fact, the Biya regime has been not so much about empowering the Francophones as it has been about empowering the Beti people. That is why his government is populated not by Francophones as a whole but by Beti people. The Anglophone crisis is therefore a Cameroonian crisis. When Patrice Nganang noted that "one day we will be Anglophones," he was saying more than he meant. He was saying that the struggle in Cameroon is more than the Anglophone experience. The fragmentation that Ambazonia is banking on is therefore not the point of the struggle. Instead of fighting to protect a culture that is British in origin, we should be struggling to create an identity that transcends the colonial baggage to create a new, peaceful and prosperous future for our people. That future is hampered by the violence of both the Biya regime and Ambazonia and should be rejected by all peace-loving Cameroonians.