Emmanuel Yenshu Vubo*
10 October 2008
analysis
My contribution in this paper is intended to define politics not just as the art of the possible with the means available by those who aspire to power but also as an endeavour which is informed by a well thought out decisions, whether these are taken individually (by office holders) or collectively (within deliberative bodies), and a certain sense of the collective good.
Such a philosophical background to performance within the domain of politics is intended to avoid the approach which takes certain assumptions for granted and to contrast the ideal with the distorted practice of politics as a cynical game which is meant to benefit the aspirant to office or office holder who takes pleasure in hoodwinking the governed.
In that regard, politics would be an art or human activity rooted in thought that informs practice. This contrasts with the political practice of the current regime and its leader characterized by a bent for afterthought rather than conscious reflection.
What I mean is that its acts are rather the effect of afterthought rather than genuine reflection a priori in the general interest. In this regard, he often comes out of many political crises full of contradictions confused and totally lacking in credibility. The recent outing on corruption will illustrate the point.
Way back in the 1980s when questioned on the issue of corruption and what he intended to do with those suspected of having looted the public purse, the President replied by recognising that he was aware of the situation but stopped short of saying what he would do for lack of proof.
Nothing was done then although he kept over the years to castigate corrupt practices as if they came from a government other than his own.Some naïve people such as myself even called on people in the late 1990s to support him in some anti-corruption crusade that ended up only as mere words and no action.
More recently, in October 2007, and during a visit to France, the President told a journalist in a prime time interview over the newly created channel, France 24, he was aware of corruption and was fighting it but could not just jump at secret reports presented to him. If he did that, all the prisons would be full, he argued.
One would, in such a consistent hesitation to act, consider that the President was either cautious or simply allowed things to go on. Wasn't corruption a part of the bureaucratic and political culture in Cameroon since the Ahidjo regime?
Up till last year, many critics of the current regime took the contrast between the presidents' speeches and his unwillingness plus inability to act as hypocrisy. If one were to venture into defining hypocrisy, one would say it is the art of paying lip service to a value while practicing its opposite in the vice.
Some persons have termed that hypocrisy an inherent part of the cynicism and sadism of the Head of State's character. For they argue, why would a President know what good to do and not do it especially when that would benefit the national commonwealth? When the President finally decided to act this year by arresting and prosecuting a substantial number of high State officials, it had come as a dismal afterthought.
Some media organs have attributed this to the intervention of foreign powers while apologists point to a consistency with the "rigor and moralisation" message of the beginning of the regime. Whatever the case, it is a little too late and reflects the irresponsibility of the regime. Whatever the case, what transpires is a situation where politics is not thought out, for how can decisions to act originate from external pressures.
I am of the opinion that if the president had any initial intentions to reform, a warped pragmatism has taught him that to survive he must also be a beneficiary of the corruption. That would explain why the President would denounce and not reform. Moreover, the majority of those prosecuted range from the President's close aides, General Managers of State corporations to senior state officials (Cabinet Ministers, Directors, etc).
History would tell us that these are people who rallied to the regime when it was taken by the storm of opposition that let to massive defections in the ruling CPDM. It was at this point in time that the party became the centre of attraction for opportunists and the haven for persons of doubtful morality.
People who have lived in the country during this period are aware of the fact that this party was the island of plenty at the time of economic hardship. It sufficed to become a member to be invited to take up a government position that was "lucrative".
This is also the period of region of impunity, looting of the public purse and the general acceptance of a culture of corruption. It is the period where some Cameroonians sat back to either bask in the ill-gotten wealth of the parvenu members of the ruling party or admire and praise the glamour of those who had stolen public property.
Witness the interjections in praise of the barons of the regime in the lead tracks of many a popular musician. Above all, these same persons have been the resource persons of the ruling party in its elections and sensitisation campaigns as well as its reorganisation drives.
We are all witnesses to the lavish spending and distribution of cash and gifts from the same people in an obvious show of wealth and shameless purchase of vote/conscience during electoral campaigns over nearly the past decade and a half or so.
This was under the imperative to "win"-in-ones- "constituency" in order to keep one's position in the cabinet or administration. That is called political trade-off or clientelism and the very heart of political corruption itself.
It was extended in the most crooked way to the distribution of amenities in an infamous formula by a former Prime Minister (himself also allegedly accused today) in the most immoral terms only fit for rascals: "Politik na njangi", "you scratch ma bak, I scratch ya own". That is to tell you how this corruption had become the very formula of the ruling party's strategy.
The only irony now is that these same persons who were the very backbone of the regime and the source of its survival are the target of the cleansing process. That the core of persons involved has worked directly with the President is both the source of worry and the subject of amusement.
Either the President is a dupe who cannot identify persons of integrity to govern with or he is the real cynic that public gossip holds him to be. What is amusing about this dimension of the Presidents' attitude is that it is regular.
Earlier this year we found him in the same posture when he started with tough talk against rioters only to go back to satisfy almost all their requests and grant an amnesty in less than three months.
*Sociology and Anthropology, University of Buea
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