On June 20th, 2019, inside the walls of their prison cell at the Kondengui prison in Yaounde, Mancho Bibixy Tse and Ngalim Felix SaFeh, detained activists of the Coffin Revolution that brought the ‘Anglophone Problem’ to the limelight back in 2016, jointly signed a letter, declaring their stance ahead of the upcoming school year in Anglophone Cameroon. The Coffin Revolution, said to be an arm of the Anglo-Saxon Youth Higher Council with purpose to defend the poor, fight for youth employment, defend the Anglo-Saxon subsystem of education, fight for the improvement of living conditions, good governance amongst others etc.
In the letter, they inform the public, National and International Community, that they are for schools to reopen, come September 2019. The letter details that they are declaring their stance, after having consulted and deliberated with all sections of the Anglo-Saxon Youth Higher Council.
“We therefore are calling on all parents in the two Anglophone regions to send their children back to school in September. We are appealing to all political, religious and traditional authorities, development associations, Parent Teacher Associations, civil society organizations and Human rights groups to join us in sensitizing our parents, children, teachers and all those involved in the education of our children for a total resumption of schools in September 2019. We call on all international bodies including the United Nations Organization, UNICEF, and UNESCO, PLAN INTERNATIONAL etc to support our initiative and bear witness to the fact that our movement is TOTALLY against the abuse of the Right to education of Anglophone children”, they write.
detained activists of the Coffin Revolution
Insisting that their revolution was never meant to bring conflict, untold misery and suffering, make children illiterates, bring chaos, disorder lawlessness kidnaps and demands for ransom etc, the activists remind: “We were fighting for a better society with better living conditions for the common man…we believe that the way to lift our society out of poverty is through education. Unfortunately our genuine fight was hijacked and the education of our children, especially the children of the poor, for the past three years has been destroyed”.
To them, “Having our children out of school for three years is a PRICE too heavy for us to pay. Therefore, we have resolved to call for school resumption in September 2019 and to do all to ensure smooth resumption while the political demands are being looked into”.
They maintain their initiative has no external influence, but is solely a move clearly thought about and taken by the Coffin Revolution activists, a decision based on their consciences and on the fact that education is a fundamental Human right: “Even if we are in prison, we are also parents, teachers, sponsors etc and will want a good future for our children. We feel the pain of the injuries our children, especially those of the poor are going through”.
Their reasons for wanting schools to resume in Cameroon’s restive North West and South West, they advance, are because education is a fundamental human right, a means to fight injustice and inequality, catalyst for development and the fact that rich parents have sent their children to schools out of the two troubled regions and even out of the country, and that schools continue to function normally in some areas within the two regions, among others.
They outline the consequences of continuous school boycott as including situations like unwanted pregnancies, drug addiction, sexually transmitted diseases, premature deaths, crime wave, illiteracy, lawlessness, stagnation, child labour and a generally bleak future etc. “We appeal to all our followers and sympathizers to join this initiative and mobilize our people to send their children to school. It is an important decision that we must take now or be judged by history”.
While noting possible questions which will follow their position on school resumption in the North West and South West regions, they go further to provide certain answers to such questions, for example the possible and obvious question of ‘What has changed since the protest started in 2016 till now that we want to go back to school?’ To this, they elaborate that “The changes have been both negative and positive. The negative changes are so pronounced more than the positive changes because of school shutdown. We risk losing even the little we had if schools fail to go on. We were demanding for an improvement in our education system. Today the entire system is collapsing because of school boycott. We cannot sit and watch it happen. We must hold onto what we have already before fighting for improvement. Again, the cost of a complete shutdown while waiting for improvement is too much of a Price to pay. The years our children have lost can never be recovered. Abandoned school infrastructure will go completely out of use. We will have to start all over in the future. Therefore, it cannot be later than now for schools to resume. Moreover, some of the demands tabled by teachers’ trade unions were accepted and solutions provided. Some solutions were provided immediately and others were to follow. Because schools have been closed, the population cannot be able to see the changes. If schools were going on, all of us will know if the government is serious or not. With schools not going on, we cannot be able to determine government’s seriousness. The government accepted to look into all demands tabled by teachers’ trade unions. The area of disagreement was on the form of state, which is a political issue, and having nothing to do with academics. So we should allow innocent children to go back to school while the political demands are being looked into”.
On another possible question of whether they regret their action back in 2016 now that things are the way they are, they answer that “There is no regret. Even while in prison we have no regrets because the message we wanted to send to the government and the international community was successfully passed”.
In conclusion, the Coffin Revolution activists emphasize that “The Coffin Revolution is not the cause of the current crisis. Our peaceful course was hijacked and we are suffering the consequences”.