By WIFAH J. NDE
The Social Democratic Front, SDF National Chairman aspirant and presidential hopeful, Felix Teche Nyamusa has challenged Ni John Fru Ndi, chairman of the SDF and his surrogates to cleanse the party which they have badly soiled.
Speaking to The SUN in a lengthy chat recently, Teche Nyamusa watered down the regime of John Fru Ndi describing it as a team of dictators, nothing short of the Biya regime which they (SDF) are always quick to condemn.
He accused the chairman of making the party a personal property, ruled alongside a few, thereby derailing the original objective of the party.
He describes the indefinite postponement of the National Elective Convention originally billed for October 27-29 as strategy by Fru Ndi to keep allying with the Biya regime and attempt to thwart his political aspirations.
By accumulating functions such as National Chairman, chairman of National Executive, NEC, National Investiture Committee, NIC and National Advisory Council, NAC, Nyamusa thinks, Fru Ndi is just as good a dictator as Biya.
Nyamusa says the absence of transparency and poor accountability of financial management in the SDF led to resignation of Dr. Elizabeth Tamanjong and two others as Secretary Generals of the party. This is because power has been centralized and is in the hands of one man, Fru Ndi.
With these ordeals, Nyamusa says, the SDF has lost its democratic values and thus calls for an urgent need for the house to be cleansed if the party must remain democratic with reputation. He says it is as a result of these cracks that the regime is taking advantage to continually commit atrocities with no outright objection.
He further argues that this has greatly weakened the party which is now a shadow of itself, unable to make a strong voice in the midst of the Anglophone crisis. “Had SDF remained a powerful opposition party, the current Anglophone crisis would not have dragged for this long”, Nyamusa told The SUN.
He however, opined that for the SDF to regain past glories, a change which he shall implement if voted National Chairman, power should be decentralized. Says the constitution of the party should be revised to modify those clauses which allocate much power to the National Chairman.
Felix Teche Nyamusa furthered that, the position of Secretary General, SG should be elective and not by appointment. He decried loudly and wondered how on earth the chairman could have been made the head of the NAC. An organ meant to advice him and other party executive members.
Equally, he opined that, the SDF is not a poor party and so should have secretariat where national events and meetings should hold. Stating that, the use of the chairman’s residence as ground for party meetings and events further depicts monopoly and high-handedness of the party by Fru Ndi.
He also did not forget to recall the death of Martin Fon Yembe, former first deputy mayor of Ndu council who had served in the capacity of provincial chairman of the SDF from 1998 to 2002 a period during which he successfully secured 19 parliamentary seats and 70% of the councils in the Northwest who died on October 2, 2017.
Nyamusa blamed the death of the exemplary Martin Yambe who served the party wholeheartedly on stress from the Biya regime given that he has always been firm opposition to the regime, a fighter for the human and people’s rights which had brought him under stiff resistance with the government and threats.
He recounted that the poor state of roads, poor medical facilities and the hesitance of the administration to have granted permission for Yembe to have been rushed to a better hospital, led to his death.