Dangers of another sleeping parliament

Dangers of another sleeping parliament

Once again it is becoming more and more evident that this great nation’s development, governance and democratic process may be stalled again by another eventual parliament of sleeping parliamentarians.  Over the last many decades the nation has been unfortunate to have a parliament without parliamentarians.  Almost all bills tabled to the assembly passed with little or no resistance or reason. The parliamentarians themselves for all this while have never tabled a single bill or consulted the electorates relating to any bill tabled before them.  So the role of the electorate seem therefore to end after drinking a few bottles of bears or afufu ( local whisky), accepting a few cups of rice and selling out their consciences and the lives of their children to individuals who careless about the life of the nation other than their selfish individual interest. One of the only bills highly debated in parliament was the bill modifying the allowance of the MPs. So you can now understand what these guys really are.

You will be surprised to know that very few MPs have an idea about the natural and human resource potentials of this nation let alone know which foreign companies are exploiting what resources under what conditions. So if these guys truly represent the voters and are this blank, then we are actually in trouble.

The head of state has said it time and again – action, action – yet the most inactive guys are so closed to him and keep masking themselves as the busy and humble bees that bring virtually nothing to the hive yet keeps the hives noisy all day long.  When ministers are appointed just to keep to some dead principle of regional balance and pay off for singing praises, when MPs are voted into parliament on tribal lines instead of based on ability to deliver, when contracts are awarded based on who chairs the award commission and who knows who, then the head of state is in for real trouble in trying to fight these ills by simple words.

What is the role of the plain cloth police? Is it to identify and victimize poor citizens who are complaining about the wrongs of the state and not paying lip service to the head of state? I would think that it’s about time these guys give way for the head of state to have a first hand knowledge of the national realities.  Tell him the truth even if it pains and puts him on a temporal stress.

I get frustrated more and more and day after day by the reaction of the so called government ministers who even after gaining the confidence of the head of state to be appointed at the service of the nation are so childish and blind to understand the mission of their appointment. “ I thank the head of state for my appointment. I am here to serve him to the best of my ability”  “I was appointed by the head of state and so I serve him and not the Cameroonian people” .  Statements like this are often enough to depose a minister or force him/her to resign.  Yet such statements made by our ministers are often carried away in the wind and nobody cares.  What a free nation!!

Corruption has installed itself as a way of life or as a culture in Cameroon. Virtually on a daily basis we have seen different agencies with the same mission or the same kind of persons formulated to tackle the same problem using the same old and failed tools.  What does it take for this nation to privatize the fight against corruption? After all if very important and cherished state institutions, companies and agencies have been privatized, why not the fight against corruption.  Those who want to make money can join the state in pointing and stopping the corrupt individuals as well as the corrupt processes including our failing electoral system and our corrupt governance processes.

The head of state noted and stated clearly that there were shortcomings in our electoral system and hope to correct that for a better 2012 electoral year. While he is probably still thinking of this, the same body that failed Cameroonian has announced the revision of the electoral list. You may say it’s based on the provision of the constitution. But if our father’s will is in the hands of an appointed heir who fails in every turn and corner of the implementation of that will, we cannot wait and watch as cowards. When the president of ELECAM instead of drawing lessons from what worked or what is good, keep comparing us to other nations where double registration was a problem, it makes good students who want to improve in their academic performance feel reluctant. After all if you are not the last in your class, why bother to be the best! So he tells Cameroonians

As the nation will soon start seeing another round of citizens with no national agenda combing the nation and constituencies for votes, it is about time the Cameroonians and the civil society put an end to all this nonsense by scrutinizing and setting an agenda for the next parliament. 

1. All candidates must address the population in the different town halls in a live debate so that the poor citizens can make informed choices.
2. All candidates must propose concrete agendas with tangible and measurably indicators and milestones. The time for picking and choosing what is good for the population is over
3. All communities (cities, villages) should within the very few weeks and months defined in tangible terms their short, mid and long term development and policy needs that should be signed upon by whichever candidates may need their votes.
4. The youths must understand that no government in the world creates jobs by recruiting into the public service. Jobs are created by generating wealth. Woealth is generated when the business environment is friendly and good enough to attract  investors.  Note that best salaries are paid by the private sector and NEVER by the public sector.  If you need a car or a good house while in the public sector in it’s currently form, then your place is kudingee central prison because you must hence dirty your hands to get what you need.
5. The civil society to lead sector-based action plan and road maps that must be adopted by the different potential MPs should they really want the people’s votes.  Such road maps and sectors include constitutional reforms, agricultural reforms, governance, corruption, trade, health, education etc.  One of the reasons our parliament has been this long without true parliamentarians is purely because these buys are often sent to parliament with BLANK checks so they choose to fill just any amount and any date on its.  This time we must give them filled checks with due dates.
6. The civil society must not allow MINATD to pick and choose who get accreditation to observe the elections. After all if you have built a good new house, you should simply be happing to get many people have a look unless you have a stolen set of chairs installed in there.

When a nation fails to lead its citizens to the Promised Land, the citizens must stand up and lead their nation to the Promised Land.