France plans to issue around 4,300 visas to Cameroonian students this year, a 10% increase compared to 2023. Thierry Marchand, France’s ambassador to Cameroon, called this “excellent news.”

“Issuing student visas is a very important part of the relationship between France and Cameroon,” he told the press last week.

The French diplomat also said France aims to issue even more visas in 2025. To help with this, embassy teams will be at the “Salon pour la promotion des études en France” (Sapef) event in Yaoundé and Douala this October. Marchand emphasized that Sapef is a chance to give Cameroonian students more information about how to apply for visas.

In addition, the French embassy has announced the opening of Campus France desks at several universities across the country. These desks allow students to start their immigration process right on campus, making it easier and saving them time.

Beyond student visas, Thierry Marchand also announced that the total number of visas issued in 2024 could increase by 30% compared to the previous year. This aligns with his goal, since he arrived in Cameroon at the end of 2022, to make the visa process easier. This task has been given to TLSContact, and he proudly noted that the wait for an appointment is now no longer than 15 days.

Source: Sbbc

On October 1, 2024, the Cameroonian government introduced a new digital platform aimed at verifying the authenticity of diplomas issued by universities, public administrations, and private institutions. The initiative was unveiled at the École Normale Supérieure (ENS) of the University of Yaoundé 1, during a ceremony co-chaired by the Minister of Higher Education (Minesup), Jacques Fame Ndongo, and the Minister of Public Service and Administrative Reform (Minfopra), Joseph Le.

The digital platform is described as an “essential tool” designed to streamline the often lengthy recruitment process within the public sector, which has been slowed by cumbersome diploma certification procedures. “This platform is not only a modern tool for verifying the authenticity of diplomas but also a guarantee of trust for citizens, employers, and especially public institutions,” said Joseph Le.

As per a joint circular from May 8, 2024, Minesup will provide Minfopra with a secure software interface, allowing access to diploma data. In return, Minfopra will be able to submit verification requests digitally, speeding up the process. A secure response confirming the authenticity of the diploma will then be sent back to Minfopra through the platform. According to Minister Le, the platform is “a crucial step” in the government’s commitment to enhancing transparency and efficiency in public administration. The initiative is part of a broader modernization effort to improve the management of civil servant integration processes.

The platform aims to address the growing issue of fake diplomas in both the public and private sectors. For example, in June 2024, Defense Minister Joseph Beti Assomo announced the discovery of 1,312 fake diplomas during the recruitment process for young gendarmes and soldiers for the 2024 fiscal year. Similarly, in 2022, nearly 1,000 gendarmerie students were dismissed due to falsified credentials. This new platform is expected to help decrease such incidents by streamlining document verification.

The platform’s launch follows an agreement signed between Minesup and Minfopra on April 6, 2023. It will be implemented in collaboration with the ministries that issue the most diplomas, including Minesup, the Ministry of Secondary Education (Minesec), the Ministry of Basic Education (Minedub), and the Ministry of Employment and Vocational Training (Minefop). Through this initiative, Minfopra aims to verify diploma authenticity more effectively and significantly reduce the processing times for recruitment and certification.

Source: Business in Cameroon

During an official visit to Yaoundé, Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UNESCO, announced the mobilisation of $44.5 million for education in Cameroon. The funds will be used to modernise school curricula and train more than 28,000 education professionals.

“Cameroon has made education a priority and it was essential for UNESCO to support these efforts. Thanks to the Global Partnership for Education, today we’re mobilising $44.5 million to boost the improvements of the country’s school system. This is yet another example of UNESCO’s firm commitment to supporting all its Member States in their efforts to achieve universal access to education” Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UNESCO said.

With these new funds, UNESCO and Cameroon will work together to modernise school curricula, with a particular emphasis on multilingual education. The Organization will provide more than 4 million school textbooks and teaching manuals. It will also support the training of 15,000 teachers as well as 13,000 headteachers, trainers and educational professionals. Finally, this initiative will provide school meals to children from the poorest families to further support their schooling.

This initiative in Cameroon joins those already undertaken by UNESCO in many other African countries. In recent years, the Organization has notably raised $15.7m for education in Burundi, $48.2m in Chad, $39.5m in Côte d’Ivoire, and $10.7m in the Republic of Congo – again as part of the Global Partnership for Education. At a time when the African Union has dedicated 2024 as the year of education, UNESCO is once again demonstrating its role as a leading partner of African states in this field.

Source: miragenews

The Basic Education Ministry recently warned public primary school administrators about “shortcomings”, including the mandatory imposition of parent-teacher association (PTA) fees, just over a week before the new school year.

In an August 20 letter, Basic Education Minister Laurent Serge Etoundi Ngoa highlighted the issue but did not take a definitive stance on the contentious matter of the fees.

Since a 2001 presidential decree made public preschool and primary education free, parent-teacher association fees have risen significantly, sometimes exceeding XAF25,000.

Parents have long criticized the situation, which persists as school administrators cite a lack of resources to pay teachers and cover operating costs.

In 2021, addressing members of parliament, Minister Etoundi Ngoa stated, “There are ongoing challenges. Since there was no cap [ the parent-teacher association fees], to prevent abuses, my colleague from Secondary Education recommended a limit of XAF25,000 during her visit to Douala. I believe that Parent-Teacher Associations (PTAs) are crucial and should continue. The government, parents, and development partners are the key education stakeholders, as outlined by UNESCO.”

The other shortcomings addressed by Minister Ngoa include “the sale of school supplies within institutions at exorbitant prices, the sale of spots for enrolling new students at each school year, including to parents benefiting from transfers, the neglect of social cases, and even children from internally displaced families.”

Source: Business in Cameroon

Elites of Eyumojock Sub-division are currently in Limbe to  brainstorm on how schools can resume in the sub-division.

The event, chaired by the determined CPDM Member of Parliament, Honorable Teku Tanyu, has brought together some prominent chiefs of the sub-division and politicians who hold that depriving children of the opportunity to go to school is a destruction of the children’s future.

Since the socio-political problems in the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon started in 2016, many kids in the sub-division have not been going to school.

For a sub-division of 66 villages, only two villages having functioning schools – Ekok and Eyumojock. 

For the past six years, kids in Kembong, Ewelle, Ossing, Ndekwai, Eyanchang and other villages have not been to school and this is bad news to the sub-division whose leaders hold that the road to a bright future passes through sound education.

Speaking during the brainstorming session, the Eyumojock Sub-division Member of Parliament, Teku Tanyi, himself a disciple of formal education, urged elites of the division to help children to return to school.

He underscored the importance of education to the sub-division’s development, adding that without education, most children from the sub-division will not have the right tools to face the future.

The Member of Parliament who hails from Ossing and who has been working relentlessly for the resumption of schools in the sub-division lamented that many children have been robbed of their future.

This is a developing story and more will be yours when available.

By Dr Joachim Arrey

Cameroon recorded 48 attacks on schools between January and June 2024, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports in a statement released on World Humanitarian Day (August 19). “Such instability affects children’s right to education,” lamented the UN, without specifying where these attacks occurred. However, several international reports revealed attacks by separatist armed groups in the crisis-affected regions of the Northwest and Southwest.

One of the most notable attacks occurred in October 2020 when armed separatists targeted the Mother Francisca International Bilingual Academy in Kumba, resulting in the deaths of eight students. In February 2022, similar attacks were carried out on the Molyko public primary school and the Catholic college “Queen of the Rosary.”

Since the outbreak of the separatist conflict in 2017, over 700,000 children have been unable to attend school due to the ongoing violence.

The UN also reported 18 attacks on healthcare facilities during the same period.

Source: Sbbc

Catholic teachers have to be peace ambassadors, imparting a culture of peace to learners, Archbishop Andrew Fuanya Nkea of Cameroon’s Catholic Archdiocese of Bamenda has said.

In his homily during the annual celebration of Teachers Day in his Metropolitan See, Archbishop Nkea urged Catholic teachers to exercise their profession, which he said is characterized by dignity, with commitment.

“The vocation you have answered to be a teacher is a very noble one. It is a profession that has dignity,” he said during the July 20 celebration that was held at St. Joseph Cathedral of Bamenda Archdiocese.

The Cameroonian Catholic Archbishop added, “The dignity of this vocation lies in the fact that  you take responsibility to do what God does; impart knowledge to others and we know that God, who has called you will not abandon you. He will continue to protect you, especially from the violence that we have in our society.”

“That is why I ask all of you to be pro-peace and to hand over a culture of peace to the children whom you teach,” the Archbishop of Bamenda who doubles as the President of the National Episcopal Conference of Cameroon (NECC) said.

He told the Catholic teachers to “see every child sitting in your classroom as your own biological child.”

“You are transmitters of knowledge and therefore transmitters of truth. You are not going to give your own ideas or what you think. You are going to transmit what is true,” he emphasized.

He also underlined the need to foster moral aptitude, saying, “You are transmitters of the doctrine of our church because our schools remain agents of evangelization. You are transmitters of the moral values of the church which are summarized in the 10 Commandments.”

The 58-year-old Catholic Archbishop, who started his Episcopal Ministry in August 2013 as the Coadjutor Bishop of Cameroon’s Mamfe Diocese called upon the Catholic teachers to find fulfilment in their profession and interaction with learners.

“Be happy, joyful, and proud teachers. Be teachers with dignity,” he said.

Archbishop Nkea added, “Let the poverty you have be known only to your pockets. The more you thank God for what he has done, the more God multiplies what you are. The value of what you do can never ever be quantified or calculated in monetary terms.”

He encouraged the Catholic teachers to be sources of inspiration. When people get to see you, he said, let them be “hungry to be Catholic teachers.”

Source: aciafrica

A man who had perhaps the most significant influence on Western political thought and education is the Greek philosopher Plato. As a student of Socrates and later the teacher of Aristotle, he cherished education and believed in its power to change people and create a stable state. Plato believed that all citizens in a society needed to be educated for it to be stable and prosperous. Inspired by the wisdom of Plato, Ahmadou Ahidjo who became Cameroon’s first head of state embarked on that great journey to educate all in his new country.

This heroic and commendable vision of President Ahmadou Ahidjo led to a national policy of sending the brightest minds the country produced to study at the finest universities in the West. Most of these students left Cameroon after A’ Levels in the ’60s, ’80s and 90s with full tuition and accommodation expenses paid for by the government of Cameroon. They studied at University College London, University of Cambridge, Columbia University, Imperial College London, and University of Oxford, Yale, Harvard and many other great institutions of higher learning in the West.

One of the communities that greatly benefited from Ahmadou Ahidjo’s policy of education for a prosperous state was the Manyu. Manyus are renowned for having an inborn aptitude for education and have consistently produced smart and fertile minds. They contributed vast numbers to the scholarship community travelling to the US and UK. A recent survey by this media outlet found that Manyu had more young men and women on the scholarship train than any other constituency in Ahmadou Ahidjo’s United Republic of Cameroon. Manyus will live to enjoy for a very long time due to the vision of one person-the late President Ahmadou Ahidjo.

Today in the United Kingdom of Great Britain, Manyu celebrates Dr Ben Tanyi, who studied Mathematics and Statistics and has distinguished himself in the global mining and petroleum industry.

Manyus bow and tremble when the name Dr Henry Tabe is mentioned! A man who navigated from a BSc in Mathematics and Statistical Science into a PhD in Pure Mathematics, which he completed in 18 months at the University College of London. Dr Henry Tabe is a prominent finance expert who can hold his own against anyone in the City of London.

Another recipient of Ahidjo’s scholarship was Ayuk Akoh-Arrey, a Senior Policy Actuarial in London who knows almost all that is about insurance products.

Dr Peter Ashu made the most of his opportunity and obtained a PhD in Physics from the renowned University of Cardiff before establishing himself in the global Information Technology sector.

Sisiku Ayuk Tabe, President of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia and formerly of the American University of Nigeria, was another beneficiary who moonlighted himself as a global Information Technology Expert. The Manyu list is long, great and remarkable.

President Ahidjo like many other African leaders was a man with many faults! He was a tricky and canny political operator who tolerated no political opposition to his views and ambition. He single-handedly brought so much benefit to the Cameroonian nation ranging from great infrastructure projects to economic growth and prosperity, building of a welfare state and instilling in the consciousness of Cameroonians that education remains the key to a prosperous society. 

As we approach the centenary of his birth, (born August 1924, Garoua, Cameroon—died Nov. 30, 1989, Cameroon Concord News Group is imploring its readers to celebrate a man who had a vision for a united people and a united nation. This publication is calling on Manyus around the world to raise a glass to this visionary that used the levers of power to set the foundation for the academic take off of Manyu as a constituency and the economic profits that Manyu is enjoying today.

Plato and Ahidjo believed education was the key to eradicating evil and achieving stability in a community and State. They were both correct, for the Manyu community at home and in the diaspora is a better place today because Ahidjo lived.

By Isong Asu

The views expressed in this article are author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of Cameroon Concord News Group

In the early morning in Buea, the chief town of Cameroon’s war-torn English-speaking region of the Southwest, 18-year-old Carine and her younger sister, Judith, are getting ready for school. But for these teenagers, it has been a long time coming.

Judith is 15 but is still in primary school. Carine was supposed to be in university, but she just started secondary school. They are among hundreds of thousands of children in the country’s two English-speaking regions of the Northwest and Southwest, who have resumed school after five years.

Carine and Judith had to stay at home since 2017 due to a persistent crisis in the regions, where separatists have been clashing with government forces in a bid to secede from the French-majority Cameroon and create an independent nation they call “Ambazonia”.

“I feel so happy I am able to attend school after five years. This is a dream come true,” Carine said in Buea, asking for her family name and school not to be published.

Judith and Carine fled the locality of Ekona in the region with their family in 2022 amid renewed fighting and relocated to Buea where they enrolled in school last year. Still reeling from her ordeal in the war-torn zone, Judith said she felt especially fortunate to go to school because some of her friends have not been able to study due to the conflict.

“Running up and down from bush to bush was difficult. Now I am focused on my studies to fulfill my dream of becoming a doctor,” said Judith who also asked for her family name not to be mentioned.

Fighting between government forces and armed separatists has made it too dangerous for formal lessons in the Anglophone regions of the Central African nation. Separatists enforced a school boycott in the troubled regions since 2016 to protest against what they described as educational injustices against English-speakers. The school boycott left more than 800,000 children out of school, according to UNICEF.

Now, schools are gradually reopening in safer areas of the regions after Cameroon’s military liberated more than 100 villages and schools from rebel occupation.

“In 2022, we expected 429 secondary schools to reopen, but only 233 functioned. In 2023, almost all the schools reopened, and this year, attendance has improved significantly,” said Hannah Mbua Etonde, chief of secondary education in the Southwest region.

“We are seeing students coming back to school in their numbers; many schools are also gradually reopening. The situation is generally improving,” said Adolph Lele Lafrique, governor of the Northwest region, adding that since the start of the year, there has been little or no attack on teachers, students and schools in the region.

The armed conflict is not over, but some separatist leaders are now encouraging children to return to school, saying a boycott is no longer a weapon of their struggle for independence. Parents here said they’re breathing a sigh of relief after the call for school resumption by the separatist leaders.

Augustine, whose name has been changed for safety reasons, teared up thinking of the bombing that leveled his son’s primary school in Batibo, a locality in the Northwest region but is determined to ensure the eighth-grader continues his studies. “My son’s school is not there anymore, but he has started school here in Buea. The most important thing is for our children to learn. Almost all schools are now functioning, and parents are no longer afraid to send their children to school,” he said.

“My humble plea as a parent to the administration is that security should be guaranteed 100 percent, 24/7 for our kids to go to school,” said Michael Njie whose child started school in 2022 after spending four years at home.

Improving school attendance is a top priority for the government given the war’s long-term social and economic impact on the country, its children, and the willingness of those who fled to return. Across the regions, authorities have been repairing damaged schools and building new ones.

As Cameroon joins the rest of the world to celebrate International Day for Education, officials have been visiting schools in the troubled regions to assure parents everything is under control and that their children will be safe.

“We just want to learn. Let them keep the guns away from schools and students,” Judith said.

By Haggai Fung Achuo