JACQUES FAME NDONGO, MADELEINE TCHUENTE, LUC MAGLOIRE MBARGA ATANGANA have been in the same ministerial posts since 2004

Longevity In Ministerial Posts:
JACQUES FAME NDONGO, MADELEINE TCHUENTE, LUC MAGLOIRE MBARGA ATANGANA have been in the same ministerial posts since 2004

A serious Minister does not need to stay long in a ministerial post to be able to do great things for his/her country and people

Philemon Yang holds the record of the longest stay in office as Prime Minister under Biya. But what did he achieve in the nine years as PM?

Come to think of a situation where a girl child was born in 2005 when the aunt was already Minister of Scientific Research and Innovations. The girl who was born in 2005 is today 18 years old and may already even have a child, while the aunt is still Minister of Scientific Research. The Minister of Scientific Research that during the outbreak of the deadly Coronavirus, was talking about rats and all what not.
By the way, have the posts of Minister of Higher Education, Minister of Scientific Research and Innovation, and Minister of Trade, become a profession? President Biya has allowed some persons in the same ministerial posts for too long a time, that the names of these ministers I have come to be synonymous with those ministerial posts. As a result of the very long stay of ministers in the same ministries, some ministries have been transformed into private properties and ‘small villages’.

Prof Jacques Fame Ndongo

Prof Jacques Fame Ndongo who is from President Biya’s South Region, entered Government in the March 18, 2000 cabinet shakeup as Minister of Communication. Then in the cabinet reshuffle of December 8, 2004, he was appointed Minister of Higher Education. In the last cabinet shakeup which was on January 4, 2019, Prof Jacques Fame Ndongo was promoted by President Biya to Minister of State. He was maintained in the same ministry. He thus became the Minister of State, Minister of Higher Education. Fame Ndongo is still in that post today, meaning that he has been Minister of Higher education since March 18, 2004. That is almost 19 years today. He has been a member of Government since March 18, 2000. That is over 23 years today.
I however admired Fame Ndongo’s response to a question that was put to him during an edition of ‘Acutalite Heddo’ over CRTV a few months ago. The journalist asked how he, who has been a minister for such a long time, will take it, if he were to be dropped from the Government in the next cabinet shakeup.
Fame Ndongo’s brilliant response was that from the day you are appointed to a ministerial post, you should bear in mind that no matter how long you stay in that post, one day you will be dropped. That when you are appointed to a post to replace somebody, you should bear in mind from that very day, that one day another person will be appointed to replace you in that post, and so should prepare your mind for that. That is what should happen in principle.
But the fact is that the reality will be different even for Fame Ndongo. When somebody has been minister for over 20 years in Cameroon of all, Fame Ndongo and the family have been used to all sorts of privileges and facilities that the State, or better still the Government, provides them for free. The minister, his wife and children have for many years been used to red carpet treatment in the society because he is a senior member of government. The minister has a body guard and there are gendarmes guarding their homes, and some even run errands for madam and the children, and so on, and so forth. The day that he will be dropped from Government and all these privileges come to end, there will be mourning in the family.
Meanwhile the very long stay of Prof Fame Ndongo as Minister of Higher Education has sown tribalism in that ministry, to the point where if the next Minister of Higher Education were to come from another tribe, he or she will have it very difficult to dismantled the Bulu hegemony in that ministry. There are also a lot of complaints from many higher education teachers, especially syndicates of teachers of higher education, about Fame Ndongo’s management of the Ministry of Higher Education. The fact is that Fame Ndongo today is unlike what he was in his early years in that post of Minister of Higher Education. He has stayed in the post for so long that he now behaves as if he owns the Ministry of Higher Education, or as if no complaint against raised him can affect him in any way. That is the problem when somebody stays in one ministerial post for too long.

Dr Madeleine Tchuente

A pharmacist by training, Madeleine Tchuente hails from the West Region of the country. Before the December 8, 2004 cabinet shakeup, she was based in Bafousam where she owned a pharmacy. She was also a WCPDM Section President. Thus she was of the private sector. In the December 8, 2004 cabinet shakeup, Madeleine Tchuente was appointed Minister of Scientific Research and Innovation. Almost 19 years after, she is still occupying that ministerial post.
The weaknesses of this minister and her ministry were exposed by the COVID – 19 pandemic also known as Coronavirus. The minister assured the Government that the ministry and its scientists had the competence to produce locally certain tablets that were greatly needed for the treatment of COVID – 19, if provided the financial means. She said the ministry would only need to import a few things to complete what they can find locally. The money was allocated.
But then those in charged instead imported tablets from India. What was worst in the mafia, was that according to the report of the investigations that were carried out by the audit team from the Audit Bench at the Supreme Court, when the drugs were imported, they were put into empty packets that were fabricated here in the country, and on which was fraudulently written, Made In Cameroon. This was to give the false impression that the tablets were produced in Cameroon. It is one of the scandals listed in what is commonly known in the county as the COVID –Gate. Unfortunately President Biya has up till now been silent on the COVID – Gate.

Luc Magloire Mbaga Atangana

Another person who was appointed by President Biya into Government from the private sector in the December 8, 2004 cabinet reshuffle was Luc Magloire Mbarga Atangana, who hails from the Centre Region. He was appointed Minster of Trade. Almost I9 years after, he is still in that same ministerial post.
Meanwhile the population has for long been questioning the use of the Price Control Department of Mbarga Atangana’s Ministry of Trade, in the face of the constantly skyrocketing prices of basic commodities. Whenever the price of a basic commodity is increased by producers, importers or traders, Minister Mbarga Atangana will denounce it and vow that the price increase will not work. Bu after so called meetings between the different parties concerned, you will see a communiqué signed by the minister, saying that at the meeting the parties considered this and that, and came to an agreement that there should be just ‘slide increase’ in the price of the product. But even so, in the market the price increase that was earlier imposed by traders, would stick.
One thing that Minister Mbarga Atangana has succeeded to do as regard he issue of skyrocketing prices of basic commodities, is that he has succeeded to pocket almost all so called consumers associations. The leaders of these so called consumer associations are always around the minister, they sing his praises and defend or try to justify his position on any issue related to price increase, claiming how the minister is fighting hard to protect the interest of consumers.

Chief Dr Joseph Dion Ngute

Meanwhile though 19 years is definitely too long a time for somebody to be in one ministerial post, it should however be noted that the three ministers cited above are still below the record that Chief Dr Joseph Dion Ngute set for being in one ministerial post for over 20 years. That is the post of Minister Delegate at the Ministry of External Relations in charge of Relations the Commonwealth, which he occupied from the 1990s to March 2, 2018.

The Case of Late Alim Hayatou

Meanwhile Alim Hayatou who was Secretary of State in the Ministry of Public Health, would have been the uncontested leader of this group of members of Government that have stayed in the same posts for too long, if death did not unfortunately take him away on April 5, 2021. Alim Hayatou who was also the Lamidou of Garoua was appointed to that post of Secretary of State in the Ministry of Public Health in the 1990s. He was one of those that crossed from the 20th to the 21st century as member of the Biya Government, precisely as Secretary of State in the Ministry of Public Health. Until he died on April 5, 2021, he was still in that same post in Government. Thus he spent about 25 years or more in Government, and in the same post of Secretary of State in the Ministry of Public Health. He was officially in charge of pandemics among other things.
More than two years after Alim Hayatou’s death, President Biya has not appointed somebody to replace him. And come to think of the importance of the Ministry of Public Health, and the function of the Secretary of State who is in charge of pandemic among other serious health issues. This is the type of thing that makes one to raise the question as to whether this country is still been governed.

What Did Yang Achieve In Nine Years As PM?

Longevity in a ministerial post does not mean achievements by a minister. Philemon Yang was appointed Prime Minister on June 30, 2009. He was in office as Prime Minister until the cabinet reshuffle of January 4, 2019. Yang Was thus in office as PM for over nine years, or better still for close to 10 years, close to a decade. Yang holds the record as the Prime Minister who stayed the longest in office under President Biya.
But what is there for Yang to show as achievement? An Anglophone Prime Minister under whose watch the Anglophone Crisis sparked off in 2016. An Anglophone Prime Minister under whose watch the Anglophone Crisis escalated in 2017. An Anglophone Prime Minister who while in office watched in 2012 – 2014 how a project to rehabilitate the Bafoussam – Bamenda Highly, started in Bafoussam, went through Mbaouda and ended in Minister Emmanuel Nganou Djomessi’s Babadjou. The PM’s power was instead to try to divert the Ring Road from the Ndop area to his village, Oku.