What Is Fru Ndi’s Problem With Chronicle?

If The SDF Chairman Were In Biya’s Shoes?

It has often been said and with much justification that unless the wind blows, you can never see the rump of a foul. In 1990 RODCOD GOBATA, ace columnist for Cameroon Post newspaper wrote that Time was a great demystifier. He was replying those who tried to demystify (understand) the secret behind Fru Ndi’s power. (The SDF Chairman was an enigma then because of his audacity in challenging the Biya regime).

Twenty years have rolled by since GOBATA made his prediction and the truth about Fru Ndi is there for everyone to see- the man who claims to have brought press freedom to Cameroon hates a free press like the plague.

The SDF National Chairman began to manifest this vice when he dragged Cameroon Tribune to court in 1992 for defamation. Since a vast majority of Cameroonians were against any organ that stood for the state, they applauded rather than condemned this onslaught against freedom of expression by an opposition leader. Fru Ndi won the case, but by that same victory lost the moral authority to pose as a champion of genuine press freedom. Utterances of the SDF chairman and his surrogates at the time all hinted at the fact that freedom of the press meant he liberty to praise Fru Ndi and the SDF, while castigating Paul Biya and the CPDM.

This thinking was manifested most glaringly in January 1996 soon after the SDF won the Santa council. A mammoth jubilating crowd stormed Fru Ndi’s compound to congratulate him. Addressing them, Fru Ndi said that as they had won elections they should start behaving in a mature manner: no more burning of worn out motor tyres or any form of violent street protests. When The Herald newspaper published the story in its next edition, Fru Ndi nearly went insane with anger. SDF vanguards were sent to hunt Peterkins Manyong, the correspondent who wrote the story as if he (the writer) was a mad dog. When the correspondent on learning of this went to Fru Ndi’s Ntarinkon residence to know why he was being hunted, Fru Ndi rushed to attack him physically but was restrained by some of his aides. In frustrated rage, Fru Ndi tore the copy of the reporter’s copy of the paper, while threatening to stab him if ever he wrote anything against him. That was not enough “you son-of-bitch” he added “if I didn’t bring press freedom to Cameroon how would you have been able to write and make money from the sale of papers”. Peterkins was later to be well tortured by Fru Ndi’s thugs at Fru Ndi’s towers along the Bamenda commercial avenue after a NEC meeting with the SDF national chairman looking on.

There is no iota of doubt that they were acting on his instructions. The hypocrisy of the SDF national chairman was manifested on another occasion. During a rally in Nkwen while he was condemning the Biya regime for muzzling the press, SDF vanguards were harassing Sama Steve, a journalist for taking pictures of Fru Ndi while he was speaking. They finally seized his camera which they returned after a hard struggle.

Fru Ndi and Chronicle

Cameroonians, especially of English expression know the degree of service and sacrifice Eric Motomu rendered to Fru Ndi and the SDF while he published the Socialist Chronicle. He did so at the expense of economic benefits and journalistic balance. Motomu saw the SDF in the same light as the party’s founding fathers perceived it: as a front to fight for a change. Since in a war situation the journalist must report from a particular platform, he chose the side of the SDF, the side of the oppressed.

But when the scale began to fall off his eyes with growing evidence that Fru Ndi and his myrmidons didn’t appreciate the sacrifices he was making on their behalf, he decided to choose the side of journalism as opposed to partisan politics. He decided to publish a new paper called Chronicle under the franchise of The Socialist Chronicle. With the change came the change of editorial policy. Motomu underestimated the level of the risk he had taken. Fru Ndi and his cohorts came up in arms against him and Chronicle. He began by pronouncing the doom of the paper. He gave the paper a life span of one month if it didn’t stop publishing stories that discredited him and the SDF. The SDF national chairman erroneously thought that newspapers survive on sales and that the failure to praise the SDF was the beginning of journalistic waterloo.

When it became evident that the paper was no more in a hurry to die than a gigantic river (the Sanaga, for instance) drying up, he resorted to the meanest of all acts- vandalizing the paper. The immediate victim of this vandalism was Ngwa Emma, a popular vendor in Bamenda. He seized a copy of Chronicle from him at his residence and tore it to shreds pouring venom on the vendor at the same time. In his fit of anger obviously because of critical remarks on him, Fru Ndi told late Charles Ande Ngi, a newspaper publisher that he was prepared to kill a journalist. To him all Anglophone journalists were ‘jabu’ meaning counterfeit.

Journalists’ Legal Hangman

There is nothing that kills a news organ faster than a legal suit. In a country whose government dreads the private press taxes news printer and gives little or no subvention to the private media, dragging a private newspaper to court is taking that paper and its publisher to the guillotine. That is exactly what Fru Ndi did when he dragged Chroncile and Life Time magazine to court for defamation. But what was more scandalous is the boast by the SDF national chairman on Cameroon Calling that he must jail the publishers of the two news organs.

But Fru Ndi’s ability to commit mischief was not as great as his desire. In other words, he underestimated the two publishers. The cases were thrown out of court after a desperate attempt by Fru Ndi to execute his evil design. Even before the Bamenda magistrate court took its very mature and highly applauded decision, Fru Ndi had resorted to the means he knows best to seek revenge. During a rally in Fundong, his thugs, with Fru Ndi gleefully looking beat the publisher of Chronicle, to near death during a rally in Fundong. They later conveyed him to hospital. Many of Fru Ndi’s opponents advised Motomu to take the SDF chairman thugs to court, but he decided not to pursue the matter, perceiving it as the price he is bound to pay for choosing journalism as a profession.

Fru Ndi Shifts Battle Field To NEC

Having failed to destroy Chronicle through legal means and campaigns of lies and calumny in the public arena, the SDF chairman has finally shifted the battle field to the structures of his party, accusing his subordinates of conspiracy with the paper against him and the party.

The attack was launched during the last NEC meeting during which Fru Ndi said some SDF mayors and MPs for leaking party secrets to the press. The fact that these elected SDF officials are projected in the paper Fru Ndi said, means two things: they support its editorial policy and sponsor the paper. In what many perceive as the worst outrage against freedom of expression and association, Fru Ndi warned that any SDF official dealing with Chronicle and its publisher is doing so at his own risk.

Press Freedom: Fru Ndi As The Very Counterfeit of Biya

From the above account, it can be seen that not everyone who shouts “press freedom!” “free the press” is an advocate of free speech and expression. Fru Ndi has proven that if he became Cameroon’s president, most journalists would either be dead, in prison or in exile.

Paul Biya is the contrary. The 1990 liberty laws gave the press in Cameroon more freedom than in the majority of African countries. Newspapers have printed the unprintable against him, but he has not personally taken action against them. Outrage against the press is committed by some of his overzealous collaborators.

But it is not any of Fru Ndi’s collaborators who try to muzzle the press. It is Fru Ndi himself doing it. Anybody SDF official who points an accusing finger at the press is doing so either at his instigation or following his example. Cameroonians lovers of press freedom are fortunate that Fru Ndi never became president. He would be worse than Gaddafi or Theodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea.