TITLE:
The Anglophone Problem in Cameroon: Focus on Education
AUTHORS:
Jean-Paul Kouega
KEYWORDS:
Cameroon, Education, Federalism, Anglophone Problem, Bilingual Competence
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Access Library Journal,
Vol.5 No.3,
March
6,
2018
ABSTRACT: This article overviews the Cameroon Anglophone educational system from the origins, through the period of Reunification with La République du Cameroun, to the present time. In the process, it highlights the issues that have pushed Anglophone lawyers and teachers to launch a series of protests that have plagued the economy of West Cameroon and seriously affected close to two academic years. Some of the issues identified include the poor state of technical education in the area, the use of French in Anglophone courts and in secondary schools, the difficulty Anglophone students face in tertiary level education where French is dominant, and when writing competitive entrance examinations into professional schools, the programme of which is French-based. Possible solutions to these problems include the creation of technical schools like the former Ombe reference technical school, either the creation of Anglophone professional schools or the transfer of the duties of existing professional schools to university faculties, the re-designing of the English syllabus for francophone secondary schools and that of French for Anglophone schools and, most importantly, the systematic certification of bilingual competence in Cameroon which will, in due course, be made a requirement for recruitment, appointment and posting of civil servants.