DIASPORAN CRITICS AND THE NEEDED CHANGE (Part 1 of 3) By Tikum Mbah Azonga (This piece was first posted on my other blog www.tmazonga.wordpress.com on the 25th of October 2011) Eric Njungwe wrote in CAMNETWORK: “International law recognizes the right of a people to have recourse to rebellion against dictatorship and oppression. If the people of Cameroon were to rise-up against the dictatorship of Paul Biya, it would be perfectly legal and be recognized by the international community as a legitimate act by an oppressed people to free themselves from tyranny”. BELOW IS MY REPLY TO ERIC AND OTHER LIKE-MINDED PEOPLE: 1. EMPTY TALK AND NOTHING ELSE That`s true. But the problem is that we have a lot of people who do very much talking and no action. Who will leave talk, rise up courageously and bell the cat? No one. We talk today as we did twenty five years ago and will do 25 years from now. 2. THE UNSONG HEROES Yet there are other Cameroonians on the ground, on the spot, in the field, doing it their own way. They may not satisfy us but at least they are there and doing something about it. That is why I feel Diasporan critics show render to Caesar what is Caesar`s by acknowledging the significant role of people like Fru Ndi and more recently, Ayah and Kah Walla. There is a saying that the man who says it can`t be done should not stop the man who is doing it. The rest of us have chosen to be absentee landlords. We have abdicated and ceded our rights. We are toothless dogs and dogs whose bark is not might, but fright.Yet someone once said: “Les absents ont toujours tort” (Absentees are always the wrong ones). 3. LACK OF UNITY FROM WITHIN ______________________________________________________________________ FOR PART 2 OF 3 OF THIS STORY, PS FOLLOW THE LINK BELOW TO THE APPROPRIATE PAGE OF MY BLOG http://tmazonga.blogspot.com/2013/12/diasporan-critics-and-needed-change_1981.html