SANKIE MAIMO: DARLING MEMORIES

 “The poets - by which I mean all artists - are finally the only people who know the truth about us. Soldiers don’t, statesmen don’t, priests don’t, union leaders don’t. It is the poets.”  James Baldwin.

Rarely can there have been someone who was called to greatness as father of the literature of his homeland (the British Cameroons) and yet has shockingly  been unsung by his people, as Sankie Maimo who passed on exactly five years ago?  The early 1960s Southern Cameroons’ intellectual enormity, which placed human dignity and literary grace at the core of the artistic life of our native land, only took birth from Sankie’s enormous poetic genius. That is, his ground-breaking I am Vindicated (1959) - first published in Nigeria, the pioneering and catalytic nature of which can scarcely be overemphasized - opened the floodgates of modern British Cameroon’s literature. Before we got the bulging literary voices of the Jedida Asheris,  the Bernard Fonlons, the Sanda Ebas, the Ngonwikuos, the Bole Butakes, the Bate Besongs, the Victor Epie Ngomes, the Kenjo Jumbams, the Anne Tanyi-Tangs, and the Linus Asongs, the name Sankie in the 1950s was already celebrated in Nigeria among literary savants. For this, we can ascertain that his position as one of the Continental sages of the epoch, to be graded alongside Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe, Leopold Seda Senghor, Chiek Anta Diop, Denis Brutus, and Nadine Gordimer, is (among enlightened West Africans)  a fact.

After the I am Vindicated (1959) debut, Sankie Maimo flamed across the literary firmament with the Adventuring with Jaja (1962), Sov-Mbang the Soothsayer (1968), The Mask (1970), Succession in Sarkov (1981), Sankie's Literary Bravura: A Reply to a Critic (1984), Sasse Symphony (1989) and Retributive Justice (1992). 

Today 4 September 2018,  the fifth Anniversary of his passing, comes an occasion for yet another consideration of his rich legacy and the current Southern Cameroons’ condition. Sankie died in 2013 (exactly five years ago), and the Anglophone Cameroon literary world is still in mourning. This is the man that got me started down the road to self-confidence and personal freedom. Because of his characteristic aplomb, we leant to unchain the overblown pious unnecessaries in us. Sankie belongs to a generation of colorful literary men who defined the 1970s, the 1980s and our literary generation in the 1990s in ways in which we – and CameroUn – have never really recovered.

Perhaps, when count is taken of the nature of the tenacious crusade carried on by him in the literary fray, how he dared and deed with his magnanimous pen, how he religiously fought the battle against stroke, how he kept on faithfully onto his untiring upfront pedestal, how he upheld his life’s principle of ‘the good life’ right to the end, when all this is taken into consideration, it will be recognized that to possess his soul in composure and not to mind, he must needs have been not merely exceptionally thick-skinned, or even rhinoceros-hided, but very much that he gave a bravura performance to aboriginal  poetic mores that his people must be willing to tell his electrifying story to the world.

I keenly feel his life should not be left to strangers, least of all literary clowns. Those who had the fortune to meet him in close quarters, share ideas with him, share a drink with him and discuss intimate matters, would do him the justice of informing the world who this African baobab was.  This thought has fired me to make a contribution.

Sankie was a fellow who loved the good life.

He prized the friendly and welcoming camaraderie of happy-go-lucky chaps possibly accompanied by liquor, ladies and cuisine. To each folk his preferred instinct, was his frame of mind; to some fine wine, to some delicious food,  to others appealing damsels, to some great company, to some cocktail and booze. He believed that the universe rotated around bonne vie and paid homage to elegance. So the life of Sankie could have its shades in a row. A joke? Surely. A fiasco? No way!

When we engage with Donald Trump on the sh*thole subject and camp areas sh*tholing the four corners of the great continent called Africa, do we realize the fertile and flourishing flowers of art and talent we brush aside in the Sankies of our beloved continent? Perhaps, the Nso are a very resilient people. The talk about sh*thole countries would not be vexing business to an ordinary Nso. He would simply jog your memory on the proverbial wisdom of their ancestors that when a colanut fruit falls on sh*t, he who esteems cola nuts would break through it, collect the nuts, and go his way. Despite Africa’s backwardness in technological development, no wretched man exposes his dejected backyard to the punches of rich bigots who are after all responsible for the perpetration of his misery. And therefore it is dangerous that I join the chorus with racists whose eternal prayer is the sh*tholing of Africa, so that blinded with shit, we can forget the golden kola nut rapped inside the messy shitty mound.

Pa Sankie’s compound is a stone throw from the Bishop’s Hill House of Kumbo. Fate brought me there for ministry. I took that opportunity to pay Sankie visits in a fortnightly basis. His open enthusiasm each time I called around humbled me. Each two weeks I arrived, the beginnings of our rendezvous always carried the enthusiasm of two uplifting companions who had been separated for a long time. Sankie single-handedly edited my pioneer work - a challenging book on my spiritual ministry among the Wimbum and a book that is yet to be published. Our discussions bore various themes and carried wide-ranging landscapes. And when I began ministering in Nkambe, my visits were still frequent. I was then preparing for studies for Germany - a thing that later, took the Italian direction. Worth elaborating here is my experience with Sankie Mamio and the German language. “ I am embarking on a personal study of German”, I told him. I had then photocopied a grammar textbook from the Bambui Major seminary. He quipped that he needed his own copy. “An 82 year old man, requesting for a German grammar textbook, what for?” I imagined but didn’t voice my thoughts out to embarrass him. But I couldn’t contain the thoughts within. So I gathered courage and inquired. He told me he had loved the German language even in his teens, but no opportunity came. Therefore he considered this the great occasion. I went on and got a copy. Granting it him as a generous gift, he refused to get it for free, paid the photocopy threatening me I shouldn’t come any more if I would not take the money. Here I break in to say that all this experience is thirteen months before Sankie’s death! We went through the first two chapters together, and we ended that day, with homework from that language text to do. I went back home to Nkambe that day. After  days something brought me back to Kimbo. I remembered to visit Pa. His first question was if I had done my German grammar exercise. I had not even taken my book along, but Sankie sat me down, boiled our regular relished honey drink and we were sipping and feasting. He then opened his own copy and word-for-word we revised the homework he had done about the first two chapters of the grammar book, before we began our normal stories about the world and its people. Sankie was a student all his day.

His simple, silent and reassuring household became a sanctuary for me. In one of those stopovers, I shared some pressure from spiteful folks I was going through. And when my great friend heard me and saw the anguish in my heart, he struggled (with the pain of stroke) to his library, picked a book , and brought it to me with words carrying the weight of his characteristic forthrightness, ‘take, go read it and learn Father”. Why a book, and more, why a play with such a scary title: The Devils! ? If I say I was flabbergasted it would be an understatement.  The heading of the book generated a curiosity in me to thumb it from page to page. Our discussions always tasted like peppers that flared hot in rice and stews. And the hot rice and stew of conversation was always delicious since the bowl of fresh water of Sankie's clever and consoling counsels were around to add flavor to the jolly chatter, pacifying  the mouth again for more hot rice.  Our next meeting (which came after a fortnight) was a discussion on the findings I made in the play The Devils, and it came out to be a most relieving, a most refreshing and a most insightful discussion.

Some are under the illusion – an impression given in certain quarters today  - that Sankie was a sworn enemy of the celebrated Bernard Fonlon. And Sankie’s fiery chatter about Fonlon could damagingly exacerbate fuel to the inflamed mind of an undiscerning onlooker. When you plunge deeper  into his heart, when you interrogate him with germane journalistic qualities, you discover a man whose admiration for Fonlon is entire and whose acknowledgment of the intellectual and moral prowess of the eminent contemporary, Fonlon, is complete. What Sankie opposed was a problem with which we are all too at home with today. This involves the idolizing of persons and the preposterous idea of thinking that the Fonlon way is the only way. Sankie fondly  expressed (at least to me) the paradigmatic power Bernard Fonlon’s sense of integrity possessed in their days. Yet Sankie did not like comparisons. Human beings are not made up of the same unique stuff. You can't assimilate the individuality of a person into the container of another. And therefore, in moments of literary debate Sankie bowed to none but the truth. He feared no one, not even the colossal Fonlon. He is the only one in litearary criticism who openly challenged the unchalleangable Fonlon in a world-class well-articulated article. He believed that God (if to him God really existed) was the supreme and unchallengeable and all men and women were mere strivers after perfection of whatever kind. And therefore the adulation of persons for whatever intellectual or spiritual appeal was intolerable. What was important was to know yourself, pick your own irreplaceable talent, do your thing, finish the task you have in this world, and disappear.

The psychic difference therefore, between Sankie and Fonlon, large as they are, quite dwindle away when we consider that all of them beheld a vision of life that valorized the power of the mind over slushiness.

There are important lessons to learn from this great son of Nso. In the final analysis, Christians have far less to fear from Sankie than sanctimonious masquerades. The anonymous Christianity of Sankie is a challenge no more to the Sankies of today as to the African religious ministers – to see how to theologically accommodate in their spiritual landscape such nameless believers and still allow them to be what they, out of strong convictions, want to be. Room must be allowed them in the spacious  Church of the welcoming Christ for,  “there are many rooms in my Father's house.” (John 14, 2). Curious thing - that the last time I met him, he requested for a rosary! And told me in his characteristic humor (but underlying seriousness) “Father,  I would be honored one day to pass my confessions to you”. With the suddenness of my leaving for overseas I didn’t achieve all of what my beloved friend prayed to gain particularly from my own hands. Sankie Maimo, my friend, I write to say I have prayed for you.

The death of Sankie is a tragedy. That much is affirmed by those who go core-deep into the human condition. But those of us who were fortunate to have his friendship experience the loss of Sankie Maimo with a special sense of calamity, for we could not think of his death merely on limited human terms. We have no choice but to believe that Sankie, with all of his amazing gifts, will have to face the very God he sometimes dismissed with his nice jokes. ‘Who knows the thoughts of men? A deathbed change of heart!’, some casual onlooker to Sankie’s life may say. As for that ‘deathbed change of heart’ stuff, my encounter with Sankie convinces me that such questions are nonsensical considering the frank and openhearted Sankie I personally came upon. Sankie was a sincere, straightforward and genuine man -  in fact, the personificaiton of frankness and fearlessness. Son to one of the most reputed Christians in Kumbo town he lived an anonymous Christianity because of deep-felt personal principles. And we must allow people to be free to choose how to live their lives. When I look at his life and the fruits thereof, I prefer that unrecognizability to the clanging hollow gong of a holier-than-thou. The striking conclusions of Christ’s story of the Pharisee and the Tax-Collector is my testimony! Do not misunderstand me – Christianity demands of its followers unrelenting enthusiasm and dedication. But as for the Final Verdict of Omnipotent God on each one’s life, only Pope Francis’ legendary epigram, ‘who am I to judge’, carries portentous power to any mortal answer.

I have not engaged my wits on Sankie to canonize him saint or to demonize him sinner. Sankie had no time for such debates. He enjoyed to be just a human being out there.  Yet, Sankie passed through Sasse College  and the enduring principles of life he carried from that power house of knowledge informed his poetical outpourings in no small way.  But then again, what stood Sankie out from other persons was a combination of a deeply ingrained sense of history and the capacity to treat words with reverence and to see writing as a semi-religious experience. He was a no-nonsense man in the literary fray. Literature – whether poesy, prose or literary criticism – was Sankie’s thing. His luminous eloquence in literary satire and criticism for example, is unrivalled in Africa. He took his pen when unfairly stung by a neophyte critic and with the flash of its flow slew his enemy with sheer utter brilliance in his Sankie’s Literary Bravura: A Reply to a Critic. This is a man who cut out the vocation of his life in the written word, held to it with sacerdotal zeal  and lived it to the end. Come to think of it, one year before he passed away, he just published his last work(even with a stroke). I am intimately aware of this because he gave me the privilege to make a comment on the blurb of that definitive short story masterpiece. At 82 he was not ashamed to study, not tired to author a work!

The finest Christian is the Christian poet. Poets - profane poets alike - are the most spiritual beings in the world. Patently, spirituality is quintessentially poetry. Whether or not Sankie will be monumentalized in our lives is down to whether or not our community becomes more enthused in relishing the titillating otherworldly stimulus of poetry, and that's why I honor him today.

Poets never die. Sankie’s enduring legacy is a blessing to our  times. With a legendary dedication to poetic talent, he attained the end for which life is worth living. And my word to those who mourn his passing is “noli timere”. Because his immortal literature will never die, we are right to conclude that the imposing poetic gushes of his literary art have lit a scintillating torchlight on his pathway to the Heavens.

 Fr. Gerald Jumbam 

SECOND INTERVIEW OF FR GERALD JUMBAM ON HIS NEW BOOK

Rev. Fr. Gerald Jumbam’s book INDEPENDENCE OR NOTHING: Theology of Self-Determination and the British Southern Cameroons, has not only been a welcome relief among his people (the Southern Cameroons), it has also attracted international attention; consequent upon this, the AuthorHouse Publishing Company Bloomington USA has accorded him an interview through its radio station Toginet Radio 2.0.  Below is the detailed interview in the written word. 

AuthorHouse Voices: How did you come to write this book? What was your motivation?

Fr Gerald Jumbam: The writing of this book is motivated by the fact that the people of the former British colony of the Cameroons are asking for their independence and this demand seems to worry some criminally-minded people. You know very well that the British Cameroons was a mandated territory of the League of Nations and all mandates were territories that were being prepared for independence. Why then did Britain with the complicity of the United Nations refuse to give full independence to the British Cameroons; a territory that was supposed to have its independence? It is this glaring injustice that pushed me to write this book. You know that the decolonization of a territory is an international affair. And you must remember that decolonization was one of the principal reasons for the creation of the United Nations Organization in 1945. Now tell me why Britain should give independence to her other colonies and when it comes to the turn of the British Cameroons, Britain with the obvious collusion of the UN should refuse to give independence to the British colony of the Cameroons. It is therefore clear that the problem of the British Southern Cameroons is an international problem and not an internal affair of La Republique du Cameroun which in all fairness has never been the colonial master of the British Cameroons. For where on earth did a colonial master grant independence to a territory by handing the territory to another colonial master? How can France and French Cameroun come to rule over a territory they never colonized? Britain should therefore assume full responsibility as the colonial master of the British Cameroons and with the collaboration of the UN, grant full independence to the territory.

AuthorHouse Voices: Who does the book appeal to and why?

Fr. Gerald Jumbam: The intended audience is all the people of the world who are concerned about the oppressed and suffering people deprived of justice and struggling under colonial oppression. But in this book, I am addressing myself principally to the British Government that was the Administering Power in the British Cameroons. I am also speaking to the United Nations Organization and to its members to correct the unjust situation they created in the British Cameroons in 1961. Finally I am addressing myself to the people of the British Cameroons to fight for their independence because it is their international right to struggle for the decolonization of their territory. For is it not a shame that the UN should in the 21st century be supporting the colonization of the British Cameroons by the French and French Cameroon.

AuthorHouse Voices: What one thing do you want readers to learn/take away from this work?

Fr Gerald Jumbam: I want my readers to note that Britain and not France was the colonial master of the British Cameroons. For this reason, the people of the British Cameroons will never, never accept any French administration in their territory because the UN already granted independence to French Cameroon on 1st January 1960 and the boundaries of that independent French Cameroon did not include the territory of the British Cameroons.

AuthorHouse Voices: What scenes and/or characters would you like to highlight during the interview? (Think of this part of the interview like a movie trailer. Exciting parts of your book to tease listeners. Unforgettable characters which would motivate listeners to buy your book.)

Fr. Gerald Jumbam: The setting is the British Southern Cameroons, some people call it Ambazonia. The first character I valorize in my book is God since it is about the theology of self-determination. Freedom and liberation are gratuitous gifts from God which tyrants would like to arrogate stingily to themselves. The other main characters of the book are the freedom fighters, the human right activists and leaders of the pressure groups of the struggle for the liberation of our homeland. They are both in homeland and in the diaspora and they speak with one voice though with diverse temperaments. I have in the book also tried to show personages representing colonialism in our homeland they are: the Governors, SDOs, DOs, and gendarmes that represent French Cameroon colonialism in the British Southern Cameroons as they conquered the territory of the British Cameroons after the British left the territory in 1961. That is why Honorable Joseph Wirba that respectable voice in our land was saying the other day that the French gendarmes in the British territory of the British Cameroons are behaving there as if they were an army of occupation.

AuthorHouse Voices: How would you introduce your book to a friend in a sentence or two? (I will use this to introduce the book at the beginning of the interview)

Fr. Gerald Jumbam: This book is an appeal to the British Government to assume its full responsibilities as colonial master of the British Cameroons and grant full independence to the territory.

AuthorHouse Voices: Tell me how this book is unlike others with similar topics. What sets it apart from the crowd?

Fr. Gerald Jumbam: This book is different from anything that has so far been written on the British Cameroons because it consistently refers to the British Cameroons as an independent political entity from the French Cameroon which became independent in 1st January 1960. I repeatedly state in my book that Britain was and remains the colonial master of the British Cameroons and that the territory has never had any official treaty of union with La Republique du Cameroun. In order words, the British Cameroons is a West African State whereas French Cameroon also called La Republique du Cameroon is in Central Africa and has nothing to do with the British Cameroons. This book therefore reveals clearly that the presence of the French in the territory of British Cameroons is an unwarranted intrusion into the affairs of another nation; an act that should be condemned by the International Community.

This book also is unlike others in that the book is about the theology of self-determination. I have been inspired Christian theology, believing that, through this theological vision of self-determination, the church can engage itself in the political and economic liberation of Africa and anywhere in the world where people are tyrannized and terrorized.

AuthorHouse Voices:  When and where does your story take place? [For novels -- Why did you choose this setting?

Fr Gerald Jumbam: My story takes place in the British Cameroons, particularly in the British Southern Cameroons, from 1916, the time when the British and the French found out that French and British cultures could never live together in a single mould to the present times 2018 when there is open confrontation with the invading French army of occupation which is trying to achieve a condominium or joint administration which the French themselves had earlier denied in 1916.

AuthorHouse Voices: What three words best describe this story? Its characters?

Fr. Gerald Jumbam: The three words which best describes this story are: Independence Or Nothing; that is, give us the people of the British Cameroons our liberty or give us death.

 AuthorHouse Voices: What was the most challenging part about writing this book? The most fun/rewarding?

The biggest challenge of writing this book came from the fact that I am a priest by vocation. And it may interest you to know that some Church hierarchy from my part of the British Cameroons were openly hostile to my open support for the independence of the British Cameroons. My life has even been threatened verbally and in letters. But seeing that here were prelates who did not realize that the voice of the people is the voice of God, I ignored these threats and came up with the writing of this book. For I strongly believe that if you are not passionately on the sight of the downtrodden, the brutalized and the oppressed peoples of the world, then you are tragically on the side of the oppressors of mankind. I chose to save my people because that is what Jesus Christ whom I serve as a priest would have done. And that is what brought joy to my soul as I was writing this book because I was deeply convinced that if God was on the side of the oppressed people of the British Southern Cameroons then God was on my side.

AuthorHouse Voices: Thank you. How has the book been received by your community, your friends, family members and colleagues and also, could you inform your listeners on where and how the book can be bought?

Fr Gerald Jumbam: The book has been received with so much enthusiasm and eagerness. Those wishing to get personal copies should get online to Amazon, https://www.authorhouse.com/Bookstore/BookDetail.aspx?BookId=SKU-001169441. Those who wish to get numerous copies can contact the author to help them as intermediary contact the Publishing House so they get the copies in a discount.

AuthorHouse Voices: Is there anything we haven't covered here that you feel is important for people to know about your book?

Fr. Gerald Jumbam: No. I feel that we have exhausted the questions and the concerns about this book. I wish to thank the Publishing House (Author House) and the radio station for giving me this opportunity to air out my feelings and thoughts on the book I have recently authored: INDEPENDENCE OR NOTHING: Theology of Self-Determination and the British Southern Cameroons.

INTERVIEWING FR GERALD JUMBAM ON HIS NEW BOOK

Rev. Fr. Gerald Jumbam Nyuykongmo alias Jerry Jumbam is a priest whose sense of inner freedom allows him to express himself freely and with concision. His huge commitment to the theological enterprise has buoyed up his spirits to fashion out a theology for his African peoples. He calls it theology of self-determination. He has launched this venture with a pioneering book entitled Independence or Nothing. Follow him in this interview and get more.

Interviewer: How do you feel after bagging a doctorate in Sacred Theology and with the brilliant distinction of Magna cum laude from the prestigious Pontifical Lateran university?

Jumbam: A Phd is not what really matters to me. Rightly it can make you feel good and fulfilled – a feeling which you justifiably deserve since the accomplishment is a result of nerve-racking toil. But I fear it because it can make you complacent or cloak up mediocrity or use it to seek trivial attention or pointless prestige. What is pleasing to the soul, what makes one truly happy in the world is when one is able to win some victories for humanity by serving the weak, by being voice to the voiceless and by pointing out without panic the right way to those in the night of powerlessness. This I seek to do and my real satisfaction comes therefrom.  

Interviewer: Let’s get then to serious business. The title of your recent work INDEPENDENCE OR NOTHING: Self-determination and the British Southern Cameroons is so powerful and pertinent that it has set tongues wagging. How come?

Jumbam: The title of my work states the obvious. It is an ordinary idea among the Southern Cameroonians. It is a title that carries with it the convictions, beliefs and sentiments of millions of people in my homeland: Independence Or Nothing. It has been their dictum, the guiding principle of over 8 million dispossessed people ( a 57 year dispossession) who seek a voice in the international scene, and whose voice is legitimate and statutory. It is about self-determination in its most insightful way. In that book, I have simply told the story of millions of people who rose and declared with defiance: Independence or Nothing! It all happened on 22 September 2017 and 1 October 2017 during civil right manifestations that can only be equaled to (and which I believe even surpassed) the historic Rev Dr King jr’s I have a Dream speech manifestation some decades ago in the United States of America. The one message the people of the Southern Cameroons put to the world is that they shall not sell out their birthright of  independence to neighboring African and oversea colonial marauders for a cup of garri.

Interviewer: In that masterpiece, you have expertly articulated their message that enough is enough! Do you think this struggle will succeed?

Jumbam: Oh Yes! I am the biggest optimist. Ardently confident. Colonialism is a crime against humanity, an international evil, and an evil which has been condemned by all nations of the world including the United Nations Organization(UNO). The British Southern Cameroons was and is still a colony of Britain and it is the place of Britain and UNO to ensure that that colony is fully independent. As long as they continue to do what they know is wrong, my people will continue to struggle. As God is always on the side of the truth, I have no doubt whatsoever that the British Southern Cameroons would achieve its goal of a full independent State.

Interviewer: Are you not afraid seeing how wild the government of your country is, they could kill you?

Jumbam: Before I left Cameroon I was already in serious problems with the Cameroon Government because I had ambitions to be a writer. And if as a writer you cannot name the unnamable, that is, to express what other people fear to say as Salman Rushdie said in his novel The Satanic Verses, then you have no business writing at all; in other words, you are already morally dead. According to Christian theology, if you are morally dead and can’t speak the truth, you are really dead. In short, I am saying that I couldn’t be taking the bull by the horns if I were not ready for a bull fight. So those who talk about the death of others shouldn’t be surprised if they die before those others.

Interviewer: We hear that they have opened a new military command unit in Bamenda to quell down the freedom struggle of the British Southern Cameroons?

Jumbam: You cannot suppress the truth. In the years that lie ahead, the bloody confrontations that would break out in the British Southern Cameroons would shock the conscience of the international community, if they do not become part of the resolution of this problem and facilitate as soon as possible a genuine resolution of the conflict. For if the government of La Republique du Cameroun knew that its presence in the British Southern Cameroons is legitimate, why is the area being militarized? They know very well that the people’s hearts had long left Yaoundé. And you know that this militarization began in 1962 after the Tombel crisis in which without the indication of the West Cameroon government, La Republique gendarmes invaded the area. All that militarization is a clear indication that the annexing power knows that its days are numbered.

Interviewer: We hear that your bishop is very angry with you for involving yourself in politics.

Jumbam: I have had some people tell me that and rather than dwell on it, I have given the bishop the benefit of the doubt. But if it is true that such anger is expressed, then such is the anger of cowardice. It is the anger of accusing Moses for being political, of accusing the Prophet Amos of being political, of accusing Cardinal Tumi or Archbishop Romero of being political, of accusing even Jesus Christ of being political. I say it is an expression of cowardice because Pericles in his famous funeral oration said that “we do not say that a man who takes no interest in politics is a man who minds his own business; we say that he has no business here at all”. So it is difficult for a serious person to ignore what politics is all about and still carry out his daily civic duties – whether laity or cleric. Already there are whispers around Rome that Archbishop Oscar Romero will be canonized in October of this year. The Church is canonizing Romero so that those who get angry at politics should follow the example of Pope Francis’ words that “Politics, according to the Social Teachings of the Church, is one of the highest forms of charity, because it serves the common good.” My statements about the oppression of the people of my homeland have served nothing but their common good. So those who think they can escape from politics should leave the world and go to another planet altogether – maybe Neptune, Mass or Jupiter.

Interviewer: This year seems to be exceptionally yours in literally production. In one year you have come out with two internationally acclaimed works. Apart from Independence or Nothing, there is another one on Pope Francis and Africa. In that recent publication entitled Pope Francis Hero of Africa what were you trying to say?

Jumbam: It is a book I enjoy sitting down to reading. It is my own pan-Africanist stand as a man of God; I call it my African Manifesto. I am saying in that book that there are lots of similarities between Latin America and Africa; similarities such as the Ubuntu spirit, fellow-feeling, colonialism, dictatorship and tyranny. This gives both the Africa and the Latin American a common vision of events; a vision already demonstrated in the public pronouncements of Pope Francis, especially in his sympathy for the poor and oppressed people of the world. This is something which has not happened for centuries in the preceding papacies.

So I was saying that the African Church should take advantage of the present papacy to solve some of the teething problems that are militating against the growth of the Church in Africa and the spread of the Gospel. 

Interviewer: In that work, you call Pope Francis hero to Africa. You mean there is no African bishop or cardinal or priest who powerfully represents Africa out there?

Jumbam: There are many, and very powerful ones of course. But to me, there is no one like the Argentinian Pope, especially when it concerns Africa in the global stage. And he openly takes sides with the poor! Where are most of the poor people found in the world? In Africa. He chose Africa when he chose Francis of Assisi as his patron. He is hero not only to the wretched in Africa but to the underprivileged around the globe. You may have your own opinion. This is mine. Francis is a fearless and convincing leader in that role and has no apologies to make to anyone when he plays the role. That is why I admire him…his tenacity.

 And so I chose him as hero to my continent not because we don’t have heroes, but because he puts Africa and other suffering peoples at the forefront in the world stage. He speaks in the Universal Church to me and to my continent, in the most intimate ways.

Interviewer: You have been so involved in these matters. How do you see the future of your priestly vocation?

Jumbam: Priesthood to me is a conviction - a cast-iron certainty.  From my childhood I had always dreamt of becoming a priest and it was and still is the one passion of my life. I am strongly convinced like the Prophet Jeremiah that even while I was still in my mother’s womb, God chose me to be his priest. Looking at all the difficulties I have passed through, I can see that God has a great future for me in this vocation. For it is clear that God’s mercies and protection have been with me during the difficult days of my vocation. And knowing as Paul has asked that “If God be for me, who can be against me?” Luckily when I was born my mother gave me the name NYUYKONGMO, meaning God-loves-me; and if God loves me who can be against me?

Interviewer: Thank you. The appearance of Independence Or Nothing has been greeted with so much enthusiasm. For those who wish to get personal copies and those who want to get many copies, where do they go?

Jumbam: The AuthorHouse Publishers have simplified things for us. Those wishing to get personal copies should get online to Amazon, https://www.authorhouse.com/Bookstore/BookDetail.aspx?BookId=SKU-001169441. Those who wish to get numerous copies can contact the author to help them as middleman contact the Publishing House so they get the copies in a discount.

Interviewer: It’s been a pleasure talking to you.

Jumbam: Me too.