If the Cameroonian public was a woman, she’ll be that absolutely gorgeous damsel with an ever broad smile. The kind of girl everyone wants to have a piece of and who doesn’t really mind. But the downside is everyone wants a piece but has only crumbs to offer.
The Cameroonian public accepts everything that has a minimally nice package, especially when this thing comes from elsewhere. Our market is flooded with foreign products and everyday they come in to get as much as they can from the Cameroonian public and give back a pittance. And that’s why many Cameroonian entertainers live from hand to mouth and it isn’t funny at all.
Even so, the hour of complaining is long gone. Maahlox has tasted firsthand the frustration of complaining and he has thus aligned himself to the powers that be, but is that the solution? I don’t think so.
Instead of complaining, we in Cameroon needsto understand that we have to put our money where our mouths are. It is obvious that multi-nationals careless about the cultural growth of Cameroon and the pivotal role entertainment plays therein and so we should stop expecting anything from them.
So what’s the way forward?
The entertainers, their sympathizers and all those who bother about cultural growth are compelled at this point to bear the very expensive cost of growth by creating platforms for other Cameroonians in order to give the necessary relevance to ourselves.
And in return Cameroonians have to support those who will come up with such endeavors. That said, we at Critiqsite congratule Tino Foy of Artchitect for what he is doing with The Discovery Show and Wax Dey of Calabash Music for what he has succeeded to put together with Njeiforbi group of companies.
The Discovery Show and the Njeiforbi Music Festival are the kind of platforms we should be creating for ourselves, where we can dictate the rules and give ourselves the value we estimate that we deserve.
Let us show them some love.