(THE POST, No. 176, May 26, 2000)
A big man is a big man, and all big men know it very well. Of course, a small man is also a small man, 
but small men don’t seem to know it. You may already be complaining that ‘what about women?’ I am not a male chauvinist. I sincerely believe in the equality of all human beings, irrespective of gender and other particularizing characteristics, although my arguments in favour of female empowerment are often misunderstood by both men and women. The problem is this English language I am using. The English language thinks that ‘man’ includes ‘woman’ whereas the contrary is evidently the case. (Wo)man includes man but not the other way round. See what I mean?
It would have been safer for me to say that a big (wo)man is a big (wo)man and knows it very well although small (wo)men who are also small (wo)men do not seem to know either that they are small women or that a big woman is and remains a big woman. There is nothing of substance that a man can do which a woman of substance cannot do. Take Madam/Dr./Professor Dorothy Njeuma, for instance. Is there anything of substance any of her male Vice-Chancellorial colleagues can do which she cannot do better? If she did not often confuse her incongruous roles as Vice-Chancellor and as a member of the Central Committee of a party that wishes to maintain monolithic dictatorship under guise of a democracy into the third millennium, she would be, by far, the best head of a University institution in this country. This is a personal opinion. Her Anglo-Saxon background probably has something to do with it?
Many Southern Cameroonians were disappointed with Kofi Annan’s pronouncements on the Southern Cameroons problem and some are even threatening to abandon the force of argument for the argument of force. I for one will never abandon the force of argument because that would be to succumb to the erroneous philosophy that ‘might is right’, that, if you are a big man, it means that you own all small men within your reach and can decide what is good for them. My open letter to the big man of the UN was signed ‘on behalf of all Southern Cameroonians who firmly and sincerely believe in the superiority of the force of argument over the argument of force’ although the printers of open letters often surprisingly leave out some important details. Kofi Annan spoke as a big man, knowing fully well that his generous hosts and co-bigmen were hanging on every word from his mouth like a drowning man on a reed. Did even His Holiness the Pope do any better when he came calling here after the repeated murder of many religious personalities? Did he not also, like the big man he is, speak with tongue in cheek? All big men are more or less accomplices of one another.
But why do small men not know this and understand that their own power as small men, who are always in the majority, lies in collective action, in genuine democracy and their right to cast a free and fair vote into a transparent ballot box? That way, small men have the awesome privilege of deciding who is the big man of the day. All systems are identified with big men, but all systems go, and it is the nameless small men who survive all systems. General Yakubu Gowon was told this in 1975 but he did not believe it and before the year ended he had gone and his small men flatterers outlived him to flatter other subsequent dictators. Where is indomitable Sanni Abacha today? Are the same misguided small men who formed the ‘YOUTHS FOR ABACHA’ movement which proclaimed Nigeria was impossible without Abacha not preoccupying themselves happily and more usefully today? Presbyterians (or is it Presbyans?) should take note. As for the young Turks of the SCNC, let them remember that, if you come face to face with a dangerous mboma in the forest, ready to swallow you, the wise course of action is to retreat backwards slowly with small steps, eyes fixed on the danger, until you are safely out of striking distance, before turning and fleeing at full speed. ALL SMALL (WO)MEN UNITE!
Gobata
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