The book is expected to be available towards the end of September 2026. Until then, I invite readers, policymakers, diplomats, scholars, members of the diaspora, friends of Southern Cameroons, Africans, Americans, Europeans, and all those interested in negotiation, diplomacy, statecraft, development, productive sovereignty, the Gulf of Guinea, and the future of U.S.–Africa relations to follow the conversation
.By Martin S. Mungwa, Ph.D., F. ASCE, Contributor to The Independentist News
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I wrote Southern Cameroons 2050: Why America Should Care because I believe the Southern Cameroons struggle has reached a point where statecraft must move to the fore.
For years, advocacy has played an indispensable role. It has documented injustice. It has kept the Southern Cameroons question alive. It has mobilized communities. It has appealed to governments, legislatures, journalists, international organizations, and human-rights institutions. It has reminded the world that the conflict did not begin in 2016 and that the constitutional and political questions surrounding the Former British Southern Cameroons remain unresolved. That work matters.
But advocacy alone is not producing the political impact required to move the conflict toward resolution. There comes a point when repeating the grievance, however legitimate, is no longer enough. There comes a point when a people seeking political change must demonstrate not only why the existing situation is unacceptable, but also what they are prepared to negotiate, what they are prepared to build, and whether they possess the institutional seriousness to govern afterward. That is the transition from advocacy to statecraft. And that transition is one of the principal reasons I wrote this book.
ADVOCACY CAN OPEN THE DOOR. STATECRAFT MUST ENTER THE ROOM.
Advocacy asks the world to listen. Statecraft asks what happens after the world listens. Advocacy explains the grievance. Statecraft defines the objective. Advocacy seeks attention. Statecraft seeks an outcome. Advocacy mobilizes sympathy and political support. Statecraft identifies interests, negotiating positions, counterpart risks, acceptable compromises, implementation mechanisms, safeguards, and guarantees.
Advocacy can place Southern Cameroons on an international agenda. Statecraft must prepare Southern Cameroons to sit at the negotiating table. That distinction is fundamental. The next stage of the Southern Cameroons question cannot be built primarily around another conference, another demonstration, another resolution, another petition, or another appeal for sympathy. Those instruments may remain useful. But they must increasingly serve a larger strategic purpose.
The central question must become: What political process can move Southern Cameroons from conflict toward a credible negotiated settlement? That requires statecraft. Who negotiates? With what authority? What exactly is being requested? What principles are non-negotiable? What options can legitimately be discussed? What interests do the other parties have? What role should Nigeria play? What role should the United States play? What interests do Britain, France, the African Union, and other international actors bring to the table? Who facilitates or mediates? What happens if an agreement is violated? Who verifies implementation? How are civilians protected? How is armed power brought under lawful authority? How are public institutions maintained during transition? How are agreements financed? How does economic activity continue? And what prevents a political settlement from collapsing during its first serious crisis? These are not principally advocacy questions. They are statecraft questions.
WHAT COMES NEXT?
This book therefore begins from a different premise. The Southern Cameroons question can no longer be discussed only in the language of history, injustice, conflict, and self-determination. Those questions remain essential. But another question has become unavoidable: What comes next?
If the people of Southern Cameroons seek the authority to determine their political future, what kind of country should they be prepared to build? Who will govern? Under what authority? What limits will exist on that authority? How will schools, hospitals, courts, ports, electricity, finance, public records, security, and local government continue functioning through political transition? How will an economy create recurring value rather than reproduce dependency? How will political settlement become durable peace?
And what kind of relationship could a peaceful, democratic, institutionally credible Southern Cameroons build with the United States, Africa, and the wider world? A movement that cannot answer these questions will eventually encounter the limits of advocacy. A movement prepared to answer them begins to practice statecraft.
FROM GRIEVANCE TO DESIGN
Much has already been written about the history of the Former British Southern Cameroons, the constitutional arrangements of 1961, and the political developments that followed. That history matters. But a people cannot build their future entirely by looking backward.
Eventually, the question must move from: What happened to us? to: What are we prepared to build? My approach to that question is shaped fundamentally by engineering. An engineer is not trained merely to admire a design. An engineer must ask whether the design will work under actual operating conditions. What is the design basis? What assumptions have been made? Where are the interfaces? Where is the single point of failure? What happens when a component fails? What redundancy exists? Who operates the system? Who maintains it? Who pays for it? And who is accountable when it fails? These are engineering questions. But I believe they are also questions of statecraft.
A REPUBLIC CANNOT HAVE A SINGLE POINT OF FAILURE
My professional experience in the electric utility industry in New York reinforced this lesson. In a reliable electrical network, you do not design the entire system on the assumption that every transformer will remain available forever. Equipment fails. Maintenance is required. Components must sometimes be removed from service. A well-designed system therefore has redundancy. If one component is lost, the remaining system should continue carrying the load within established limits.
The same principle applies in structural engineering. A resilient bridge should not be designed so that the loss of one critical support automatically causes the entire structure to collapse. Engineers think about alternate load paths, continuity, robustness, redundancy, and the ability of the remaining structure to redistribute forces when damage occurs.
A Republic must be designed with the same seriousness. Its legitimacy should not depend on one leader. Its treasury should not depend on one official. Its electricity should not depend on one substation. Its communications should not depend on one cable. Its trade should not depend on one port. Its institutional memory should not reside in one person’s computer. Its security should not depend on one commander. Its international relationships should not depend on one foreign patron. The governing question is therefore also a statecraft question: IF THIS COMPONENT FAILS, WHAT CONTINUES TO WORK? That leads to another central proposition of the book:
LIBERATION CAPACITY IS NOT GOVERNING CAPACITY
A movement may successfully mobilize people. It may expose injustice. It may sustain resistance. It may raise resources. It may attract international attention. But government requires something more. Government must protect people who disagree with those in power. It must preserve records. Manage public money. Maintain infrastructure. Administer justice. Regulate commerce. Place armed power under civilian law. Provide public services. Honor legitimate obligations. Enter international agreements. And eventually transfer political authority peacefully. The practical test begins the morning after political change.
A teacher must know whether the school opens. A nurse must know whether medicine remains available. An engineer must know whether yesterday’s operating instruction is still valid. A customs officer must know whether cargo documents remain lawful. A magistrate must know what happens to pending cases and detainees. A pensioner must know whether a legitimate obligation survives transition. Political freedom opens the door. Governing capacity determines what happens after people walk through it. And statecraft must begin preparing for that morning long before political change occurs.
STATECRAFT BEFORE NEGOTIATION
Negotiation should not begin when people finally sit around a table. Serious negotiation begins much earlier. It begins when a movement develops the capacity to understand: What do we want? What does the other side want? What do neighboring countries fear? What do international partners need? Where do interests overlap? What can be guaranteed? What cannot be compromised? What happens after signatures are placed on paper? That preparation is statecraft.
It requires disciplined policy positions. Institutional readiness. Economic planning. Diplomatic relationships. Negotiating authority. Legal preparation. Security-transition thinking. Financing mechanisms. Implementation benchmarks. And an understanding of counterpart risk. A negotiator who arrives with only a grievance has an argument. A negotiator who arrives with a grievance, evidence, institutional capacity, economic propositions, safeguards, implementation mechanisms, and an understanding of the interests of others has statecraft. That is the shift I believe Southern Cameroons now requires.
THE FIVE-TEST INSTITUTIONAL READINESS FRAMEWORK
From this reasoning emerged the Five-Test Institutional Readiness Framework developed in the book: Legitimacy. Administration. Protection. Production. External Relations.
Legitimacy asks who has authority to govern and how that authority is limited. Administration asks whether lawful decisions can become dependable public services. Protection asks whether citizens, rights, territory, and critical systems can be secured under civilian law. Production asks whether the economy creates recurring value, jobs, skills, ownership, public revenue, and reinvestment. External Relations asks whether a country can enter agreements, implement them, honor them, and cooperate internationally without surrendering strategic autonomy. These are not merely nation-building tests. They are statecraft tests. Any serious negotiating partner will eventually ask whether commitments made today can be implemented tomorrow.
WHO OWNS THE PRODUCTIVE SOURCE?
Running through all five tests is another question: Who owns the productive source? A country can export resources and remain poor. It can attract foreign investment without accumulating domestic capability. It can build infrastructure that nobody locally can maintain. It can educate talented people who leave because productive opportunity is unavailable. Political sovereignty therefore requires more than legal authority.
It requires productive sovereignty. Productive sovereignty does not mean isolation. It does not mean rejecting foreign capital, technology, trade, imports, or international finance. It means asking what remains after the transaction. Who owns the asset? Who controls the technology? Who receives the recurring benefit? What skills remain? What domestic suppliers were created? What productive capability remains when the investor, donor, contractor, or foreign partner leaves? The objective is not to prevent capital from moving. The objective is to ensure that productive capability is not depleted faster than it is regenerated. This too is statecraft.
Economic weakness becomes diplomatic weakness. Dependency becomes negotiating vulnerability. A country that cannot finance basic functions eventually bargains from necessity. Productive capability therefore strengthens political autonomy.
WHY SHOULD AMERICA CARE?
This brings us to the question in the title. Why should the United States care about Southern Cameroons? The answer should not begin with charity. The stronger argument is mutual interest. The Gulf of Guinea matters. Nigeria matters. Maritime commerce matters. Critical minerals and diversified supply chains matter. Energy matters. Agriculture matters. Technology matters. Regional markets matter. Conflict prevention matters. A peaceful, democratic, productive, outward-looking Southern Cameroons could become a constructive African and Atlantic partner.
But I do not ask America to determine the political future of Southern Cameroons. I ask America to help create the diplomatic space in which the parties can negotiate that future seriously. The United States should give the Southern Cameroons question a serious strategic hearing. Study the history. Study the constitutional record. Study the humanitarian consequences. Study the Gulf of Guinea. Study Nigeria. Study the diaspora. Study the economic possibilities. And study whether those seeking political authority are prepared not merely to advocate, but to negotiate, govern, implement agreements, and exercise power responsibly.
America should not choose the outcome. It can help make a credible negotiating process possible. That could include a mediator or facilitator acceptable to the parties, negotiations without preconditions that predetermine the political options available for discussion, and credible international mechanisms supporting implementation. The objective should not merely be another expression of concern. The objective should be a negotiating process capable of producing a durable political settlement. That is where statecraft must lead.
PEACE IS ECONOMIC INFRASTRUCTURE
A settlement is not peace simply because signatures appear on paper. There must be implementation benchmarks. Verification. Civilian protection. Security transition. Mechanisms for dealing with noncompliance. Dispute resolution. Reconstruction.Financing. And credible guarantees. Peace must survive its first crisis. That is why I make another central argument in the book: PEACE IS ECONOMIC INFRASTRUCTURE. Without peace, investment retreats. Young people leave. Schools remain disrupted. Farms become insecure. Infrastructure deteriorates. Public resources are diverted. Communities lose confidence in the future. Political settlement and economic transformation therefore cannot be treated as separate projects. Statecraft must connect the two.
WHAT DID YOU BUILD?
This book is deliberately future-oriented. It does not deny suffering. It does not erase history. But no people should be condemned to define themselves permanently by what was done to them. Eventually history asks another question: What did you build? Did you create schools that educate? Hospitals that work? Courts that protect? Enterprises that grow? Infrastructure that is maintained? Public finances that can be audited? Security institutions under law? A political system in which opponents remain citizens? International partnerships that leave knowledge and capability behind? And perhaps most importantly: DOES THE REPUBLIC CONTINUE FUNCTIONING AFTER THE FOUNDING GENERATION IS GONE? That is the ultimate test of redundancy in statecraft.
The strongest founding generation is not the one that remains indispensable. It is the one that builds institutions capable of functioning without it. Courts should work after the first judges retire. Electricity should remain available after the first engineers leave. Elections should survive an unpopular result. The treasury should resist an unlawful telephone call. Records should survive a cyberattack, flood, political dispute, or death of an official. Local governments should continue serving citizens when the national center is distracted. The ultimate proof of sovereignty will therefore not simply be that a flag has been raised. IT WILL BE THAT THE COUNTRY STILL WORKS THE MORNING AFTER.
That is why I wrote Southern Cameroons 2050: Why America Should Care. Not merely to make another case for Southern Cameroons. Not merely to repeat an advocacy argument. And not as a final constitution or instructions that future generations must obey. I wrote it because I believe Southern Cameroons must increasingly prepare for the work of statecraft. For diplomacy. For negotiation. For institutional readiness. For economic viability. For implementation. For governing. And ultimately for durable peace.
Advocacy has helped keep the Southern Cameroons question alive. Statecraft must now help move it toward resolution. The questions therefore can no longer be only: What happened to us? Who failed us? Who recognizes us? They must increasingly become: What exactly do we seek? Who has authority to negotiate? What interests must be reconciled? What safeguards are required? Who guarantees implementation? What must we build? Who pays? Who owns the productive source? What happens when a critical component fails? What redundancy exists? What commitments can we honor? And what kind of country will remain when the founders are gone?
That is the journey of this book: From advocacy to statecraft. From grievance to design. From diplomacy to negotiation. From negotiation to settlement. From resistance to responsibility. From extraction to productive sovereignty. From conflict to durable peace. From the idea of a country to the disciplined work of building one.
COMING TOWARDS THE END OF SEPTEMBER 2026. SOUTHERN CAMEROONS 2050: WHY AMERICA SHOULD CARE
By Martin S. Mungwa, Ph.D., F. ASCE
The book is expected to be available towards the end of September 2026. Until then, I invite readers, policymakers, diplomats, scholars, members of the diaspora, friends of Southern Cameroons, Africans, Americans, Europeans, and all those interested in negotiation, diplomacy, statecraft, development, productive sovereignty, the Gulf of Guinea, and the future of U.S.–Africa relations to follow the conversation.
Advocacy helped the world hear the Southern Cameroons question. The next challenge is statecraft: converting political attention into negotiation, negotiated possibility into settlement, and settlement into institutions that work.Publication and availability details will be announced shortly.
As Amazon associate this site earns from qualifying purchases
Shop from Amazon on special terms
Martin S. Mungwa, Ph.D., F. ASCE, contributor for The Independentist News
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