Nostalgia seems to have gripped SONARA and the echoes are spreading without limitation within the rank and files of the low and middle class labour of the corporation.

The executive stratum it appears, have also not been spared the groan because they too are humming the chorus of a confusing song. Even though some in silence.

“Oh! When SONARA was SONARA!” or simply “Ah! Eding! Eding! When Eding was GM oh!”
These exclamations and interjections are the resentments often expressed by the SONARA workers now, those then and even some of the local businessmen who had their hay days with the former General Manager.

From the SONARA corridors to Isokolo, Ngeme to New Town via Middle farms, and from Batoke to Bonadikombo and beyond, the melancholy is about the same.

And then ask: “was Eding really the Angel they say he was?” May God bless his soul, I need no answer. Or is it simply that Cameroonians hate change? The answer is equally yours.

“SONARA is dead my son”, one old man once intimated in an off license at the Cite Nanga neighbourhood when he heard me express my wish to work with the petroleum company.
He cast a wild gaze at me, leaving me in awe as though I had said something never heard before by the human race. And then he ordered me to sit down and listen to him.

He went for a match and lit a cigarette and then uttered in a dialect that did not sound neither Bakweri nor Bakossi to me. And it couldn’t have been English as it wasn’t even French.
I stood up to go away, telling him I did not understand what he was saying. He stopped me apologetically saying “What I spoke was Bakoko, the language of SONARA then”.

Thinking he was wasting my time, or may be that I was not interested in his conversation, he immediately gathered composure and began to rant, lamentably: “oh SONARA! SONARA! Eding! Eding! Oh! Eding!” some drops of tears fell from his eyes as he repeated this cacophony, which to me was embarrassing. I refused to be flattered and he noticed I wasn’t.

He came closer to me almost putting it directly into my mouth”.

“My son, SONARA workers were demi-gods in this town when Bernard Eding was General Manager”.
I was still not moved. I gathered from him that times were when any SONARA emblem could pass for a credit card any time, anywhere.

“You can’t understand my son. Just the name SONARA was collateral security in any bank and for any amount”, he continued.

To myself I said no doubt they took wild loans that some one is compelling them to repay today without sentiments in order to revive the estate.

I lost interest in knowing what payouts were like then, or that putting on a SONARA t-shirt could win a toilet cleaner a glamourous lady.

It took me time to halt him for just a single question. I however, pressed in “and the SONARA today sir?”

He laughed aloud and in the course spotted five SONARA workers in a corner, discussing quietly in low tune. He drew my attention and said “see those five, in the past they would fill this place with noise and you would believe God is creating a new earth. But today some of them are traveling incognito because of accrued debts”

The General Manager, he told me with emphasis, is not ready for any nonsense. He is bent on retrieving all the debts workers contracted in the past.

“Charles Metouck!”, he said “fear him”.
This time it was my turn to smile, I told him. He jokingly pushed my head as if to say “you man you are too dull”.

Now having heard the story, chapter and verses, a few questions readily come to mind: primo are the mighty fallen, and the spoils of wars all lost?

Secondly, who is to blame for the workers’ ugly plight? Is it Eding’s epoch of largesse or is it Metouck’s legitimate debt recovery measures? Your guess may be as good as mine.

What will it be for the Lions in South Africa visibly lost in the blare of the international mass media is any mention of Cameroon’s Indomitable Lions, except for a cursory mention of the unlikeness of the team to qualify for the 8th finals in South Africa.

The once revered Lions are beleaguered with a myriad of problems, not the least of which needed the travel and intervention – albeit later than sooner - of the Minister of Sports to the training camp in Portugal to assuage rising temperatures due to the unease created by the lurid criticism of team captain Eto’o Fils by the retired soccer legend, Roger Milla.

The criticism had me wondering about the motive and whether it has been demoralising to the extent of causing waning support for the team.

There are obviously different schools of thought on whether or not Roger Milla should have taken out his Kalashnikov on Eto’o Fils. These divisions intensify no less when the inquiry has to do with the timing of the criticism as Eto’o supporters see it, and what Milla supporters perceive as critique.

But where the lines are really drawn in blood is when it comes to why? Why has Milla been calling out the team captain with such relentless fervour? Is it because he has earned the right to do it? Or is he acting on behalf of his paymaster, the Government of Cameroon with whom he is gainfully employed? It could be a plethora of other questions before we begin exploring any answers.

At issue is Milla’s assertion that Eto’o is not sacrificing anything for the national team the way he is known to sacrifice at the respective clubs in Europe, leading to Championship titles with Barcelona and Inter Milan. As many as agree with the essence of Milla’s remarks, there is also consensus that the spat brewed to spilling point mainly as a result of its recycling by the former International.

There is need, nonetheless, to establish an important timeline at which the bashing started. The newly appointed head coach, Paul Le Guen had barely selected Eto’o as captain in lieu of Rigobert Song Bahanack. Milla immediately cheapened the position of team captain as worth nothing, adding that Eto’o needed to bring home trophies with the Lions if he wanted to show his worth.

It is all speculation what may have prompted Milla’s outburst against a lad who grew up in adulation of him and having Milla’s giant poster on his walls. Out of total frustration and without any visible mediation in sight Eto’o barked back at his idol. He wondered out loud what Milla really has to brag for in his 102 caps – scoring 28 goals - with the Lions between 1978 and 1994.

To wit, Eto’o scorned the braggadocio of getting to the 1990 quarterfinals of the Italia World Cup, a pinnacle of Roger Milla’s otherwise tepid professional career. And it is true, one can argue, that the fact of upholding failure as success has literally kept African teams chasing the wrong goals of obliterating their continental records while others win the trophy.

For the record, Eto’o has scored 44 goals in his 96 caps since his selection to the Lions in 1996. Yet, even with a performance that speaks for itself, comparisons with Milla continue to dog the striker. But there is really very little to compare except to say that like Milla in his time, Eto’o is a striker. And that is about it. Anything else is far from a similarity.

In his prime Milla was the sole player with professional experience in the Lions. The rest were celebrated amateurs and looked up to Milla as the source of light. Fast forward to the new dawn and Eto’o is playing on a team with 22 or so other “professionals”, including two fossils that Le Guen is keeping against natural logic - Jeremy Njitap and former team captain Rigobert Song Bahanack. 

What is the point of the rambling: It is difficult in any Cameroonian milieu of “equals” to find a leader, much less have two leaders co-exist in the same room! There will be no Biya if Ahidjo was alive, and no one else will lead in peace if Biya is alive. Back to the field of play, there has been reason often times to wonder whether Rigobert Song Bahanack has deliberately become a wetter blanket to make sure that Eto’o does not win any titles as team Captain with the Lions. Many fans celebrated the benching of Rigobert Song when Paul Le Guen became coach.

Very few can explain what has drastically changed in his style of play such that he has regained the confidence of the coach. For those who believe in or plot conspiracy theories, there is talk that Milla has been making all the noise about Eto’o to distract from having Rigobert Song removed from the selection. According to this theory, Song is the last thing directly connecting Milla to his golden era with the Lions.

Whatever the case, I have been burning with a question: How can it be that the government allowed this situation to escalate to the point where Eto’o nursed the thought of not playing in South Africa? My question is premised on the fact that as a government appointed itinerant ambassador for African affairs, one is hard pressed separating what Milla says as a public official and what is personal opinion.

Is he projecting the frustrations of his employer? It made perfect sense that the Minister of Sports finally made the move to Portugal to talk to the team. But was this a stitch in time? Was it not possible for the higher ups to ask the blunt and uncouth Milla to approach Eto’o like a son and talk it over in private? But this is the same Milla that has never stood up for his teammates - including Ndip Akem and Mbouh Emile – who are alleged not to have, till this date, received their bonuses after the World Cup of 1990.

It is good that both have come to their senses and have expressed regret for their actions. But this has come at a cost. In my history of following the Lions, there has never been a worst time of waning support from its most ardent than today.

The most optimistic supporters that I know of are probably my younger brothers – Hubert and Glenn. In fact, on Glenn’s Facebook page he has picked the Lions to win it all! Hubert seconds his younger brother in what I only consider total lunacy.

The Lions have made headlines in the past with their Puma jerseys that were not FIFA sanctioned. Since then, the jersey has gained fame not from the on field performance of the team as much as it did after Puma convinced Serena Williams to don the colours at the 2002 US tennis slam.

Until they take to the field of play and prove their worth beginning with the encounter against Japan in South Africa, Chicago’s two top dancing girls may just have broken the dancing shoes before the party, ensuring that the Lions don’t get to spoil the fun for them…

But Eto’o can take this matter into his hands and decide that this will be his last and most memorable World Cup. Some Cameroonians are hoping against hope that the Lions live up to the chime of its ailing President to join either the Netherlands or Denmark in round two qualifications from group E – L’impossible n’est pas Camerounais.

The football skills of Cameroon players rank among the finest in the world, indeed, other analysts and commentators, have compared talented Cameroon football players to Brazilians. World fans remember Cameroon and its extra-ordinary 1990 performance.

Yet, after the 1990 feat in Italy, the Cameroon football national team has done little outside the African continent to convince its world lovers, that this team the  world admires, and which has projected Cameroon in a highly positive way is made of a rare breed of players.

Organisers of the Cameroon national team all these years have been glorifying the past and believing in perhaps divine powers to create another glory for the future. No! Fame seekers continuously work for it.

The absence of a continuous preparatory schedule for the Cameroon national team may cause the team not to perform better than an average team in South Africa this June. Cameroon is likely to beat any team on a given day, but any team is so too likely to beat Cameroon on any given day. This description fits an average team. A solid World Cup winning team, however, has the skills of beating strong teams, but not allow itself to be beaten by weaker or an equal strength teams.

If Cameroon dreams of winning the World Cup, it must scrape off its attitude of living in the past and stewardly prepare for the future.

Football analysts no longer place Cameroon on the 1990 pedestal. But what has become wrong with a football team admired by distant fans around the world.

The tussle between the Cameroon Football Federation and the Ministry of Sports over who controls the Cameroon national team, a financial arena surrounded by prestige has reduced the team to a point so average that every team wants to try its chance on Cameroon. “I can probably beat Cameroon, why not?” Gabon did not only nurse such an imagination, but it achieved it in Angola 2010.

The same struggle between the Cameroon Football Federation and Ministry of Sport may be responsible for the Cameroon national team organisers’ “22nd hour philosophy.”

By this philosophy, Cameroon does not need a national team coach until there is a tournament. At the eve of a tournament, Cameroon scrambles for a coach, who runs up to Europe and gathers 22 Cameroon players, then, prepares the players at the 22nd hour, and everyone expects the team to start winning matches at the 24th hour. Such preparation will not help Cameroon become the Indomitable of the World they believe. This must be a Rapid Result College of Football. Not too fast.
Cameroon’s struggle to win matches at the 2010 African Cup of Nations demonstrates a team that needs intense practice time under a determined coach.

A continuous build up, and intense practice time has been absent in the Cameroon team because of the “22nd hour” mindset. Since the last two or four years other teams have been preparing for the same tournaments Cameroon has participated in, or will participate – for example, the African Cup of Nations last January, and the ongoing FIFA World Cup.

For years, Cameroon will remember Paul Le Guen for quickly winning four World Cup qualifying matches, displacing Gabon at the top of the group after Gabon sprang out of no where to becoming a threatening football power in Africa.  The test match against Italy, Georgia, Slovenia and even Portugal on 1 June all saw different set of players. Emmana, Enow Eyong, Eto’o Manjeck, Makoun, Nkoulou appear to be the regulars, all others are place holders.  

A team which has a core of six or seven players exemplifies an average team – that is, only six or seven players regularly play in every match or may be listed as first team players. Five new players must be brought into the team or kept out of the team each time. This was evident in the January 2010 Angolan African Cup of Nations.

Le Guen has not been given time to prepare a team, but had an obligation to win matches. Had Le Guen 11 or 10 players in his first team, Cameroon should have won Egypt and eventually the cup. That should have changed Cameroon status entering the World Cup.

Angola 2010 also demonstrated some goalkeeping problems. There were speculations of Kamini being over weight and questions about his attentiveness in these high level and high stalk matches. Some three defendable goals by the goalkeeper, two of them against Egypt, caused Cameroon the chance to progress. Had Le Guen worked with the team for a while, he should have noticed and found solutions to such weaknesses ahead of time.  The Cameroon versus Portugal match 1 June 2010 may not easily be used as a good gauge for a test match when Cameroon played for 58 minutes without one player – Eto’o sent off at 32-mins, yet Kamini’s returned to the team again demonstrated shakiness around the goal. 

This commentator does not admire French Football, but one must marvel at Le Guen’s clever coaching skills. He must be credited for his shrewd coaching ideas that are making Cameroonians proud for going to the World Cup in South Africa after all. Beyond that, he has a tremendous duty of naming a strong team against Japan. If test matches are anything, then Japan is a tough knot  Visionalists, years ago, foresaw Cameroon as a potential African football force much closer to winning the World Cup than any African team. That hope was propelled to light by Cameroon’s brilliant performance at the 1990 World Cup.

At that time; Cameroon has a serious Russian coach, Valeri Nepomniachi, who had been building a team for more than two years ahead of the tournament. And that team had a nucleus of 15 to 16 regular players whose energy can withstand 90 minutes of playing time. Cameroon’s performance that year helped Africa gain three more places at the World Cup, raising the number from two to five.

If it were not the Cameroon Football Federation versus Ministry of Sports squabble, what is the wisdom behind not keeping a coach for two to four years to create and grill a formidable Cameroon team? To go close to the World Cup, Cameroon must weave its way pass Holland, Brazil and Germany.

Nothing has ever been impossible with Cameroon, but a better than average performance at the South Africa 2010 World Cup will be cherished by fans worldwide.

That at these moments of decentralisation, the speedy development of Limbe is becoming an urgent imperative more than ever before and no one needs to remind the Government Delegate to the Limbe City Council of the number of gallons of fuel he requires to enable him steer his development boat.

Many a Government Delegate has come and gone, each leaving behind him a catalogue of deeds shelved to attest their marks. Some have scored well, some bad and others mediocre, depending on who the judges are and from what standpoint.

In May I went back for a week to my last posting in the Foreign Service - Cameroon in Central Africa. I served there as U.S. Ambassador from 1993 to 1996. I wanted to see how this country of such great potential had changed - or not - in the intervening 15 years.

I had forgotten how beautiful this country is. There are the white and black sand beaches, the volcanoes, the lakes and lush highlands, the tropical forests, the old grassland kingdoms bursting with history and art and the totally different north with its terrain similar to America’s southwest and boasting a nice game park. Cameroon should be, but isn’t yet, part of the tourist route in Africa.