Cameroon Wants to Ban Achu? Have a Taste Before It’s Gone! Beyond Tribal Politics in Eséka

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:01]Please tell me I am dreaming.

[00:00:04]Because in just 24 hours, Cameroon has given us two stories that should never belong in the same country.

[00:00:12]Yet, somehow they do.

[00:00:15]Yesterday we were dealing with violence, a Cameroonian worker beaten inside a Chinese run space, humiliated on camera, only taken seriously after the video went viral.

[00:00:27]Today we are debating food, achu, sauce jaune, taro, dimanche taro.

[00:00:33]One story is power, the other is identity.

[00:00:37]But here's the truth, both stories are telling us the same thing.

[00:00:43]A state that fails to protect dignity and a society learning to divide itself.

[00:00:49]So no, this is not distraction. This is Cameroon compressed into headlines.

[00:00:56]But let's do a quick update about yesterday's scandal.

[00:00:59]After the video spread, public outrage exploded. And suddenly the government moved.

[00:01:06]We now have a communique from the Minister of Labor, Gregoire Owona. He visited the site, the Sino market in Yaounde, and now it's temporarily closed according to his ministerial decision.

[00:01:18]We also have reports that three people have been arrested.

[00:01:22]Investigations are ongoing.

[00:01:25]But here's the pattern.

[00:01:26]Nothing moves until cameras appear.

[00:01:29]Nothing happens until outrage trends.

[00:01:33]Nothing changes until the state is embarrassed.

[00:01:37]And even then, we must ask, what happens next?

[00:01:43]Because this is bigger than one video.

[00:01:45]We now have multiple clips, different sites, same pattern.

[00:01:51]Chinese employers cited and others.

[00:01:54]Workers living in very terrible conditions, workers under pressure.

[00:01:58]Allegations of abuse.

[00:02:00]When you look at this video, these allegations say uniform men are being used to control and enforce.

[00:02:07]And let us say it as it is, when regulation fails, power becomes abuse.

[00:02:12]When inspectors sleep, employers decide the rules.

[00:02:16]And when the state is absent, exploitation organizes itself.

[00:02:22]So yes, arrest people, investigate, punish, but do not perform.

[00:02:29]Do not turn this into another public relations exercise where the state arrives after the damage, speaks strongly, then disappears.

[00:02:39]Because here's the real issue.

[00:02:41]What happens before the camera matters most.

[00:02:45]Because how many workers have been assaulted daily, underpaid, threatened, overworked, without contracts, without protection, without a voice?

[00:02:58]The dignity of Cameroonian workers cannot depend on who pressed record.

[00:03:05]C'est pas fini.

[00:03:07]Now, let's move from power failure to identity crisis.

[00:03:12]Because when the state fails, people start regulating each other.

[00:03:18]And that is how we arrive here, and I'm taking you to Eseka.

[00:03:21]Because on the 4th of May, 2026, a circular appears attributed to the Conseil de Chef Bassa, Mbock Lia.

[00:03:28]And what does it say?

[00:03:30]A notice to promote culture, yet banning something.

[00:03:35]And what is being banned?

[00:03:37]Not corruption, not embezzlement, not land grabbing, not even hate speech, not theft of public funds.

[00:03:48]Achu, taro, sauce jaune, dimanche taro.

[00:03:54]My dear compatriots, soup has become a governance issue in Cameroon.

[00:03:59]According to the text, dimanche taro is forbidden on ancestral land.

[00:04:04]Reason, to stop acculturation and restore cultural sovereignty.

[00:04:10]So now achu is invasion, yellow soup is a threat. Taro is geopolitical.

[00:04:17]Please wake me up.

[00:04:18]Because I thought Cameroon had problems.

[00:04:21]Roads, hospitals, schools, electricity, youth leaving, no jobs, no hope, corruption, insecurity, political stagnation.

[00:04:30]But apparently, the emergency is Sunday taro.

[00:04:35]And now let's be clear.

[00:04:37]Every community has the right to promote its culture.

[00:04:41]Bassa culture is rich.

[00:04:43]Mbongo tchobi has authority.

[00:04:46]That black sauce has presence.

[00:04:49]When it arrives, you know tradition has entered.

[00:04:53]We all know the old story, a man treating his wife like royalty, and the whispers starts. She has given him mbongo tchobi.

[00:05:02]That is power.

[00:05:03]So now we must ask, has mbongo lost confidence?

[00:05:08]How does achu become a threat?

[00:05:10]If your culture is strong, it does not fear a plate of food.

[00:05:15]Because culture does not survive by banning others.

[00:05:19]It survives by being loved.

[00:05:22]So promote mbongo tchobi, promote ekok, create festivals, support restaurants, train youth, package it, export it, make people choose it.

[00:05:36]But do not ban achu.

[00:05:38]Because the moment you ban another culture, you're no longer promoting yours.

[00:05:44]You're policing others.

[00:05:47]And that is where the danger begins.

[00:05:50]Because this is not about food.

[00:05:53]This is about autochtone and allogene.

[00:05:57]Listen to Elimbé Lobé, who belongs and who does not.

[00:06:01]Today it is food.

[00:06:03]Tomorrow it is business, the Bamileke's.

[00:06:06]Then land, then schools, then marriages, then votes.

[00:06:10]Votes has been a long term.

[00:06:13]And that is how exclusion grows quietly, slowly, legitimized through language, through documents, through tradition, until one day it becomes conflict.

[00:06:25]And let's ask a very simple question. If Cameroon is one, how does achu become foreign in Eseka?

[00:06:31]How does a Cameroonian dish become an invasion?

[00:06:36]Are we in a country or in tribal kitchens?

[00:06:40]Where we need food visas, checkpoints for soup, authorization for eru, ndolé clearance in Bamenda, kok detained in Garoua, mbongo permit in Bafoussam.

[00:06:52]At what point do we stop and think?

[00:06:56]Because you cannot preach unity on TV and practice exclusion on the ground.

[00:07:02]You cannot say vive l'ensemble and fear what is on the plate.

[00:07:07]That is hypocrisy at the highest level.

[00:07:10]And Cameroon has too much of it.

[00:07:13]Let's also look at the sanctions mentioned.

[00:07:15]Withdrawal of recognition.

[00:07:18]Ritual measures.

[00:07:19]That is threatening.

[00:07:22]My people, what does that even mean? A woman opens a restaurant, serves achu, customers eat, then what?

[00:07:31]She is summoned.

[00:07:32]Soup is judged.

[00:07:35]Taro appears before ancestors.

[00:07:38]This is where absurdity meets danger.

[00:07:42]Because vague traditional sanctions create fear.

[00:07:47]People self-censor. Businesses shut down.

[00:07:50]Communities divide.

[00:07:53]That is not culture.

[00:07:55]That is control, abuse.

[00:07:58]So let's say it clearly.

[00:08:00]Promote Bassa culture.

[00:08:02]Promote mbongo tchobi.

[00:08:04]Promote ekok.

[00:08:06]But do not make achu the enemy.

[00:08:09]Do not turn food into politics. Do not use tradition to divide and threaten people. Because the moment you do that, you have lost the argument.

[00:08:19]And here's the truth.

[00:08:22]Cameroon is a mixture.

[00:08:24]Ndole, eru, achu, kok, mbongo, okok, kondre, fufu corn and njama njama, water fufu, midnight suya.

[00:08:40]That mixture is the country, not a weakness.

[00:08:45]So when you fear another dish, you're not protecting culture.

[00:08:50]You're exposing fear.

[00:08:53]And fear in politics becomes exclusion.

[00:08:56]Exclusion becomes discrimination.

[00:08:59]Discrimination becomes conflict.

[00:09:02]And then everyone pretends they did not see it.

[00:09:07]So yes, today we laugh because it sounds ridiculous.

[00:09:12]But behind the laughter, there is a warning.

[00:09:15]What kind of unity are we building if Cameroonians cannot even share food?

[00:09:22]And here's the message I'm going to leave with you.

[00:09:25]Celebrate mbongo, okok, achu, ndole, eru, all of it.

[00:09:32]I'm just naming a few. Nchi, aben chi, abebe kan.

[00:09:35]Because Cameroon is not weakened when cultures meet.

[00:09:40]Cameroon is weakened when people are taught to fear each other.

[00:09:45]Achu is not the problem.

[00:09:47]The mentality is the problem.

[00:09:50]Yellow soup is not dangerous, division is.

[00:09:54]And if a plate of taro can shake your idea of sovereignty, then maybe the problem was never the tarot.

[00:10:01]Maybe the unity we keep preaching was never properly cooked.

[00:10:10]See you in the next one.