- Linguistic minorities
Cameroon is a bilingual country with a population of about 25million inhabitants. The French speaking Cameroonians (francophones) make up about 80% of the population while the English speaking Cameroonians (Anglophones) constitute the remaining 20% of the population.
N.B: Anglophones constitute the largest minority group of Cameroon.
- Ethnic minorities
There are basically 3 ethnic minorities in Cameroon. They are THE PYGMIES and THE MBORORO
- THE PYGMIES
The pygmies are the group of people living in the dense forest of the southern part of Cameroon and are traditionally hunter gatherers. The name PYGMIES has gained negative connotation but has been reclaimed by some deyenous groups as a term of identification. These people identify themselves as the “forest people” due to the importance of the forest to their life hood, culture and history. The pygmies are divided into three ethnic groups which include; THE BAKA, THE BAKOLA and THE BEDGANG.
They make up of about 0.4% of the Cameroonian population.
The pygmies also suffer from economic, political and social discrimination or problems as follows;
- Politically, the majority of pygmies community do not benefit from any form of political representation and also lack institutions able to defend their rights.
- Being graphically and politically separated and having little tans-national awareness as an ethnic group they remain politically weak.
- As a result they lack development and emergency relief operations.
- At the economical level the pygmies barely benefit from forest taxes and scarcely enjoy the fruits of the forest resource exploitation due to non recognition of their rights as inhabitants of the forest.
- Pygmies lack secure rights of their ancestral land as their rights are not recognized in statutory and customary law.
- The pygmies have very limited access to basic social services.
- Society prejudices against pygmies further obstructs building included in development schemes, they are often considered inferior or sub-humans by the Bantus neighbours.
- THE MBORORO
They are nomadic herdsmen whose life depends on cattle rearing and gazing. They rely almost entirely on cattle which is a source of wealth and food. They are found mostly in the Bamenda highlands especially in Sabga which is the head quarter of the Mbororo community. Like the pygmies, their rights too participate in cultural, social, religious, economic and public life seriously obstructed.
- They suffer from Marginalization of their pastoral life due to official policies.
- They have very little access to social infrastructure.
- Their illiteracy rate remains very high
- They are victim of social exclusion by policy makers.
- They are considered as foreigners on the very land they have occupied for so long.
