Witchcraft as an Issue in the "Politics of Belonging": Democratization and Urban Migrants'

Involvement with the Home Village

Author(s): Peter Geschiere and Francis Nyamnjoh
Reviewed work(s):
Source: African Studies Review, Vol. 41, No. 3 (Dec., 1998), pp. 69-91
Published by: African Studies Association
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Witchcraft

as

an

Issue

in

the

"Politics

Belonging": Democratization and

Involvement
with
the
Migrants'
Village

of
Urban

Home

PeterGeschiereand FrancisNyamnjoh

Abstract: In many parts of Africa, political liberalization seems to have given new
impetus to the "politics of belonging," leading to an obsession with "autochthony."
Thus the continuing relations of urban migrants with their home area tend to be
reaffirmed. However, these relations, marked by an explosive mixture of intimacy
and inequality, continue also to be a hotbed for witchcraft rumors. In this article we
compare two different cases, from different parts of Cameroon, of witchcraft
threats and efforts to contain them in the context of rural-urban relations. In both
cases, the accusations are the same-they refer to a novel form of zombie witchcraft
attributed to the nouveaux riches-but they are dealt with in a strikingly different
manner. A Grassfields chief from the Northwest challenges the authority of the state
by arresting three witchcraft suspects among his subjects in the farawaySouthwest.
In the segmentary societies of the southern forest area, urban elites appeal to the
state for protection against vicious witchcraft accusations.
The increased importance of "belonging" and "autochthony" in national politics makes witchcraft more and more a public issue, triggering new efforts to contain
it in which the new associations of urban elites play a central role. However, the effectiveness of such efforts remains doubtful: the increased importance of the relations
between urban elites and the home area tends to reproduce witchcraft, which is,
indeed, thriving on such an explosive mixture of intimacy and blatant inequality.

African StudiesReview,Volume 41, Number 3 (December 1998), pp. 69-91

Peter Geschiere is Professor of African Anthropology at Leiden University (The
Netherlands). He recently published The Modernityof Witchcraft:Politics and the
Occult in PostcolonialAfrica (Univ. of Virginia Press, 1997) and together with
Joseph Guler he edited an issue of Africa (1998, 3) on "The Politics of Primary
Patriotism."
Francis Nyamnjoh is head of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology of the
University of Buea (Cameroon). He is currently completing a study on media
and democratization in Africa in the 1990s. He is also a novelist (The DisillusionedAfrican [Limbe, 1995]) and a playwright.

69

70 AfricanStudiesReview
R6sume: Dans plusieurs parties de l'Afrique, la liberalisation politique semble avoir
'
'
donn6 un nouvel 61an la "politique de l'appartenance", menant ainsi une obsession de "l'authenticite". De ce fait, les relations entre les immigres urbains et leur
lieu d'origine tendent a se raffermir davantage. Cependant, ces relations, marquees
par un mdlange explosif d'intimit6 et d'in'galit', continuent aussi de faire l'objet
de rumeurs de sorcellerie. Dans cet article nous comparons deux cas diff6rents de
menace de sorcellerie et d'efforts de les contrtler dans le cadre des relations
ville/campagne dans diff6rentes parties du Cameroun. Dans tous les deux cas, les
accusations sont les memes- il s'agit d'une nouvelle forme de sorcellerie attribute
aux nouveaux riches-mais ces accusations sont traittes de manieres totalement diff6rentes. Un chef Grassfield du nord-ouest defie les autorites de l'tat en arretant
trois de ses sujets accuses de sorcellerie dans la region lointaine du sud-ouest. Dans
les soci&tts segmentees de la zone forestiere du sud, les 61ites urbaines font appel a
l'tat pour se faire proteger contre des accusations de sorcellerie.
L'importance croissante de "l'appartenance" et de "l'authenticite" dans la vie
politique nationale transforme de plus en plus la sorcellerie en un problkme public, et engendre de nouveaux efforts de la contrbler, efforts dans lesquels les nouvelles associations des 61ites urbainesjouent un rble central. Cependant, l'efficacit6
de tels efforts demeure incertaine: l'importance croissante des relations entre les
'
61ites urbaines et leur lieu d'origine tend reproduire la sorcellerie qui atteint de
nouvelles dimensions sur ce mdlange explosif d'intimit6 et d'inegalit6 criarde.

The continuing involvement of urban migrants with their village of origin is

generally considered a special trait of processes of urbanization in Africa.
Already in 1971, Dan Aronson stated that for Africa one should speak of a
"rural-urban continuum," rather than of urbanization as a definitive choice,
since people go on moving between city and countryside throughout their
life cycle. More recently, Joseph Gugler (1991)-in
a re-study of the Enugu
area (East Nigeria) where he had done earlier fieldwork in the 1960s-concluded that the ties between the city and the countryside had even become
stronger during the intervening period. It remains to be seen whether this
involvement will continue to be as strong for future generations (see
Geschiere & Gugler 1998), especially as the worsening economic crisis and
corruption mean any benefits small people can claim from their connections with the big- (or the not so big-) men and women of power are increasingly illusive (Nyamnjoh 1999). Lucrative networks of patronage and influence which linked the masses to the elite and frustrated attempts at bringing about a more democratic dispensation over the years seem to be crumbling nearly everywhere in the continent (see Mbembe 1992; Bayart et al.
1999). Chinua Achebe's famous dictum that in Africa even the beggar in the
urban streets has a family behind him may become less and less applicable.
Yet it is clear that this process is not self-evident or unilineal.

Witchcraft
as an Issuein the "Politics
of Belonging"71
Recent changes-notably the liberalization of politics and the return
of multipartism-seem, on the one hand, to give the village a renewed
importance for urbanites, especially for aspiring politicians among them;
and on the other, to provide villagers and local leaders with an opportunity to demand their own share of the national economic "pie."In many parts
of the continent, democratization seems to have given new vigor to what
could be termed "the politics of belonging." What is especially striking is
that various versions of the notion of "autochthony"-in practice notably
the question of who should vote where and, even more important, who can
be elected where-have become of overriding importance in everyday politics. Once more urban elites have good reason to reaffirm their rural
roots, as well as to renew the rhetoric of being spokespersons for their peoples. Such notions and the concomitant practices have rapidly come to
dominate the new parties, engendering unorthodox forms of participatory
democracy. In practice, democratization seems to engender fierce and
often violent struggles over who "really"belongs and who is a stranger. In
many countries-Cameroon and Kenya, to mention two blatant examples-the national regime, which never abandoned the old one-party logic,
seems to be intent on encouraging such struggles in order to diffuse the
momentum for change through the age-old tactic of divide-and-rule. Thus,
opposition is diverted from the national to the regional or even the local
level. Citizenship is more and more defined in local rather than in national terms. The old ideal of nation-building seems to be superseded by ideological oppositions between autochthonsand allogines (or "strangers"),with
the active support of national politicians.1
All this makes the relation between urban migrants and the rural area
they consider "home" (even when they are themselves born in the city)
once more a nodal point in recent developments: in politics, but also in the
crystallization of ethnicity or in the networks of the booming "informal"
economy. Of importance, however, is that the urbanites' continuing involvement with their rural background follows highly different regional trajectories. Crucial factors are, for instance, the accessibility of the rural area
and the degree of success of urban migrants in their new surroundings (in
more mundane terms, the varying possibilities for urban migrants to invest
profitably in their village of origin); and, on the other side, the villagers'
varying opportunities to exercise effective pressure on their urban "brothers" to redistribute and share what is perceived as new and dazzling forms
of wealth. In practice, a crucial issue seems to be to what extent the new
opportunities for accumulation in the city can be legitimized within the
rural setting. In some areas, where more or less hierarchical arrangements
existed which tended to make inequalities acceptable, the new rich from
the city can be co-opted into "traditional" (often "neo-traditional") structures. In other areas, where local societies were dominated by more egalitarian ideologies, the new inequalities remain an unsolved problem and
subject to fierce levelling tendencies. There, urbanites emphasize that they

72 AfricanStudiesReview
have good reason to keep at least some distance from the village, despite
their continuing moral involvement with their "brothers."Yet everywhere,
the urbanites' relation with their rural "home" seems to be marked in practice by a deep ambivalence: their concern for their relatives-backed up by
real political or economic interests and even more by pressing moral issues
(for instance, the fact that they want to be buried "at home") is balanced
by the fact that the wealth amassed in the city, even if it is only imaginary,
retains a more or less suspect character for the people at home.
Issues of sorcery and witchcraft constitute a strategic (and by now quite
urgent) starting point to explore such variations in the evolvement of
urban-rural relations.2 Indeed, in many parts of the continent, these relations seem to have become a hotbed for rumors about potent occult forces
and their spectacular manifestations.3 Villagers tend to suspect urbanites of
using the occult forces to enrich themselves, while urbanites profess to be
afraid of the levelling impact of the villagers' "witchcraft."But this basic
pattern allows for many variable elaborations. The village is also the place
where urbanites look for protection against occult threats in their new surroundings, and villagers may try to appropriate the secret knowledge available in the city for their own enrichment.
This omnipresence of witchcraft rumors in urban-rural connections is
hardly surprising. In general, witchcraft is supposed to thrive in relations
that are marked by a mixture of intimacy and inequality. Witchcraft is often
closely related to kinship or in any case to intimacy: elsewhere we characterized it as "the dark side of kinship" (Geschiere 1997). In many societies,
the "witchcraft of the house" is seen as the most deadly form of occult
aggression; the origin of occult attacks is sought primarily within the victim's intimacy, and curing the victim mostly requires a meeting or at least
the collaboration of the members of the family (see de Rosny 1981). Yet
witchcraft is also generally related to inequality: on the one hand, to the
envy of the poor who try to remind their richer "brothers" or "sisters"of
their family obligations; but, on the other hand, to the efforts of the rich
and the powerful to enhance and protect their superiority. The new relations between villagers and urbanites are marked by the same ambivalence
of intimacy and inequality. The urbanites-"our sons and daughters in the
city"-are emphatically classified as kin, even when they have moved into
the outside world (and even if the exact kinship relations are often distant
and construed with some difficulty). Yet, especially the more successful
urbanites are also the most direct representatives of the new forms of
wealth and the new inequalities which seem to surpass the old frameworks.
No wonder, therefore, that the ambiguity of these relations is often
expressed in terms of witchcraft and occult dealings.
In this article we compare two case studies, from different parts of
Cameroon, of the role of witchcraft accusations and rumors in the context

as an Issuein the "Politicsof Belonging"73

Witchcraft
of urban-rural relations. The accusations are quite similar, yet the ways in
which they are dealt with are strikingly different. This comparison may contribute to an exploration of the different trajectories by which urban-rural
relationships evolve, an issue that remains crucial in many parts of Africa.
It may contribute to an understanding of the often desperate efforts people make to contain witchcraft and the various possibilities open to them.
Urban-rural relations seem to be a self-evident focus for worries, by now
general in many parts of the continent, about a supposed proliferation of
witchcraft-for the idea that witchcraft is "running wild" and that the old
sanctions no longer suffice. The question as to how witchcraft can be contained has become a major issue in everyday life.

Witchcraft in the City:

The Long Arm of the Chief "at Home"
In 1996, frenzied rumors of witchcraft began to circulate among migrants
from Bum (one of the major Grassfields chiefdoms far into the interior of
the country), in Douala, and in other towns along the coast of Southwest
Cameroon. In the course of that year, a certain Victor Fula Msama (a pseudonym) became the main target of these stories. Before this, he was not
known to be a witch. But both in the coastal communities and in the hometown, people felt that his unexpected malice had been exposed by two
treacherous attacks, in rapid succession, on his intimates.
In July 1996, Msama's mother-who still lived in Bum in the family
hometown Fonfuka-went off to weed around a new house that Msama
had just constructed for himself on a site he had bought for that purpose.
On her way back to the compound she slipped, fell by the roadside, and
died on the spot. People were confused and could not understand why a
healthy woman should die from a simple fall on a slippery footpath. News
of her death was communicated to Msama on the coast, where he worked
in Tiko as foreman with Delmonte Bananas and lived in Misellele. When
some emissaries from Bum arrived at his home to offer condolences, he
was already making arrangements to travel to the village. Among his visitors
was his uncle's daughter from Douala. Upon Msama's departure for Fonfuka, she returned to Douala, only to die there two days later. Because Bum
migrants, like many others, consider a city burial shameful, her corpse was
conveyed to Fonfuka for burial.
The young woman's husband was deeply shocked and did not intend
to accept the sudden death of his wife without question. After arriving in
Fonfuka, he consulted a diviner who clearly "saw"that Msama was responsible for both deaths: he had killed his mother and his cousin so that they
could work for his enrichment through n'yongo,a relatively new form of
witchcraft which especially since the 1960s has created panic throughout

74 AfricanStudiesReview
the region. Its perpetrators, supposedly the new rich in particular, are
reputed not to eat their victims as in older forms of witchcraft, but to transform them into zombies who can be put to work. Indeed, in this case as
well, the diviner's findings revealed that Msama's mother was splitting
wood while his uncle's daughter fried and sold puffpuffs (puff balls) and
picked coffee in that invisible world, all toward Msama's enrichment. It was
further reported that Msama in his n'yongosociety had agreed to "sell"
more than seven souls in order to become very rich.
All this made Bum people, both at home and on the coast, wonder how
a quiet and humble man like Msama could be responsible for such violent
witchcraft. Even after the kwifon announced Msama's isolation from the
Bum community, he was not prevented from committing further acts of
witchcraft. After returning to Misellele, he sent some money home to his
half-brother's son who wanted to start trading in kerosene. But the boy
found that no one would sell him kerosene in exchange for this "bad
money," which was dangerous because it had been acquired illegitimately
through n'yongo.A few days later, the boy caught a headache with a light
fever and soon died. For those who were still keeping company with
Msama, this third episode was the last straw.Now everybody felt obliged to
distance themselves from him completely. But the rumors continued; up
until June 1998, stories continued to circulate about more killings by
Msama. Moreover, other witchcraft practitioners on the coast were identified as Msama's collaborators: his driver, William Wut (a pseudonym), and
a Douala-based female relative, Anna Msama (a pseudonym). The three
were held responsible for spreading terror throughout the Bum community on the coast.
In 1997, a Bum man in Douala threatened his nephew Daniel Wafuyen
(a pseudonym) with death. Wafuyen, a high school teacher and national
executive member of the Bum Development Union (BDU), the prestigious
assocation of Bum migrants, complained to his parents about the matter,
but no action was taken. It was not long after the quarrel that a vehicle
knocked Wafuyen down on the Tiko-Douala highway. His corpse was conveyed home by the BDU for burial, and his father visited a famous diviner
(this time in Guzang, Momo Division), who had the reputation that he
could even make the dead speak. Just as many in the Bum community in
Douala suspected, the father was told that his brother was responsible for
Wafuyen's death.
After this third death, many migrants insisted that the Bum authorities
back home should do something to rescue their group, whose members
seemed to be dying at the hands of their own brothers and sisters. The May
1998 North West Chiefs' Conference in Bamenda provided the occasion
for a response. The meeting was attended by, amongst others, the paramount fon of Bum, his Royal Highness Peter Kwanga Yai III, and by the
chiefs of Mbamlu, Mbuh, Mungong, and Saaff (all under fon of Bum's

Witchcraft
as an Issuein the "Politics
of Belonging"75
authority)-but not by the chief of Sawi, who is currently contesting the
authority of the of Bum because the Sawi were the first to settle the territory. All chiefs expressed shock and concern that since 1996 so many
corpses had been transported back from the coast to Bum for burial. When
the conference ended, the rulers took advantage of the good roads and the
money donated by Bum migrants to travel down to Misellele and see if they
could find a solution.
When the chiefs arrived in Misellele, the coastal Bum chief Kimbi and
his notables (njitu) were given the responsibility of tracking down the culprits. Msama was arrested in his Likumba home by the nji of Tiko (the Bum
chief's representative there) and taken to Misellele where the chiefs were
waiting. His two followers, William Wut and Anna Msama, were also picked
up in Douala and brought to the chiefs in Misellele. In June 1998 the three
were forcibly taken to Bum to account for their acts to the kwifon(the more
or less secret police association of all Bum).
When Msama was taken away, his wife went to the gendarmerieand
reported that her husband had been kidnapped by the nji. The brigade
commander immediately summoned this nji and locked him up for failing
to produce Msama. However, the nji'sfellow notables sent messengers from
Tiko to other areas around the coast calling on the Bum population to
donate money and liberate their leader. After two weeks of negotiation, he
was freed by the gendarmesin exchange, of course, for a considerable sum
of money.
Meanwhile the three accused of practicing witchcraft were taken to the
kwifonlodge of LakaBum, the capital of the chiefdom, where the kwifon
decided they should be taken to Nkanchi, a neighboring village in DongaMantung Division, to be administered the poison ordeal langfu (the feared
sasswood ordeal). On the eve of their departure, Msama reportedly bribed
a boy to show him the way from LakaBum to Fundong, the divisional capital, and he managed to escape. His assistants, William Wut and Anna
Msama, however, were transported to Nkanchi for the poison ordeal.
William Wut drank the mixture, was proven not guilty, and allowed to
return to his base in Douala. Anna Msama drank the poison and was found
guilty, although she did not die. She was taken back to the kwifonlodge and
kept in custody, pending a final decision.
Many Bum notables and chiefs were shocked that the main perpetrator had been able to escape. They appeared to blame the paramount chief
himself of not having been vigilant enough. In certain quarters it was insinuated that Msama had promised the fon money and a tree-felling machine
if he were allowed to escape. The assembled chiefs issued a strict order that
Msama be searched for and brought back to Bum for judgment, along with
a general warning that while the search was on, all Bum persons must be
watchful and avoid Msama, who was described as dangerous and an enemy
to the community. As this paper was being written, the search was still on.

76 AfricanStudiesReview
The Fon and the Unity of Bum
To understand these dramatic developments, and especially the spectacular role of the fon of Bum-who even dared to challenge the state's fearsome gendarmesby persecuting witches far outside his own area-some general remarks about Bum, its migrants, and its chief may be helpful.
Bum is a major chieftaincy of the Northwest Province of the Republic
of Cameroon. Its chief, the paramount fon of Bum, now claims territorial
rights over a vast plateau with low hills interspersed with deep ravines, valleys, and rivers. But the unity of this realm-despite the impressive show of
Bum solidarity in persecuting Msama in the story above-is not self-evident. This land was not occupied at the same time by the various groups
that are living there now. Instead, each of these groups migrated to this
area from different places and at different moments. Each occupied its
own site and enjoyed some measure of independence and autonomy. The
Alung (Bum proper) were the last group to come to this area, and their
arrival brought remarkable changes in the power structure. According to
Bridges (1933), the people who had already lived there, the Sawis, Mbuks,
and Mbamlus, all made overtures of friendship to the Bum. The Mungongs
initially resisted but were finally overcome. Thus, the Alung/Bum, who
were stronger than all the other groups, established their suzerainty and
promised protection to their subordinates as long as allegiance was paid to
them.
A crucial role in the cementing of the unity of Bum was played by the
paramount fon. According to tradition, eleven fons have ruled and died
since the Bum left Mbilimbot. The present fon, Peter KwangaYai III, is thirty-fiveyears old. He is the son of the eleventh fon, John Yai, who died in May
1997 and is generally regarded as the father of modern Bum. Indeed, fon
John Yai's conception of the role the fon has to play in the outside world is
at the basis of his son's spectacular interventions in witchcraft cases
described above.
FonJohn Yai had formal primary education in the Bamenda Government School, from which he graduated in December 1937 with a School
Leaving Certificate. This qualification earned him some relative advantages
over other fons of the Bamenda Grassfields when he subsequently became
ruler of Bum in 1954. Bum was-and still is-a relatively inaccessible area.
The only two roads that are passable for motor vehicles throughout the
year are of quite difficult access, even for four-wheel drives. YetfonJohn Yai
resolutely set out to raise the profile of his realm in the modern developments that were to wake up the area. Already in 1956, just after being
crowned, he participated in a delegation to welcome Queen Elizabeth II in
Lagos. The next year, in his speech to the governor he raised the possibility of Southern Cameroons' becoming independent, or, alternatively,
reuniting with French Cameroons. FonJohn Yai was also very active in the
ensuing political struggle over the future of this area. By backing southern

Witchcraft
as an Issuein the "Politics
of Belonging"77
politicians-notably the famous Dr. Endeley, who opted for a union with
Nigeria-he threatened to become marginalized within the Grassfields
area, since most of his colleague fons opted instead for unification with
French Cameroons. But fonJohn Yai succeeded in remaining a central figure in regional politics. Of particular interest for our analysis is that,
because of his modem education and his familiarity with developments
outside Bum, he succeeded in retaining great popularity among "the sons
and the daughters of the soil," especially the ones who chose to migrate to
the economically more prosperous areas of Southwest Cameroon.
For, even though Bum itself has remained a fairly isolated region,
migration has developed rapidly, especially since the 1940s. Right from the
beginning of colonization-that is, since the 1880s-the colonizers had
tried to solve the need for labor in the plantations of the fertile southwestern area on the slopes of the volcanic Mount Cameroon, notably by involving traditional rulers of the populous Grassfields, further inland. Already
in the 1890s, chiefs like Bali or Bafut were sending regular levies of labor,
whether forced or without direct coercion, to the developing plantations in
the Southwest. After 1918-and in striking contrast to their German predecessors-the British rapidly succeeded in solving this "labor problem"
without overt coercion. Their efficient use of "native authorities" no longer
obliged them to apply direct coercion in the recruitment of labour. As a
consequence, a broad regional migratory movement developed, especially
during the interbellum period, which affected more marginal areas-like
Bum-as well.
Since the 1940s, nearly every family in Bum has one or more members
who are more or less permanently settled in the coastal area to the South.
But even though considerable distances are involved-Bum is more than
600 kms awayfrom Douala and this distance is aggravated by the condition
of the roads-people do maintain regular contact with the home area. In
the case story above, we saw, for instance, that Msama, the main "witch,"
had just built a house in his village (as most migrants want to do). We saw
also that for most Bum migrants it is self-evident that one must be buried
in the village. In the early 1980s, the more successful migrants founded the
Bum Development Union, already mentioned, which tried to create a formal framework for the migrants' continuing involvement with the village.

The Fon, the Migrants, and the Spectre of Witchcraft

In the latter stage of his life, fon John Yai-the "father of modern Bum"took a spectacular step. He suddenly decided to be baptized during a Baptist Field Conference at Songka in Bum. The pastor agreed and the fon was
baptized that same day-November 25, 1990. On the day of the baptismat which one of us was present and took photographs-he forgave one of
his wives, Bona Mboh (a pseudonym), who had been accused of awungabe

78 AfricanStudiesReview
(bad witchcraft) and had been expelled from the palace in LakaBum.4
Indeed, despite his emphaticly "modern" profile, fon John Yai was
deeply emmeshed in witchcraft matters, both before and after his baptism.
During his reign, a good number of Bum people were found guilty of
killing by witchcraft and were banished from Bum. A man named Tamfo (a
pseudonym), whose witchcraft was thought to have exceeded the limit of
tolerability, became the subject of a popular song in the 1980s which
accused him of "eating" even the children of "strangers"such as the resident Fulani and Hausa pastoralists. The fon himself was not beyond the
witches' powers. Throughout his reign, witch-doctors and diviners were
summoned to the palace to sort things out. His death, after prolonged illness, is said to have been caused by the witchcraft of one of his wives who
for long was the most trusted and the most dear to him and who had never
before been accused of witchcraft. For the first time, even one of the fon's
sisters-who had lived all her life in the palace and who had been equally
close to him-was accused of witchcraft and was forced to leave the palace.
The fon's long-standing complaints of rheumatism-which had led medical
doctors to ask him to give up alcohol although he was virtually addicted to
it-were now explained as caused by witchcraft.
In the story above of how Msama's and other migrants' witchcraft was
punished, it became clear that the relation between the fon and witchcraft
is still-as in former days-mediated by his kwifon,his police association.
Amongst the Bum, if a person dies suddenly, falls unaccountably ill, or suffers some major misfortune or repeated setbacks, his relatives always try to
"find out" whether witchcraft is responsible. Once contacted, the diviner
usually identifies the culprit. But the alleged culprit may deny his guilt. At
this point he is taken to the palace to be judged by the kwifon.In the past,
if he still would not confess, the accused was subjected to the poison ordeal,
langfu, which normally took place at Mungong where the sasswood tree
(Erythraphlaeumquineense)is found. In the poison ordeal, the red bark of
the tunghawas cleaned, mixed with other substances in a liquid, and given
to the accused to drink. The one who administered the langfu was called
wutagwu.The accused were said to die instantly in cases of guilt. Should the
accused not die upon drinking the mixture, he or she was pronounced
innocent, released immediately, and given a meal by the kwifon to compensate for the ignominy suffered. It is noteworthy, however, that the kwifon sent the accused for the poison ordeal only if guilt was denied persistently. Those who admitted their guilt were either chained with sticks,
flogged, and then forgiven and asked to cooperate with the authorities in
tracking down other witches (by agreeing to act as the "ear and eye" of the
kwifonin the dark world of witchcraft); or, if their danger to the community was thought to have reached an incurable height, they were simply
expelled from Bum.
This poison ordeal, banned in colonial times, is generally supposed to
have disappeared completely. Yet our story above shows that it has resur-

Witchcraft
as an Issuein the "Politics
of Belonging"79
faced in the 1990s. Indeed, the Bum continue to relate all sorts of aspects
of new developments to such "traditional"-often rather "neo-traditional"-representations. People often blame the relative backwardness of
Bum when compared with other chieftaincies, even those that were less
prominent in the past, on witchcraft and the fierce jealousy of local witches. Such people see in every death of an elite further proof of their conviction. The spectacular Lake Nyos Disaster of 1986, which claimed over two
thousand lives and displaced thousands in Bum and elsewhere, also was
explained locally by witchcraft and conspiracy theories.

Chasing Witches Abroad:

The Fon and New Modes of the Politics of Belonging
But even though the link between modernity and witchcraft has a long
intellectual history, in Bum as elsewhere (Geschiere 1997), the daring
arrest or "kidnapping" in 1998 of Msama and other urban witches by the
fon of Bum far outside his own area was a new kind of intervention. Why
did the chief and his notables suddenly intervene so directly in the witchcraft affairs of their "sons"abroad?
An important factor seems to be the new urgency of what could be
called the "politics of belonging" since democratization (1990). As elsewhere in Cameroon, the liberalization of politics seems to have given new
momentum to the competition between neighboring areas. For urban
migrants, it seems also to give a new importance to the village as a place
where one belongs and from which one derives essential political rights. In
the new political context-for instance, in the new election laws-national
citizenship increasingly is related to one's home area-or to one's
"autochthony," to quote a now highly current phrase in Cameroonian politics and elsewhere in Africa.
Bum leaders, both in the home area and in the diaspora, clearly saw
democratization as offering new possibilities to get even with old rivalsnotably with the neighboring chieftaincy of Kom. Mission had brought
education much earlier to Kom than to Bum, further into the interior.
Consequently, Kom elites had been in a much better position to channel
"development" to their own area. With democratization, Bum elites abroad
were expected to play a crucial role in Bum's attempt to get better access
to the state and its services. The situation became all the more urgent
when, in September 1992, Fundong Subdivision, until then encompassing
both Bum and Kom, was turned into a Division (renamed Boyo Division).
This transition seemed to bring new chances for Bum to liberate itself from
Kom tutelage.
Since the early 1990's, fonJohn Yai, the present fon's predecessor, had
been busy strengthening his links with Bum migrants in the South, succeeding, notably, in ironing out his differences with the Bum Development

80 AfricanStudiesReview
Union (with which he had quarelled throughout the 1980s). Moreover, he
appointed a nji (notable) in Tiko/Misellele (this was the representative
who was to play such a crucial role in the arrest of the "witches"in Misellele and Douala) and he succeeded in getting his nji's authority recognized
by a wide array of Bum groups in the Southwest.5 Indeed, these external
elites were expected to play a crucial role in presenting a united front in
Bum interests. They had to become more and more detached from organizations such as the Kom-Bum Development Union or the Kom-Bum Students' Union which appeared more and more as thinly disguised instruments of Kom hegemony.
The vicissitudes of party politics in the 1990s further reinforced this
tendency. At the municipal elections of 1996, the candidates of the Social
Democratic Front-until then the dominant party in the whole Northwest
Province and the main opposition group against President Biya's regimewere disqualified by various government manipulations. The candidates of
Biya's own party, the CPDM, profited from this to win the elections in Bum.
Subsequently, Bum rulers and elite decided to make political capital out of
the fact of being one of only four CPDM councils in an SDF-dominated
Northwest Province. Thus for the 1997 legislative elections, they tried to
persuade the Ministry of Territorial Administration and the Prime Minister
to make the Bum subdivision into a single-candidate constituency in
exchange for a promise to vote CPDM. This request was meant to free Bum
from their union with Kom. When they failed in this bid, and also in the
bid to obtain for Bum one of the two parliamentary seats allocated to Boyo
Division, they blamed this on the lack of Bum elites at strategic positions in
the center of power in Yaounde. At the same time an influential Kom
elite-including a minister, university professors, and several highly placed
civil servants-was very much present in Yaounde, ensuring that Bum
remained marginalized.6
In the new political context, the Bum Development Union (BDU)
determined that the position of Bum had to change. At a meeting in
Yaounde on August 18, 1996, exactly ten years after the Lake Nyos Disaster,
the Union launched the Lake Nyos Gas Disaster Rehabilitation Fund
(LANGADIREF), declaring that "the victims' right to survival, healthy
development and protection from abuse" had been neglected, and that as
a result, many survivors had continued to die from "entrenched poverty,
sickness and inadequate services." At the launching ceremony, which was
attended among others by the Minister of Social and Women's Affairs (Mrs.
Yaou Aissatou as the Prime Minister's special representative) but boycotted
by the Kom elite in Yaounde (including the minister, Francis Nkwain), the
BDU presented Bum as "a minority and underscholarised ethnic group of
about 50,000 people who are geographically landlocked in an enclave,"
where "many pregnant women and other patients taken ill have lost their
lives as a result of the difficulty of evacuation to where adequate medical
attention could be secured."

Witchcraft
as an Issuein the "Politics
of Belonging"81
In the new context of political liberalization, the role of the new elite
as the defender of the community's interests abroad is even more
enhanced than before. No wonder that special interventions seem to be
necessary in order to ensure its protection under the aegis of the fon, still
the symbol of Bum unity-even if this means long-distance interventions
and formally illegal arrests which can put the fon's representatives in trouble with the state's gendarmes.In the new politics of belonging, "witchcraft"
acquires a new kind of urgency. Like its counterpart, "autochthony," it is
reproduced on an increasing scale. The need also to contain it among the
Bum in diaspora obliges the fon and his kwifonto perform novel and audacious interventions.

MigrantsReturningto the Village:

Witchcraft and the Dangers of Home in East Cameroon

In itself, the accusations against Msama-the Bum man who even killed his
own mother and turned her into a zombie-are not exceptional. Especially since the end of the colonial period, rumors about n 'yongo(or whatever
name is used: kupe,famla, ekongor kong) have swept periodically like an epidemic through the various parts of southern and western Cameroon. The
names used may be different but the basic pattern is the same: the new rich
are suspected of owing their riches to the labor of their victims, whom they
have turned into zombies. It is striking, however, that similar accusations
are dealt with in very different fashion in the various parts of the country.
Take, for instance, a spate of recent accusations that one of the authors witnessed in a village in the East Province-around the same time as the Bum
chiefs interventions.
In 1994, just as Geschiere's informants had predicted for more than
ten years, Nkwud Maurice (a pseudonym), one of the best-known elites
from the Ndjonkol-a Maka district in the forest area of the East Province
of Cameroon-was accused of witchcraft by the people of his own village.
Nkwud, long a leading politician of the East, had decided to return to his
village upon his retirement at the end of 1970s. Until then he had been
headmaster of a primary school in one of the province's urban centers.
This decision to go back to the village was generally seen as a daring step.
The Maka-a loosely structured group of about sixty thousand people in
the dense forest area of the East Province-are widely known for the fiercely levelling tendencies of their highly segmentary forms of social organization. Witchcraft is seen as a deadly threat against any rich relative who
refuses to share with his kin, and Maka kinship ideology defines kin and
the obligation to share in a particularly wide sense. In the face of so much
pressure most nouveaux riches-in this area mainly the better educated
who had become civil servants and made their career in public serviceemphasize the dangers of returning to the intimacy of one's former fellow-

82 AfricanStudiesReview
villagers. Is intimacy not the nursery of witchcraft? Most elites profess their
continuing involvement with the village and most of them do take very seriously the endless streams of requests from "their"villagers for support and
protection. But as real as this feeling of involvement might be, they are
wary of physically returning to the village. Most limit their visits to rapid
trips, spending the night in one of the provincial towns rather than in the
village itself.
Nkwud clearly had different ideas. Even during the 1970s, when he still
lived in one of the towns of the East, he was a part-time resident in the village. He spent most of his weekends and nearly all his holidays in the
impressive house he had built at the entrance of the village. Even then he
had a car-still quite an exceptional possession in the East-which enabled
him to come and go as much as he wanted. He always emphasized how
much he enjoyed village life. He liked to supervise the work in his extensive cocoa plantations which were, indeed, a non-negligeable source of
income. But apart from such material interests, he enjoyed sitting and chatting with his people, playing songhoand drinking an occasional beer. He
participated very actively in village politics: in the conflicts around the village chief and the problems between the different grandesfamilies which
consituted the village. But his status as evolue--an expression from French
colonial jargon that was still current in the village in the 1970s-ensured
him at the same time a position above the village intrigues. Moreover, his
main interests in the village were the Presbyterian church and the school,
concerns clearly above petty politics.
Nkwud's relations with the church were highly ambivalent. He owed
his career to the fact that in the thirties his father had taken refuge at one
of the first Presbyterian mission stations in the East to escape from the
harshness of the French forced labour. There, the young Nkwud had been
sent to school and thus he became one of the first dipl6misof the province.
He was, moreover, one of the best pupils of the Presbyterian school and
seemed, therefore, predestined to become a pastor or at least a teacher.
However, in his twenties he had a series of fierce conflicts with the American missionaries, notably over his stormy love life and his refusal to adhere
to their strictly monogamous regime. Later on, he even became excommunicated because of polygamy. Therefore, as soon as he could he
obtained a transfer into the teaching profession in public service, which
also happened to be much better paying. Today, despite all these conflicts,
Nkwud still feels a deep emotional involvement with the Presbyterian
church in his village. He attends the service every Sunday and is involved
in endless schemes to raise money for a new church building to replace the
existing ramshackle mud construction. The fact that there is now at last a
church en semi-dur,even if it is only half-finished, clearly fills him with great
satisfaction and pride.
Nkwud has shown a similar involvement with the village school. He
never tires of emphasizing how important schooling is, quoting his own

Witchcraftas an Issue in the "Politicsof Belonging" 83

brilliant career as an example. To him the village school is the sign of
progress; indeed, he repeats time and again that the only reason his village
can boast of several brilliant evoluts like him is that the Presbyterians started a school here earlier than anywhere else along the piste. He considered
it particularly galling that in the 1970s the schoool was still housed in an
unattractive mud construction. He devoted even more energy to building
the school than he had to building a church, and today makes it quite clear
that he considers it a tribute to himself that the school is housed in a modern construction.
All these efforts can explain why Nkwud chose definitively to return to
the village at the end of the 1970s. Still, this was a remarkable decision.
Only ten years earlier, his cousin Mpoam Nicolas (a pseudonym), who also
had made an important career in public service, had returned temporarily
to the village. But he soon began to suffer from a mysterious illness that no
doctor could cure. Finally he was saved by a nganga ("traditional healer" or
"witch-doctor"), who saw that he had been attacked by his close relatives.
Since then, Mpoam does return to the village from time to time, but he
strictly keeps his distance from his fellow villagers. This case was often quoted by other urban elites from the area as one more warning of how dangerous it was to venture too far into the intimacy of one's relatives.
Nkwud seemed to be oblivious to such warnings. He clearly enjoyed
being with his people, all the more so since he was obviously liked and
respected by them as "an evolud,but also one of us." Indeed, Nkwud's personal style-his sociability, his rhetorical prowess, and most of all the
respect he gained through his untiring efforts for the church and the
school-seemed
to "armor" him against witchcraft and its treacherous
ambushes. However, in the end, not even Nkwud's undeniable prestige
proved to be sufficient protection.
In the early 1990s a woman began a new kind of practice as healer. She
had recently returned from Douala, where her father had spent most of his
life in relative obscurity. She claimed to be both a "diviner"and an "exorcist" and, as the last term suggests, her cures were deeply influenced by
Catholic ritual. In contrast to other nganga in the area, who are supposed
to be able to protect against the witches because they themselves have
developed their djambe("witchcraft")to an extreme degree, this new healer claimed to have nothing to do with this djambe.A striking difference was
also that her customers did not have to pay anything; they only had to bring
a new candle. After her "invocations," the women had her clients drink
blessed water, rubbed them with oil, and then gave them her benediction.
Probably because of the novel character of her treatment-and maybe also
because it was free-she became a great success; sometimes she received
more than eighty persons a day. Success may have emboldened her. In
1994, to everyone's surprise, she announced suddenly that she had "seen,"
without a shade of doubt, that not only Richard Nkwud, but also the village
chief Meboua Dagobert and two of his notables had the kong and were

84 AfricanStudiesReview
using it "to decimate the people of the village." This, then, was the hidden
cause of a recent series of deaths in the community.
The kongis the local variant of the n 'yongo.In the East as in the Southwest, this is seen as a novel kind of witchcraft used by the nouveaux riches.
Precisely because of its novelty-in this area, further into the interior,
rumors about kongbegan to spread much later, mostly after 1980-people
are extremely concerned by it. The woman's accusation, therefore, was very
serious and people were wondering especially how Nkwud, the main
accused, would react.
Nkwud took immediate action, going straight away to the tribunal in
the nearest town (25 kms away) and lodging a complaint against the
woman for defamation. This step was not without risks. Since the end of the
1970s, and especially in the East Province, state courts have shown themselves inclined to accept the declarations of nganga and other healers as
proof. People accused of witchcraft are now regularly convicted and given
heavy prison sentences and fines on the basis of the nganga's testimony
alone. However, Nkwud had enough confidence that his prestige would
turn the verdict the other way. In this, he proved to be right. Only two
months later, the woman was fined 45.000 FCFA (about eighty dollars) and
given a three-months suspended sentence. Even more than this verdict was
the speed with which the court reacted. Normally, in witchcraft affairs as in
others, complaints drag on for years and years before the tribunal comes to
a verdict. The fact that Nkwud's daughter and son-in-law were very influential in the new Associationdes dlitesMaka-Mboansmay have spurred the
courts on to clear the name of this worthy son of the East as soon as possible.
However, in the village things were not that easily forgotten. The
woman's reputation had certainly suffered, but Nkwud's name was tarnished as well. For some time, he kept away from the village. Even more
striking was that Mpoam, the other powerful elite of the village, and his
whole family consistently refused to have any contact whatsoever with
Nkwud and his people. Apparently--as is so often true among the Makajealousy and conflicts among the elites themselves were at the heart of the
whole affair.

SegmentarySocieties and the Searchfor New Sanctions

The accusations against Nkwud and the other village notables may have
been similar to the ones in the Bum case, but their effects were very different. In itself it is not that striking that chiefs hardly played a role in arranging the affair in the East. Instead, the village chief himself was one of the
suspects, even if he only played a minor role in the whole tumult. Nobody
even suggested placing the matter before the chefsuprieuror the chefde canton. Now that the regime again takes chiefs seriously as an alternative chan-

Witchcraft
as an Issuein the "Politics
of Belonging"85
nel for the encadrementof the population-since multipartism makes partypolitics less dependable-chiefs have once more been appointed by the
government to all these positions. But the people do not take the chiefs
very seriously, certainly not seriously enough to expect them to solve difficult cases like witchcraft affairs. Throughout the forest area-and in glaring contrast to the Grassfields or the northern parts of the country--chieftaincy is clearly a colonial remnant. In the forest societies, which were segmentary in character and dominated by a fierce egalitarian ideology, the
chieftaincies imposed under colonial rule took root only under exceptional circumstances (Geschiere 1993). As a consequence, people seem to be
inclined rather to put their witchcraft problems directly before the state,
even though the outcome is often uncertain. As Fisiy shows elsewhere in
this collection (see also Fisiy & Geschiere 1990), it is notably in the old segmentary societies of the forest area that there is heavy pressure on the state
courts to intervene against a supposed proliferation of witchcraft.
But there are parallels with the Bum cases too. In the East as well, the
urban elites played an important role. It was especially because Nkwud was
so clearly backed by the Associationdes ilites Maka Mboansthat he got away
quite easily from the woman's dangerous accusations. This association,
however, has a very different history from that of the Bum elites and from
the elite associations in the Northwest in general. The elite associations of
the forest area are younger-most of them only clearly profiled themselves
since 1989, after the onset of political liberalization-and they are much
more a direct product of the regime's interest in encouraging a new type
of "politics of belonging" in order to curb the impact of multipartism.
In itself the emergence of these new elite associations in the East was
quite a surprising development. Until the end of the 1980s, people in the
Maka area generally agreed that their urban elite neglected their area of
origin scandalously. People like Nkwud were seen as great exceptions. In
this region, the villagers were accustomed, for instance, to refer to the minister and the miserable house he had built in a nearby village as a true
example of the egoism of Maka elites. As Geschiere's neighbor often said,
"When he [the Minister] receives visitors he has to lodge them at the mission-so miserable is his own house." And she never failed to add, full of
indignation, "These Maka big men spend all their money on drinks and
women, but not a penny on the village. How can we ever have development
here?"
The Maka elites from their side qualified their insistence on their emotional attachment to the village with long complaints about la mentaliti
impossibleof the villagers. A recurring phrase was that they feared "to be
eaten" by these villagers; cases like that of Mpoam-the elite who returned
to the village only to fall ill-were referred to as examples. Indeed, the
term "eaten" is here particularly heavy of meaning: it refers directly to the
urge of the witches to eat their own relatives. Clearly, for the Maka elites
and for those of other forest groups, the fear of the unbridled witchcraft of

86 AfricanStudiesReview
the villagers and its fiercely levelling impact is reason enough to keep at
least some distance.7
Under the authoritarianism of one-party rule-that is, until the end of
the 1980s-there were also good political reasons to keep some distance.
In the forest area, the control of the one-party regime over regional politics was particularly strong (much stronger than in the Anglophone Northwest Province) and politicians were often reminded in no uncertain terms
that they owed their position to the national party and not to their popular support. Politicians who regularly visited their constituency, like Nkwud
himself for instance, were invariably denounced by theirjealous colleagues
for trying to build up their own base of support. This could easily be called
subversion,a very serious charge in the one-party jargon. In this context,
autonomous regional elite associations were certainly not encouraged. On
the contrary, each and every association outside the one-party structure was
highly suspect.
All this changed quite abruptly in the early 1990s. Suddenly urban
elites were much more regularly on the pistes of Makaland. And what was
even more spectacular, elites were building in their village on an unprecedented scale. There was clear competition over who would construct the
most impressive mansion. One elite person-most appropriately the president of the new AssociationdesRlitesMaka Mboans-even had a kind of Islamic palace erected, complete with pillars and a portico. An important factor
in this sudden change seems to be the new government's encouragement
of regional elite associations as an alternative to multipartism. As said
before, among the Maka,just as in other forest societies, nearly all urban
elites have made their career in public service. All depend, therefore, on
the supporters of the government. This has made it all the more important
to them that under the novel political constellation of multipartism the
regime had new expectations of the elite associations. Instead of being
seen as potential rivals to the one party, they were more and more considered to be reliable supporters in the struggle for votes. Party politicians had
become less dependable clients. Even in a solid CPDM-fief (the president's
own party), other parties were active, so that overambitious politicians
could try to switch sides. But the elites were paid by the government and
therefore under the regime's direct control. And because of their personal relations in their area of origin, they were the obvious persons to try to
win votes for the regime.
For Makaland, the turning point seems to have been the presidential
elections of 1992, when President Biya's reelection was far from guaranteed. Many civil servants were simply ordered to return to their home area
and start campaigning for Biya. Concomitantly, the elite associationswhich until then had manifested themselves informally, at most, and in the
urban context-were suddenly actively encouraged by the regime. Since
then, these elite associations have become an important factor in Makaland
as well.

Witchcraftas an Issue in the "Politicsof Belonging" 87

In 1995 one of these elite associations invited Geschiere to discuss his
work with them in Yaounde. Significantly, and as was only to be expected,
witchcraft quickly became the central issue of discussion. Interestingly, the
elites present showed themselves to be conscious of a certain ambivalence.
They recognized that the occult did remain very important for people of
their own group as well; indeed most elites are regular clients of the nganga. Yet they insisted that, one way or another, these forces had to be contained if they (the elites) were ever to succeed in their attempts to bring
development to the villages. However, none of those present had a clear
scenario in mind of how this containment could be effected. And the sheer
excitement the topic raised among the audience was a clear indication of
how deeply the relation between the elite and the village remains beset by
the fear of the occult.

Parallels and Differences

Political liberalization seems to have given the home area new relevance
for the locals as much as for the urban migrants. But the "politics of
belonging" triggered by this transition have followed different patterns. In
Bum it led to determined efforts to close the ranks of the urban migrants
in hope of a new breakthrough in the chiefdom's rivalrywith neighboring
Kom. In Makaland it rather opened up a new scope of action for urban
elite associations in their dealings with the village. However, different as
those scenarios may be, they follow similar trends.
One such trend is the emergence of "autochthony" as a crucial and
hotly debated issue. Among the Maka elite associations, the segmentary
logic has led to constant fissions and redefinitions of "autochthony": an
elite described as a "true Maka"at one moment can next be declassified as
an outsider, since he is originairefrom a different part of Makaland. In practice, these elite associations tend therefore to become smaller and smaller.
Among the Bum, the old associations for "Kom and Bum" do not suffice
anymore; they have had to make way for purely Bum organizations. But
inevitably this has triggered fierce discussions about who "really"is Bum
and who is not.
Another general trend is that "autochthony" always has its dark counterpart in "witchcraft."As said before, "autochthony" and "belonging" are
about links of origin, and therefore about intimacy. But that is precisely the
context in which witchcraft blossoms. Our comparison above suggests that
in some contexts more than others, concrete means seem to be available to
try and contain this dark threat. Even for the Bum people in diaspora in
the farawaySouthwest, the fon at home was the obvious figure to appeal to
when witchcraft seemed to be proliferating amongst them. But this storyand other similar ones-shows also that even in the highly structured societies of the Grassfields, with their elaborate institutional constructions for

88 AfricanStudiesReview
legitimizing hierarchy, such "traditional" (or, rather "neo-traditional")
interventions are alwayshighly precarious. The fon of Bum was more or less
openly accused of letting the main culprit get away in exchange for certain
presents. This recalls Goheen's powerful description of the worries of the
people of Nso, the major chiefdom of the Northwest, about the alliance of
their fon with the new urban elites. Apparently Nso people are in doubt:
will these new elites prove to be the fon's "new leopards" who will accompany him when at night, transformed as a lion, he prowls the countryside
in order to protect his people against evil? Or will they turn out to be themselves "sorcerers of the night" who will corrupt the chief and his court from
within? (Goheen 1996).
Elsewhere, such crystallization points-like the fon in the Grassfieldsseem to be lacking. In the segmentary forest societies, the only solution
now seems to be to invoke outsiders: the Catholic priest, or more often the
state with its gendarmesand its courts. In these contexts, accusations of
witchcraft can rapidly lead to straightforward violence as shown by Eyoh's
shocking case study (1998) of the killing of one of the most prominent
chiefs of the Southwest who had been accused of witchcraft by his own villagers.
The renewed importance of the village in the politics of belonging
inspires new efforts to contain the threat of witchcraft, which seems to be
inherent in any appeal to autochthony and belonging. In his determined
attempts to close the ranks of his elites in diaspora, the fon of Bum did not
hesitate to challenge the state and its gendarmesby having three of his people arrested far outside the borders of his realm. But his effort toward containment was drastically undermined by the escape of the main culprit. In
our case study from the East Province, Nkwud appealed instead to the state
in order to contain the dangerous accusations against him, and this appeal
was successful to a certain degree. The same cannot be said of the much
more frequent popular appeals to the state courts to contain witchcraft by
arresting the "witches." Elsewhere (Fisiy & Geschiere 1990, Geschiere
1997), we have tried to show that the state's judicial interventions against
witchcraft, at least in the East Province, have been most ineffective and
even counterproductive. The state with its prisons and gendarmesmay possess an impressive disciplinary apparatus, but it is utterly incapable of neutralizing the witches' dangerous forces. On the contrary, when the latter
get out of jail, they are supposed to have learnt new secrets and therefore
to have become even more dangerous. And the nganga, the expert of old
on the subject of containing witchcraft, becomes a disciplinary figure who
drags his "suspects"before the gendarmes,rather than a healer who is able
to neutralize their dangerous forces.
Unfortunately, these various scenarios, different as they may be, seem
to have in common that they are of little avail in people's efforts to try and
contain witchcraft. In itself, this is hardly surprising. The particular trajectories of political liberalization in many parts of Africa-with the renewed

as an Issueinthe "Politics
of Belonging"89
Witchcraft
emphasison "belonging"and "autochthony"-havestrengthenedrelations
of a particularlyexplosive kind. To both urbanitesand people "athome,"
maintaining a feeling of belonging-even if this can become somewhat
artificialto people who were not even born "at home"-remains a vital
interest.The kinshipterminologyis stretchedfurtherand furtherto bridge
new inequalities,between city and countryside,between rich people and
poorer ones. It is this explosive mixture of ostentatiousemotional attachment and intimacywithblatantinequalitythat makesthe relationsbetween
urbanitesand their "brothers"at home a hotbed for witchcraftfears and
rumors.

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de Rosny, E. 1981. Lesyeux de ma chevre:Sur lespas des maitresde la nuit en pays douala.
Paris: Plon.

Notes
1.

2.

3.
4.

5.

6.

Murray Last (personal communication) characterizes these struggles as "the

politics of primary patriotism"; see in general Geschiere & Gugler 1998; see
also Nyamnjoh & Rowlands 1998 for a striking example of such struggles in
Southwest Cameroon. For a more general approach to the issue of "autochthony," see Geschiere & Nyamnjoh (forthcoming).
A few rapid remarks about terminology are necessary here. We realize that
terms like sorceryor witchcraftare highly problematic since they are quite partial translations-notably too pejorative-of much broader African notions.
Yet, these Western terms now have been generally appropriated by Africans:
tensions between urbanites and villagers, for instance, are often discussed in
precisely these terms. In our view, social scientists have, therefore, little choice
but to retain these terms-refusing to use them would mean to distance ourselves from the discussions going on in the societies concerned--but we have
to be constantly on the alert for the dangers of distortion (see also Fisiy and
Geschiere 1990; Geschiere 1997). Moreover, we do not follow the classical (but
often criticized) anthropological distinction, proposed by Evans-Pritchard on
the basis of his Zande material, between witchcraft (inborn) and sorcery (use
of tools), since it does not apply to the areas concerned here.
See Nyamnjoh 1985; Geschiere 1982, 1997; Bastian 1993; J. and J. Comaroff
1993.
The latter is an isolated rocky wilderness of a village where various fons have
lived despite popular suggestions that the palace be relocated closer to the
people.
It is worth noting here that the practice by Grassfields chiefs of appointing and
installing representatives in the diaspora is quite common. However, in recent
years since the politics of belonging has taken center stage, autochthonous
chiefs on the coast have started speaking out against the practice. In their
meeting of March 23, 1996, during which they lamented the fact that "settler"
votes had resulted in the CPDM defeat at the municipal elections in the area,
the Fako Chiefs' Conference of the Southwest Province condemned the "creation of settler fondoms and chiefdoms with heavy installations and enthronement rites" in Fako Division, stressing that "the paramount chiefs of the various towns were the ones to appoint quarter-heads answerable to them [the
chiefs]" (The Herald,April 11, 1996).
In a piece titled "Total Eclipse of Bum," published in TheHerald (February 5,
1997), Augustin Kiteh, a Bum elite, accused the Kom elites of having "left no
stone unturned to marginalise Bum" politically. Among his grievances was the
fact that "the only parliamentarian from Bum was the CNU bigwig-Honourable J. J. Fugwoh from 1982 to 1987 [the CNU was Ahidjo's one-party and

of Belonging"91
as an Issueinthe "Politics
Witchcraft

7.

as such the forerunner of Biya's CPDM-FN]. From 1987 to 1997, Kom has outwitted Bum and provided the same CPDM parliamentarians who have hardly
considered Bum for the parliamentary support fund for microprojects in social
services. From the era of the Kom/Bum Council some thirty years ago, until
today, no road links Kom to Bum within the Division. The defunct Kom/Bum
Development Union realised no project in Bum." He argues that although "the
creation of Bum Sub-division marks the freedom from oppression and marginalisation," political participation for Bum continues to be eclipsed by Minister Nkwain and the two parliamentarians from Kom. In yet another piece
(The Herald,March 28-30, 1997), Augustin Kiteh writes, "The entire Bum populace constitutes a helpless electoral dupe in the hands of Kom politicians....
Politicians everywhere attempt to deceive, but the Kom politician succeeds very
admirably in Bum. If he fools Bum again, shame on Bum. Is Bum not standing
too long on the sidelines of politics? But whose duty is it to create an atmosphere conducive to the emergence of Bum?"
See, for instance, Laburthe-Tolra 1981 and 1988 on the Beti, the western
neighbours of the Maka, who now play such an important role in national politics in Cameroon.