1. The document expresses beliefs in the power and potential of Africa and its youth. It believes that Africa was the origin of humanity and its youth have great intelligence, integrity, and a deep love for humanity. 2. It expresses the belief that if Africa's youth are given knowledge and their hearts are filled with goodness, they will transform the continent from a dark past to a bright future. Through unity and righteousness, Africa can achieve success, hope and peaceful coexistence. 3. The document expresses the belief that Africa will only thrive through the hard work and sweat of its people in teaching, touching hearts and transforming lives with a united voice, not through outside aid or intervention. It has faith that a united Africa will

1. Credo (I belive)
I believe in Africa the seed of the human race. Who has been there from the
beginning of the world, inhabited by human beings and not by beast with their heads
in their chests tearing one another apart. And from the vantage point of its present
reawakening, I foresee a United States of Africa in a distant vision: stronger,
advanced and more beautiful than the hills in the North West region of Cameroon;
it beggars in strength and majesty the mountain dome of Everest in in Mahalangur
section of the Himalayas.
I believe in the youth of Africa because their intelligence cannot be
underestimated, in their integrity, cultivated hearts, their sense of sacrifice, a love
for humanity so deep, so keen, so unswerving that they are the pride and envy of
those of other continents: this is known to everyone else except them.
I believe in the youth who feel more deeply over the misery that looms over
their desires and attempt to take their destinies in their own hands. I believe in the
youth who rise in love more readily with deep seated joy past wordings and who
weep with deep agony when they fall in love. I believe in the youth who rally round
more eagerly to fight for a noble cause: on us a lot depends.
I believe that if YOU could but fill OUR minds with extensive sound, solid
and genuine knowledge; if WE could forever fill OUR hearts with love for all that
is good and true and beautiful, if YOU could but teach the hands of youths to drop
THEIR guns, to love the salutary dirt of labour, to hold the guitar and play the sweet
melodies that brings joy to the troubled heart, then having touched their hearts,
taught their minds, you would have transformed a dark day to a bright future.
I believe in the power of clean hands and lives even when YOU are in
power. I believe in the strength of unity and in the might of right. To reach success
and hope and a peaceful coexistence, this cannot be overlooked. I believe and I
profess that all YOU need is love. YOU don’t need force except for evil; take up
the force of love and you will not need to build walls. LOVE is the strongest
transformational force in the world.
I believe in sacrifice as the law of growth and life. I believe that it is not on
the ample showers of Debundscha at the foot of Mount Cameroon, or on the rich
morning dews around Lake Oku or Kilum Mountain, that a continent like Africa
shall thrive: it is only on the steaming sweat, from teaching minds, touching hearts
and transforming lives through a united voice that Africa shall thrive.
If YOU could only cause this perspiration to flow more copiously, if YOU could
only make this continent the dearest thing, under God to your soul, if WE could
only put our hands, hearts and heads together and dare and do like one person,
where the welfare of the continent calls, the Africa of tomorrow would surprise our
highest hopes. And thus this continent whose voice, today is known through sobs,

2. appeal for aids and interventions, shall take its rightful place at the table of nations
in the world under God…even though by then the dust of the years would have
been thick on MY, YOUR, OUR graves.
(Excerpts: B. Fonlon’s, The Genuine Intellectual, Buma Kor, Yaounde 1978 and
As I see It, Catholic Press Buea, 1971.)
Ultan Nche Nkinen (Maryknoll Institute of African Studies, Nairobi Kenya)