SYDNEY, N.S. — Two decades after a failed attempt to reach Europe over the dangerous trans-Saharan migration route, Cameroon native Marc Njoh couldn’t be happier about his present state of affairs.
After all, the 38-year-old is now a public crown prosecutor who resides with his wife and three children in a peaceful Sydney neighbourhood. Njoh’s infectious smile and humble disposition endear him to those he meets both through his job and in the community. He loves Cape Breton. He loves being by the ocean.
He was also recently honoured with a national Humanitarian Award from the Federal-Provincial-Territorial Heads of Prosecution Committee at its annual Prosecution Awards ceremony held last month in Ottawa. And, he and his wife own a seasonal e-bike and e-scooter rental business at the Joan Harriss Cruise Pavilion.
Yes, life is good. But he has never forgotten his roots.
DECOLONIZATION
McFarlane (Marc) Chebesi Njoh was born in the English-speaking part of Cameroon. He was the eldest of six children raised by parents who were both teachers and political activists. Njoh said he was not yet a teenager when he first started becoming aware of the problems in his native country.
“I was very little but I remember the protests in the street, I remember the water cannons,” he recalled.
“Cameroon was colonized first by Germany and then after the First World War was split into French and English Cameroon. But there is a failed decolonization process. Cameroon was not properly colonized. The United Nations bungled it up and Great Britain bungled it up and we are left with what looks like a language issue but is really an identity issue.”
Njoh also remembers a chat with an opposition political leader when he was 11.
“Before the 1990s, Cameroon was a one-party state and because my parents were involved in politics, this leader would sometimes stay at our home,” he said.
“He sat me on his lap and he told me that the work he and my parents were doing was for our future, the future of the children. And that never left me. It stuck with me and as I grew up I became more and more aware of the injustices.”
It was after high school that Njoh first demonstrated his strong resolve to better himself through education.
“Our parents couldn’t afford to send us all to school, so I worked a bit but it was tough trying to support myself so I decided I would make the trip to Europe through the back roads,” he recounted.
“They call it the trans-Saharan migration route. I went with a bunch of friends. We were going to go to Majorca. We made it to Algeria but, for several reasons, we couldn’t make it, so instead we made our way back to Cameroon.”
Despite the setback, Njoh remained undeterred.
Certainly, his journey from tension-ridden Cameron to the east coast of Canada was an adventure in its own right that took time, hard work, lots of study and a bit of luck.
CANADA-BOUND
By chance, an aunt of Njoh’s happened to be living in North America. Although a Canadian citizen, she was residing in the United States when her nephew’s desire for an advanced education came to her attention.
“She sort of adopted me and I am very grateful because she was my route into Canada,” he said.
At the age of 22, Njoh arrived in Montréal. He had relatives there but didn’t know them well. His destination, however, was Calgary.
“My target was Calgary because when I was doing some crude research before coming to Canada I saw that the city was in a boom then. I saw that dishwashing jobs paid $16 an hour, so after translating that into Cameroon money I thought this must be the place to go.”
Through a chance encounter at the Montréal airport, Njoh made friends with two other Africans, one from Mali and one from Niger. They in turn knew people in Calgary and suddenly he had a contact in Alberta. Before long, Njoh was enrolled first at Mount Royal College and then the University of Calgary.
In 2009, he met his future wife who just happened to be from Sydney. A year later they made their way to Nova Scotia where Njoh completed his post-secondary studies and earned a law degree at Dalhousie University.
The young African was just getting started.
LEGAL CAREER
He became involved locally, he served as the vice-president of the Association of the Dalhousie Law Students Association, and in 2017 was awarded the Nova Scotia Barristers’ Society President’s Award for Leadership in recognition of his community volunteer work and leadership.
Njoh also led a Dal law school initiative called “Out of the Cold” in which led a group of law students volunteers to attend homeless shelters once a week and to provide free legal information.
He then joined the Nova Scotia Public Prosecution Service working out of the Yarmouth office before he secured a transfer to Sydney.
WORLD CUP
Meanwhile, the national men’s football teams of 32 countries are now gathered in Qatar for the 2022 World Cup. Among those teams are Canada and Cameroon.
The event has been controversial since it was first announced due to both Qatar's intense heat and for its human rights violations.
Njoh will, of course, be cheering for both Cameroon and Canada. But he’ll be doing his initial cheering, at least during the Indomitable Lions first game Thursday against Switzerland, from Cambodia where he is attending a humanitarian relief conference.
So while he will be keeping an eye on the World Cup, he’ll be even more focused on the working toward bringing peace and stability to his native country.
CAMEROON
Where: West coast of Africa bordering six countries, including Nigeria
Population: 29,000,000
Language: French and English
Government: Unitary dominant-party presidential republic
President: Paul Biya (since 1982)
Domestic Issues: Dispute between country’s Francophone and Anglophone peoples, many of the latter who seek independence for Cameron’s minority Anglophone regions
Conflict: Human Rights Watch organization estimates 4,000 people died in the conflict over past five years
Independence from France: Jan. 01, 1960*
Independence from United Kingdom: Oct. 01, 1961*
*Cameroon formerly consisted of Frenchy Cameroons and British Cameroons; both were classified as mandate territories
