FON ABUMBI II

His Royal Majesty Abumbi II,

Fon of Bafut following elders
meeting with the King at
Sunnyside Café

King, elders connect in

Royal visit to community
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By Al McFarlane and B.P. Ford

The Editors

S
pike Moss summed it up beautifully. “Your Majesty,” he said, addressing
H.R.M. King Abumbi II, the Fon of Bafut, “for years I have been
teaching our children, telling them, ‘You are the sons and daughters of
kings and queens!’ Sometimes it’s hard for them to believe that kingship runs
in our veins. In a country that enslaved us, robbed us of our freedom and
dignity, stole our labor and our lives, and that continues to try to marginalize
our culture and distort our identity, it’s hard to keep them believing there is
something greater in them than all the negative assaults that come from
outside. That negativity breeds self hatred and self destruction. That is why
our young men are killing each other.”
“I want to thank you for meeting with the elders of our community.
Your visit helps us refresh our own sense of purpose, our sense of
sovereignty, our duty to the ancestors and to the Creator,” Moss said.
Moss and other leaders of civic, cultural and social service
institutions met King Abumbi II at a breakfast hosted by Insight
News at Sunnyside Café, 1815 Glenwood Avenue, in the heart of
H.R.M. Abumbi II, Fon of Bafut with Spike Moss. Photos: studiotobechi
North Minneapolis. King Abumbi II is the hereditary leader of the
kingdom of Bafut, which is a region in the northwest of the nation
of Cameroon, in central Africa. Abumbi II is the 11th Fon, which completing a three week tour of the U.S.
means king, to rule the kingdom. His first visit to the United States, While in Twin Cities, the Fon received a formal welcome by
the Fon said his mission was to meet with Cameroonians in general Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak and officials of Minneapolis Institute
and in particular, his subjects from the Fondom of Bafut, who now of Art, where his delegation was given a tour of the MIA’s extensive
live in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Houston and African Art collection. Rybak also gave the royal visitor a tour of the
Twin Cities. He returned to Cameroon Sunday, Aug, 26th, after I-35W bridge disaster and recovery area and operations.
Story continues on page 6 X
 Photos: studiotobechi
Top: Liz Moore; H.R.M. Abumbi II, Fon of Bafut; Elizabeth Samuels; Ora Hokes and Kelley Hardemann following elders meeting with
the King at Sunnyside Café. Bottom (left to right): Reverend Ian Bethel, Pastor of New Beginnings Baptist Tabernacle; Reverend
Randolph Staten, Co-chair of the Coalition of Black Churches/African American Leadership Summit; H.R.M. Abumbi II, Fon of Bafut;
Peter Hayden, President, Turning Point Inc and Clarence Hightower, President, Minneapolis Urban League.
 Photos: Suluki Fardan

H.R.M. Abumbi II with host, Al McFarlane, Editor-in-Chief of Insight News at the Elder’s Meeting.
 Photos: Suluki Fardan

Bottom: Victorene Ambe, a member of the Fon’s Royal Court who resides in Minnesota.
 Photo: Suluki Fardan

Photo: studiotobechi
Top: Khalil Wright with H.R.M. Abumbi II. Bottom: Kelley Hardemann and Khalil Wright with his grandfather, Insight News photographer Suluki Fardan

Alice Baker, Sunnyside Café; Ex-MN Vikings superstar and Hall of Fame professional football player, Carl Eller and H.R.M. Abumbi II, Fon of Bafut
From 1
The meeting with Elders of the Black community was a special
highlight for the Fon, his spokesperson said.
Minneapolis Urban League President, Clarence Hightower asked
Abumbi II how he came to be king.
Fon Abumbi II said his being named king to succeed his father,
Achirimbi II, the tenth king or Fon of Bafut who ruled over the town
of Bafut and adjoining areas (the Fondom of Bafut). Achirimbi II
ruled from 1932 to 1968, and was preceded by Abumbi I and
succeeded by Abumbi II.
The Fon said his society is polygamous, and that as the leader of
the nation, he is also the leading polygamist. While he has some 25
wives, he said his father had hundreds of wives and his grandfather
had more than a thousand wives. The idea behind polygamy in his
Photo: Suluki Fardan
H.R.M. King Abumbi II with Al McFarlane
Photo: studiotobechi
society, he said, was the belief that every man and every woman
should be married. Since there were more women than men,
polygamous marriages enabled the society to achieve the goal of
nearly 100 percent marriage among its population. He said divorce
was uncommon.
In response to Hightower’s question, Abumbi II said he was the
choice of his father and his father’s advisors, and beyond that, he was
the choice of the Spirit. He said his culture practiced ancestor worship
and that as Fon, he was the principal intermediary between the living
and the dead.
He said he was the 400th son of his father. All of the sons were
elegible for selection to succeed the father as king. He said his
selection therefore, reflected the will and guidance of the
ancestors…the Spirit.
His father, Fon Achirimbi II is famous for having remarked about
the choice to join independent Cameroon or independent Nigeria
from the British Cameroons in 1961. Achrimbi II called it a choice
between the “Fire and the Deep Sea”.
He was considered by many as being progressive and willing to
experiment with new ideas. He was treated with respect by both
colonial administrators and nationalist politicians, according to
internet information resource, Wikipedia.
The Germans tried to put a puppet ruler in place of the Fon after
the Bafut Wars at the turn of the century, but failed. The Fon Abumbi
I was openly hostile to the Germans, and diplomacy was not pursued.
The idea of decentralized governance by local people was put into
practice in July 1917 in the British Cameroon when the District officer
inaugurated an ‘Instructional Court’ in Bamenda.
This was an assembly of chiefs from surrounding communities who
were summoned to be instructed in the new native court ordinance
and to go on to form the new courts.
Continued on next page X
The membership of the court consisted of
27 chiefs with the Fon of Bafut Abumbi I
appointed as president due to his role as the
“supreme fon,” Wikipedia reports.
Bafut is one of the two regions in
Cameroon (the other being Bali, Cameroon),
where traditional power structures are still in
place. The Fon of Bafut also holds several
important administrative positions including
that of the head of the North West Fons’
Union (NOWEFU), and member of the
Management Board of the North-West
Development Authority (MIDENO).
The Fon participates in virtually all the
important ceremonies of Bafut. One of the
most important ceremonies is the annual
dance Abin e Mfor or Dance of the Fon:
This annual event, held in December is also
known as the Abin Lela, or Dance of the
Flutes. Village nobles play traditional flutes
and fire guns to mark the proceedings. It is
the climactic point of the annual ritual cycle,
and is supposed to signify the death and
rebirth of the year (i.e. a new year
ceremony). The ethnic dance is performed in
traditional dress. Luminaries of society (the
Fon of Bafut and his advisors) form a spiral
in the centre. The general public dances
concentric rings around the spiral in a
counter-clockwise fashion. Present-day
African American ring dance ceremonies
probably owe their origins to such
ceremonies, Wikipedia said.
Social worker and educator Liz Moore
asked the Fon about the philosophy of
education in Bafut. The king said his society
views education as the primary responsibility
of the family, particularly the child’s mother
and father. He said the schools and teachers
are partners, supporting parent in their role
as primarily responsible for the education of
the child. He said corporeal punishment,
administered publicly, in the presence of the
child’s parents and peers, is a tool to force
attention and compliance by students.
“If a child has not arrived at school for
two or three days in a row, but instead has
gone to town to be with other errant youth,
the teacher or headmaster will come to the
child’s home and tell the parents that the
child has not been in school. Punishment to
the child, in front of the parents might be a
specific number of strikes with a cane,” King
Abumbi II said.
Himself a lawyer by training, Abumbi II
said he owns several schools as well as
herding, and agriculture production, and
mining enterprises. His palace in Bafut is on
a world list of important structures that are
endangered. Some 30,000 tourist a year visit
the palace, 8,000 from the United States, Photo: Suluki Fardan
with almost none of them African H.R.M. Abumbi II, Fon of Bafut
Americans,” the King said. people of Bafut. Abumbi II said creating the in reciprocity, visits by Black Americans to
Former Minnesota Viking superstar, Carl connection was a high priority. He said it Bafut, and Cameroon. “When you come to
Eller asked what opportunities there are for should begin with more visits by Bafut,” the King said, “I will show you the
commerce between Black Americans and the Cameroonians to the Black community, and, same hospitality you have shown me.”