E L AMBIENTE EXTERNO

Nowadays the situation regarding football sponsorship in Anglophone and Francophone Cameroon is similar to the earlier description of Tonnerre in the 1970s. In fact, almost all the clubs depend on the financial support of a few wealthy local men. In other words, clubs are sponsored and run by local big men. For instance, Olympique de Buea is financially supported by its club president. The president is a wealthy Bamileke big man from the West Province who is the

founder and owner of a successful company that sells satellites and insurances, among other things. In fact, the vice-president of Olympique de Buea probably got his job because of his day-to-day profession as vice-president of the club president’s company.

The club president is a big man in the true African sense of the term and definitely looks and acts as one. As I said before, I met the president once at the Sporting Centre near the village of Muea. When I went into the Centre through the gate (there is a huge wall around the entire area with guards on top of it) and walked onto the main square, I saw the club president sitting in the middle of a terrace drinking a glass of beer. The tables on the terrace were ‘protected’ from the sun by sharp triangular rooftops, a distinctive trademark of Bamileke archi- tecture. The traditional clothing, the golden rings on all his fingers, the thick sun- glasses, the impressive physical posture and the bodyguard right behind him truly complemented the picture of the club president as a man of wealth and power. He was flanked by the director of the Sporting Centre on his right and the club’s vice-president on his left.

As is custom with chiefs and fons (local rulers) in Cameroon, the club presi- dent did not speak to me directly and I think I was not even supposed to look at him. Instead, I talked to the vice-president who then translated my words to the club president. The club president posed only one question to me after I had asked his permission to start training with the team. ‘What’s in it for me?’ I thought about it for a moment and then answered: ‘I’ll write a book about the club to give the team some media attention’. The club president, so it seemed, was not really satisfied with this answer but the vice-president gave me his per- mission anyway.

I also met the club president of Union de Douala and saw the club president of PWD Bamenda one day. Both of them looked very similar to the club president of Olympique de Buea. The club president of PWD Bamenda, for instance, is also an incredibly rich businessman whose name alone is enough to make even the loudest North Westerner become quiet and humble. Indeed, many Bamendas in Buea spoke of him with respect and awe. He was, in their words, ‘a very, very powerful man’.

In short, all these club presidents have two things in common: they are busi- nessmen and they are filthy rich. Sometimes these big men use money from their own companies to sponsor a football team, such as the club president of Olym- pique de Buea. Sometimes, however, they are the elected general directors or managers of companies and use company money for football purposes. The club president of Fovu de Baham, for instance, is the general manager of a dairy com- pany in the West Province. He uses money from the company to support the team.

The club president of Victoria United is also the general manager of the CDC in the South West Province. We have already seen that the CDC used to be the main sponsor of Victoria United. These days the situation is slightly different because Victoria United is indirectly sponsored by the CDC through the assist- ance of its club president. So when the direct sponsorship of local government departments and companies in the Anglophone zone disappeared, there were local big men to take over financial matters in the clubs in this area of Cameroon. It is easy to understand why a football club would benefit from having a rich big man as club president. After all, they provide the financial stability that any football club ultimately needs and they are able to attract talented players. But since football is not really profitable in Cameroon for various reasons, it would be logical to ask why such big men would spend their money on a football club. It seems that they use football clubs to increase their economic and political power.

Armstrong & Giulianotti (2004: 14) argue that ‘… powerful clubs often emerge in townships under the influence of local “big men” whose patronage is gained in exchange for the club becoming a more personalized symbol of the success of charismatic leadership’. As Clignet & Stark (1974: 419) argue, ‘... if individual clubs are anxious to attract those who occupy a high position in the general social structure, there is nevertheless a quid pro quo in this respect. While clubs are able to benefit from the network of influences established by a successful member of the elite, this also tends to reinforce his socio-economic and political pre-eminence.’

The overall importance of football in Cameroon makes sure that club presi- dents are always in the spotlight and are respected for keeping football alive in the country. A club president will be especially respected within his own commu- nity if he manages to be successful with the local football team. He will earn the support of the local community and uses this support to gain political power. ‘The club presidents use football as a stepping stone to gain popularity so that people will vote for them,’ someone in Buea told me. ‘Without football the people would not have known them but now everybody knows them.’

The political aspect of sponsoring a club is especially visible in the West Province. We already know that the Bamileke have made their province into one of the main football provinces in the country over the last few decades. The Bamileke are businessmen, they ‘are well known for their entrepreneurial spirit’ (Nkwi & Vidacs 1997: 127) and they are even referred to as the ‘Jews of Cameroon’ (Vidacs 2000: 101). Some say that the Bamileke are now using their economic wealth to gain political power.

As Nkwi & Vidacs (1997: 127) note, ‘Bamileke themselves openly admit that their rise in football is part of an attempt to show the world what they are capable

of in a political context where many Bamileke feel that they are being margin- alized by the country’s political powers’. These days a number of Bamileke big men are also the presidents of several first-division clubs. All of these club presi- dents have become Members of Parliament (MPs) because of their sponsorship of their respective clubs. Indeed, the club president of Olympique de Buea is also a parliamentarian and is addressed as ‘Honourable’.