DOUALA, CAMEROON – Dr. Basile Njei hails from the Northwest region of Cameroon. But he says he had to leave Cameroon to pursue a career in medicine.
Njei is now a resident physician at the University of Connecticut Health Center in the United States. He specializes in internal medicine and researches co-infections of HIV and hepatitis B and C.
But in spite of his success abroad, Njei says he is frustrated that he had to leave Cameroon to find these opportunities.
Njei earned his bachelor’s degree and doctorate from the University of Yaoundé I to become a medical doctor. He then left Cameroon to obtain a Master of Public Health from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland before moving to the United States in 2010.
During a phone interview from the United States, Njei says he needed to move abroad to learn cutting-edge medical techniques and treatment approaches, which are limited in Cameroon. Without leaving his country, he would not have been able to gain the crucial support and recognition needed to advance his career.
“Sometimes you also need exposure,” he says. “You learn from people around the world.”
The conditions young physicians face after graduation in Cameroon are tough, he says. Some new doctors may practice for two years before earning a salary from a government hospital.
“Having been among the best five in the Advanced levels certificate examinations, it amazes me that I have to be in the United States,” he says.
Njei says he is saddened by the “brain drain” in Cameroon, a trend in which high-performing students and professionals must leave the country for better opportunities abroad.
Access to higher education, dynamic job markets and the perception of a better life abroad lure young, skilled Cameroonians out of the country. This emigration stymies Cameroon’s growth by depleting the country of educated minds and skilled manpower. Government officials encourage young entrepreneurs to take advantage of state loans and trainings to expand their businesses and create job opportunities for others. Expatriates say that difficulties abroad create another reason to stay in Cameroon and to contribute to its development.
There were nearly 280,000 Cameroonians living abroad as of 2010, which constitutes 1.4 percent of the population, according to the World Bank’s Migration and Remittances Factbook 2011. More than 17 percent of the people who receive higher education in Cameroon emigrate, according to the latest available data.
Diffang Funge, a lecturer in the University of Buea Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, says during a phone interview that reasons for why ambitious, young Cameroonians emigrate vary. But a dearth of jobs often tops the list.
“There is a lot of job scarcity in Cameroon,” he says, “which compels people to look for greener pastures elsewhere.”
More than 70 percent of Cameroon’s population is underemployed, according to a 2012 World Bank report. This percentage includes people who work fewer than 40 hours per week and those who earn less than the minimum wage.
Some Cameroonians may move to neighboring countries with more opportunities for physical labor, such as Chad, the Central African Republic and Equatorial Guinea.
“Had it been we had a vibrant private sector, one could have been able to say that they can have a brighter future in Cameroon,” Funge says of emigrants.
Funge says that when Cameroonians study abroad, such as in Nigeria, Ghana, the United States, Britain or France, they tend to stay to take advantage of job opportunities and raise their families there. Still other Cameroonians try their luck at securing a visa abroad, where they anticipate a higher quality of life and the possibility of gaining wealth.
Such is the case of Sharon Asonganyi, who moved to the United States with her mother in 1997 through the Diversity Visa Program, a lottery administered by the U.S. Department of State. Now a student at The Chicago School of Professional Psychology, Asonganyi also works for the American Psychological Association, where she builds capacity around HIV prevention.
In the United States, there is a greater range of educational and career options, Asonganyi says.
Anthony Ateh, a businessman who deals in electronics, also moved to the United States in 2002 to seek a better life. He became a U.S. citizen in 2010.
Ateh says he is an advocate of Cameroonians enjoying the lifestyle he has found in the United States. He and fellow Cameroonians are also able to support families back home with the extra income they earn abroad.
“Those in the diaspora contribute a lot back home,” he says, “because the money they send to their families doesn’t only remain with them, but circulates within the Cameroonian economy.”
Despite this flow of money back into Cameroon, the migration of Cameroonians abroad has left the country with limited ideas and manpower, others say.
Innocent Fasse, a lecturer and language teacher at the University of Douala, says he regrets the country’s intellectual loss when students emigrate after completing higher education.
“We actually lose a lot,” he says during a phone interview, “because in order to develop our country, we need young people with strength and ideas. When they go out there, they remain there and they develop other countries.”
With plenty of work to be done to develop Cameroon, Fasse says he advises young people to stay because their work will have greater value at home than abroad.
“It’s in Africa that you have everything to do,” he says. “It’s in Africa that you’re able to leave your mark, doing things that can have an impact.”
Proving to young Cameroonians that they have reason to remain in their country may be one way to slow emigration, Fasse says.
“The only thing is to give those who are here clear signs,” he says, “facts that when they remain here, they would have something to do and would have an impact.”
Government officials say that encouraging entrepreneurship and increasing awareness of the job opportunities available in Cameroon top initiatives to prevent skilled youth from moving abroad.
Evélyne Nji is the divisional inspector of vocational training at the delegation of the Ministry of Employment and Vocational Training in Cameroon’s Littoral region. She says the government has developed programs and funds to invest in microprojects of young Cameroonian entrepreneurs.
The ministry offers loans to support the growth of existing projects with strong business plans, she says. The loans aim to grow these projects so the owners can provide opportunities for other Cameroonians.
“If you have a small restaurant,” Nji explains as an example, “the ministry can give you financial support to enlarge the size of the restaurant and maybe create something that can provide jobs for other Cameroonians.”
The loans range from 200,000 Central African francs ($400) to 3 million francs ($6,000). Recipients must pay the government back within a year at an interest rate of 6 percent.
Nji also encourages job seekers to register at the National Employment Fund, which also finances projects and provides complimentary training opportunities to Cameroonians. The government advertises these opportunities on radio and in print media, but Nji urges young job seekers to be proactive.
“There are many programs for the youths, but the youths themselves don’t know how to get them,” Nji says. “You need to know where to go to when looking for a job. If you don’t know the structures that can offer you those opportunities, then you cannot have a job.”
If more job seekers were aware of these programs, Nji says that some former emigrants may not have left.
“Everybody cannot have a job,” she says, “but I am very sure that many would have.”
The difficulties encountered in building a new life abroad may provide another reason for Cameroonians to reconsider emigration, Ateh and other expatriates say.
Asonganyi says she faced struggles when she arrived in the United States with her mother in 1997. They ended up in Ohio, a state in the Midwest region, where she says they had to cope with a lack of diversity.
“Life here’s not easy,” she says. “It’s very challenging. It’s very hard and probably one of the most challenging things you’d ever have to do in your life. And it will challenge you physically, emotionally, mentally.”
Victoria Faison is pursuing a doctorate in law at Humboldt University of Berlin. Before, she lived in the United States, where she attended Georgetown University.
“There are several challenges,” she says of living abroad, “which have resulted from cultural shock and adaptation problems that have led to frustration, as well as family breakups. A good job at home may be better than traveling abroad.”
After earning advanced degrees and launching his career as a doctor abroad, Njei proposes a different solution. He says that once Cameroonians gain the knowledge they need abroad, they should consider returning home.
“Let’s not think in the lines of, ‘What’s Cameroon done for me?’” he says. “Let’s think of what we’ve done for Cameroon. Let’s think about how to go back and change that place. Let’s think about how to invest in Cameroon.”
His dream is to return to Cameroon to train new physicians to improve Cameroon’s health care system.
“The most important thing I want to do in my life is to be able to make a difference in the lives of these people who never had the opportunity that I had,” Njei says.
Irene Zih Fon reported this article from the United States and Cameroon.
