Ahmadou Ahidjo

Ahmadou Ahidjo was born on the twenty-fourth of August 1924 in Garoua, a river port on the Benue in the north of what was then French Cameroon. The son of a Fulani village chief, he was raised a Muslim, learning first in a Quranic school before entering the local government primary school. He completed his studies at the École Primaire Supérieure in Yaoundé, the training ground for the territory's aspiring civil servants.

In 1942 he joined the colonial civil service as a radio operator with the postal administration, a modest post that carried him across the country and opened his eyes to its peoples. He entered territorial politics in the years after the war, rising through the Assembly of the French Union, and in 1958, at only thirty-four, became prime minister of the autonomous territory.

When French Cameroon gained independence in 1960, Ahidjo became its first president. His signal achievement came the following year: working patiently with the Anglophone leader John Ngu Foncha, he joined the southern portion of the former British Cameroons to the French-speaking republic, forming on the first of October 1961 the Federal Republic of Cameroon — one of Africa's rare enduring reunifications.

He governed for twenty-two years, consolidating a single-party state and, in 1972, a unitary republic. In November 1982 he stepped down of his own accord, handing power to his prime minister, Paul Biya — a peaceful surrender of office uncommon in his era. He died in exile in Dakar on the thirtieth of November 1989. May the builder of a nation's unity be remembered with honor.