By Franck Essi

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20 May 2025 in Yaoundé, capital of Cameroon. Once again, the images speak for themselves: tired old men, clearly unable to move without assistance, carried, pulled, supported like relics from another era. Yet they are the ones who symbolise power, who preside over ceremonies, who officially embody the state and the nation.

But what did we really witness? A tribute to experience? No. A live shipwreck. That of a system on its last legs, where political corpses remain standing only because a population of 30 million souls still supports them, sometimes with resignation, sometimes with fervour. And the burning question arises: what is keeping us collectively in this voluntary servitude?

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The tyranny of the weak: when power no longer rests on strength but on our weakness

It must be said: those who govern us today have no physical strength, no vision, no creative energy. Their only real power is our submission. They are not the ones who are strong. It is we who are weakened. And if the tyrant reigns, it is not because he is formidable – it is because we continue to fear him.

La Boétie wrote in the 16th century: ‘Resolve to serve no more, and you are free.’ But how can we stop serving when everything around us has taught us to bow down?

We were born in fear. Educated in obedience. Imprisoned in dependence. Corrupted in our conscience. And by bending our backs, we have forgotten that we have a spine.

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What makes us so docile?

Why do we continue to applaud those who steal our future?

Why do we sing about unity in a country torn apart?

Why do we accept that our fate depends on old men, some of whom no longer even know where they are?

Why aren’t there millions of us shouting ‘Enough!’?

Voluntary servitude cannot be decreed. It sets in slowly, insidiously. It rests on well-known pillars:

– Fear: fear of losing one’s job, one’s freedom, one’s life. Fear of speaking out. Fear of being the only one to say no.

– Habit: we have lived under oppression for so long that it seems normal to us.

– The comfort of submission: it is easier to wait for crumbs than to fight for a fair share.

– Division: while we fight among tribes, parties, generations or statuses, the system remains intact.

– Loss of faith in ourselves: we have been taught to believe that nothing will change, that we are too small, too disorganized, too divided.

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But this resignation is not inevitable.

Individually, we must:

✓ Refuse to lie in order to survive.

✓ Refuse to serve lies, even for comfort or convenience.

✓ Dare to say no to what humiliates us, infantilises us, impoverishes us.

✓ Re-learn to think for ourselves, to disobey with conscience, to dream with courage.

Collectively, we must:

✓ Forge bonds of solidarity beyond identity or partisan affiliations.

✓ Build networks of mutual aid, resistance and alternatives.

✓ Mobilize our intelligence, knowledge and resources to prepare for a new beginning.

✓ Organize the succession, the transmission, the break.

Because it is not enough to denounce the old men at the top: we must build the faces of the future. Women and men who are upright, clear-headed, honest, rooted and bold.

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My conviction: prison is in our heads

We are not dominated because they are powerful. We are dominated because, too often, we have internalised submission as normal.

South African activist Steve Biko said it in words that ring out like a sharp truth:

‘The oppressor’s power is in the minds of the oppressed.’

That is where the real struggle begins. Not against the old men, but against the invisible chains we carry within us.

Taking back power means first taking back our minds.

Franck Essi

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