By Ndode N. Nkumbe
Madam Minister,
I write with profound disappointment and a deep sense of concern over what the reported 150,000 CFA francs awarded to the national FENASCO champion says about our collective commitment to school sports and the young people who represent our nation. My concern is heightened by the fact that the winning school is a small rural institution in Muebah-Nninong, Bangem Subdivision, with fewer than 150 students, whose achievement reflects extraordinary talent, discipline and perseverance despite limited resources. At a time when Cameroon urgently needs institutions capable of inspiring national pride, unity and confidence among its youth, such recognition appears profoundly inadequate. This is not merely a question of money; it is a question of value, dignity, priorities and the message we send to the next generation of Cameroonian athletes.
When a tiny rural school conquers the nation, the state should not respond with a token. There are moments when a number becomes more than a number. One hundred and fifty thousand CFA francs is one of them. According to information surrounding the 2026 national FENASCO competition, that is the trophy money reportedly allocated to the winning school. One hundred and fifty thousand francs for a national champion!
Stop for a moment and consider what that means.
A school from a remote rural community in Bangem Subdivision, with fewer than 150 students, has managed to produce young athletes capable of competing against schools with far greater access to facilities, equipment, transport, coaching and financial resources. These children travelled, trained, competed and persevered through successive stages of a national competition until they reached the final in Bafoussam.
And the reward? 150,000 CFA francs. This is not simply an inadequate prize. It is a question about priorities. It is a question about what the Republic thinks the achievement of its children is worth. And it is a question that the Ministry of Secondary Education should answer.
Let us put the money into perspective.
The Ministry of Secondary Education cannot plausibly claim that the 2026 FENASCO finals were a small, improvised school activity. The ministry’s own website records that preparations for the 2026 FENASCO League A finals involved the Federal Council examining the federation’s 2026 budget and preparing for games to be hosted in Bafoussam and Bangangté. The finals subsequently brought together young athletes from all ten regions of Cameroon for a week of competition.
And the public expenditure records tell an even more striking story. The Public Contracts Regulatory Agency records a 121,408,425 CFA-franc contract for the transportation of athletes, coaches and officials during the 2026 FENASCO finals in Bafoussam and Bangangté. Another public contract records 42,457,055 CFA francs for catering to athletes, coaches and officials during the games. That is more than 163 million CFA francs in just those two documented expenditure lines.
And yet the national champion is reportedly handed 150,000 CFA francs. There is something profoundly wrong with that picture.
To be clear, nobody is suggesting that athletes should not be transported or fed. They must be. Officials performing legitimate duties must also be properly supported.
The question is different: How can a national school sports system mobilize hundreds of millions of CFA francs around an event and then appear to place so little financial value on the young people who emerge as champions?
That is not an unreasonable question. It is a question of public policy. It is a question of institutional priorities. And it deserves an answer from MINESEC.
The children from Muebah-Nninong-Bangem are not asking for charity. The circumstances of the winning school make the issue even more disturbing. This is not a giant urban institution with thousands of students, wealthy parents, powerful alumni, private sponsors and easy access to sporting facilities. We are talking about a school in a remote village in Muebah-Nninong, Bangem Subdivision with fewer than 150 students.
That matters.
A school of that size does not have an unlimited pool of resources from which to finance transport, training, meals, equipment, accommodation and the countless incidental costs associated with taking young people through a national competition. Someone had to make sacrifices. Teachers had to put in the work. Parents and community members undoubtedly had to find ways to support the team. The students themselves had to endure the discipline and pressure of competition.
And somehow, from that small rural school, came a national champion. That is not a story of poverty. It is a story of talent overcoming structural disadvantage. It is precisely the kind of story that a government committed to education and youth development should celebrate. A national championship by a small rural school should be an advertisement for the potential hidden in Cameroon’s villages.
It should make policymakers ask: How many more talented children are sitting in rural schools waiting for someone to discover them? Instead, we appear to have arrived at a situation where the message is almost the opposite:
You can overcome the odds. You can travel across the country. You can compete at a national level. You can bring glory to your school and community. You can become a national champion. And the state will give you 150,000 francs.
That is a miserable message to send to a generation. What exactly are we rewarding?
There is a dangerous tendency in public administration to measure everything in terms of ceremonies. There is a podium. There are speeches. There are photographs. There are dignitaries. There are television cameras. There are official statements about patriotism, discipline, fair play and national integration. And then the athletes go home.
But the children do not live inside the ceremony. They live with the consequences of whether their talent is actually valued.
The Ministry of Secondary Education itself presents FENASCO as much more than a sporting contest. The 2026 edition was framed around inclusion, and officials publicly emphasized fair play, discipline, patriotism, living together and national cohesion.
Excellent.
But if those values matter, they must exist beyond speeches. Recognition is itself a form of investment. A meaningful prize tells a young athlete, “Your effort matters.” A school development grant tells a rural community: your children matter. Sports equipment tells the next generation: continue training. A scholarship tells an outstanding student, “Your talent can take you somewhere.” A proper development programme tells an entire community: we see you.
What does 150,000 CFA francs say?
Sport may be one of the last great pieces of social glue. Cameroon is not short of divisions. We have political divisions. We have regional grievances. We have linguistic tensions. We have economic inequality. We have insecurity. We have a population increasingly frustrated by the distance between public institutions and ordinary citizens.
And yet, put a Cameroonian athlete on a football pitch, a volleyball court, an athletics track or a handball court, and something remarkable can happen. The child from a village can compete with the child from the city. The child from the East can compete against the child from the West. The South can meet the North. The Littoral can meet the Northwest.
For a few precious hours, the argument is not about politics. It is about performance. Who ran faster? Who jumped higher? Who scored? Who defended? Who won? That is why school sport deserves much more serious treatment than it receives. Sport is not merely recreation. In Cameroon, sport is social glue.
The 2026 FENASCO finals brought together young athletes from the country’s ten regions. The official narrative around the games themselves emphasized unity and confidence-building among young people. Then why would we starve the very institution that can help create that unity?
MINESEC needs to look beyond the trophy. The problem is not merely that the prize is small. The deeper problem is that the prize exposes a poverty of ambition. What should happen when a small rural school wins a national championship? The answer should not be limited to a cheque. Give the school sporting equipment. Upgrade its playing field. Provide coaching support. Give outstanding players scholarships or educational assistance. Create a pathway for exceptional athletes to be identified and followed. Provide a development grant that allows the school to continue building its sporting programme.
Imagine what that would do. A national championship would not end when the medals are handed out. It would become the beginning of something. The next generation of children would walk onto that field and see evidence that their predecessors achieved something extraordinary. The village would have a sporting legacy. The school would have an institutional legacy. The Ministry would have converted a moment of victory into a long-term investment in human capital. That is how a serious country builds sports. Not merely by organising competitions. By building institutions around talent.
And what about the officials?
There is another uncomfortable question. When a national school sports competition is held, officials travel. Meetings take place. Accommodation is arranged. Transport is provided. Meals are organized. Administrative machinery moves.
That is normal. Nobody should object to legitimate expenditure required to run a national event properly. But public expenditure must always be judged against public value. If hundreds of millions of CFA francs can be mobilized for transport and catering connected with the event, the government should have no difficulty explaining why the champion’s prize is only 150,000 CFA francs. And if an official’s legitimate out-of-station allowance for travelling from Yaoundé to Bafoussam exceeds the amount given to the national champion, then somebody should be brave enough to ask whether our priorities have become inverted. The people who came to watch the champions should not be valued more highly than the champions themselves.
That is the uncomfortable principle at stake. This is bigger than FENASCO. Cameroon has spent years talking about youth as “the future.” The phrase has become almost ceremonial. Young people are the future. Youth are the leaders of tomorrow. Education is the foundation of development. Sport builds discipline. Sport promotes national unity. All of these statements are true.
But eventually, a country must stop telling its young people what they represent and start showing them what they mean. A 150,000 CFA national championship prize does not look like a serious investment in the future. It looks like an afterthought. And that is particularly troubling in an environment where public confidence in institutions is already fragile.
Cameroon’s anti-corruption authorities continue to document allegations and investigations involving misuse of public resources and abuses of office across the administration. The FENASCO prize itself is not evidence of corruption. That distinction must be maintained. But citizens are entitled to ask questions when they see a pattern in which administrative expenditure can reach substantial sums while direct recognition of young citizens’ achievement remains remarkably modest. Governance is not only about whether money is spent legally. It is also about whether public money reflects sensible priorities.
The Ministry should not be offended by this criticism. MINESEC should welcome this debate. If the ministry believes 150,000 CFA francs is an appropriate reward, it should explain why. If the amount is only one component of a larger prize package, the ministry should tell the public exactly what the package contains. If the prize structure is determined by FENASCO regulations, those regulations should be made readily available. If the amount is constrained by the available budget, then let the public debate the budget. And if the ministry recognizes that the prize is inadequate, then change it. That is what responsible administration looks like.
The answer cannot simply be another speech about patriotism. The children have already demonstrated patriotism. They travelled. They competed. They represented their school. They represented their community. They represented Cameroon. Now Cameroon must demonstrate that it values them.
Give rural champions something that lasts. There is a particularly compelling reason to rethink the entire prize structure. A national champion from a wealthy urban school may return to an environment that already has a functioning sports programme. A national champion from a tiny rural school may return to a football pitch that needs improvement, equipment that is inadequate and a school that has almost no resources. That is where government intervention can transform a victory into development.
Why not establish a National FENASCO Champions Development Grant? Why not give winning schools a package consisting of equipment, coaching support, infrastructure assistance and educational opportunities? Why not create a national talent identification programme linked to FENASCO? Why not make the national championship a genuine gateway into the country’s sporting future?
The cost would be insignificant compared with the potential return. One child discovered at a school competition can eventually become a national athlete. One school transformed by investment can produce generations of young people. One successful rural sports programme can give an entire community something to believe in.
The 150,000 CFA question.
The Ministry of Secondary Education should not dismiss this criticism as noise. The 150,000 CFA question is bigger than 150,000 CFA. It asks what kind of country Cameroon wants to be. A country that spends money organizing ceremonies but gives little thought to what happens after the applause? Or a country that uses every national event to identify talent, reward excellence and build institutions? A country where young people are repeatedly told that they are the future? Or a country prepared to invest in that future?
The students from that small school in Muebah Nninong-Bangem have already done their part. They have shown that excellence does not belong exclusively to the big cities. They have shown that a school with fewer than 150 students can produce national champions. They have shown that talent can emerge from places the national spotlight rarely reaches.
The Ministry now has an opportunity to show that it understands the significance of what those children have achieved. Increase the prize. Invest in the school. Support the athletes. Build the facilities. Create pathways for the talent. And, above all, stop treating school sport as an ornamental item on the education calendar. Because when a small rural school defeats the odds and becomes a national champion, the victory belongs to more than the school. It belongs to Bangem. It belongs to the Southwest. It belongs to Cameroon. And it deserves more than 150,000 CFA francs.
If Cameroon wants its young people to believe in excellence, excellence must first be shown by Cameroon believing in it.