Open letter to Cameroonian society: why discuss football while the nation is in turmoil?

Jean Rodrigue Atemengue challenges the national obsession with sports amidst serious governance failures.

The national team of Cameroon failed to secure a spot in the upcoming World Cup. Despite this absence from the global arena, the public sphere remains trapped in endless disputes over football, federation politics, and matches that our players will not even attend. Meanwhile, our country continues to struggle with deep and painful wounds.

Are our priorities misplaced?

There is a more concerning issue at hand. Football, long used as a primary tool to unify the nation and distract from other debates, is itself in a state of crisis. The very mechanism of this diversion has broken down.

Cameroonian football, once the pride of the continent and a symbol of national excellence, is now a shadow of what it used to be. Contested management, personal rivalries, repeated scandals, and a federation mired in controversy have replaced sporting achievement. With crumbling infrastructure and abandoned young talents, our failure to qualify for the World Cup is simply the logical conclusion of this decline.

While the game remains a legitimate passion for millions and Samuel Eto’o is rightly admired for his legendary career, football cannot be the curtain that hides the issues threatening our national future. This is especially true when our team is absent from the world’s biggest stage.

What should we really be discussing?

In a country where a government reshuffle has been anticipated for months without action, the public debate should not be monopolized by a ball. When the Parliament holds an extraordinary session to create a Vice-President position that remains vacant months later, the functioning of our institutions should be our primary concern.

In a nation where the Council of Ministers and the Higher Judicial Council have not met in years, we must question the state of institutional normality. When ministers resign only to be replaced by temporary figures for extended periods, and when high-ranking officials pass away without being replaced, our focus belongs elsewhere.

The state of the rule of law is equally troubling. When a judge’s arrest warrant is ignored by police orders, or when a provisional release order is publicly dismissed as a forgery, the very credibility of our justice system is at stake. These issues should mobilize citizens far more than any FIFA ranking.

Furthermore, the reality of daily life in Cameroon cannot be ignored. Dilapidated roads, unfinished public works projects, and the lack of basic water and electricity in many towns are urgent problems. With youth unemployment persisting and the high cost of living weighing on every household, football cannot reasonably be the main topic of conversation.

The cost of this distraction

Every time the public discourse focuses almost entirely on footballing drama, vital institutional, economic, and social questions are pushed to the background. This allows systemic difficulties to remain unaddressed while the visibility of real problems fades.

Intellectuals, journalists, and opinion leaders have a specific responsibility. Devoting the majority of public space to sports polemics while the country faces deep institutional uncertainty risks choosing noise over reflection and spectacle over substance.

It is not about giving up on football, but about establishing a hierarchy of priorities. Once our institutions are fully operational, our justice system inspires trust, our roads are safe, and our youth have jobs, we can talk about football as much as we like. But today, making it the central theme of national life is a dangerous distraction from our most pressing challenges.

The people of Cameroon deserve a public debate that matches the scale of their challenges. We deserve institutions that inspire confidence, a credible judiciary, and responsible governance that informs rather than distracts. History will honor those who had the courage to ask the right questions, rather than those who focused on a tournament we aren’t even playing in.