Local Development and Civic Participation in Local and Indigenous Communities

The main aim of this project is to empower the Mbororos and the Baka Pygmies minorities in east Cameroon by making them aware of their rights and duties, and enabling them to take full advantage of their inherent capabilities.

Hope Foundation is striving to educate and train these groups on their rights by helping them manage their natural resources to get out of poverty. We also encourage them to get involved in developmental and income generating activities like other groups of Cameroonians.

Baka Pygmies, estimated at about 30,000 individuals, occupy the rainforest regions of east Cameroon where they survive off nature. Today they suffer alarming levels of poverty. Over the years, many of them have been made to leave their territory without compensation to make way for logging companies. They are often forced to settle on the edges of farming villages where they are exploited for labour. Mbororos are nomadic cattle breeders from northern Cameroon who have long been the targets of organised groups of bandits who steal their cattle. Livestock is the Mbororo’s main livelihood and a symbol of wealth in this part of Africa. Many trade their wives and children or even have them kidnapped for high ransoms. In addition, an estimated 25,000 refugee Mbororos from the Central African Republic are also living in an extremely precarious situation.

These two minority groups are often discriminated by the rest of Cameroonian society and denied rights to land, health services and education. This makes it impossible for them to develop and it is extremely rare for a Baka Pygmy or Mbororo to enter, let alone complete, primary education. This lack of formal education exacerbates the disadvantages faced by these communities, leaving them open to exploitation and exclusion.

This project aims to increase the community confidence of the Baka Pygmies and Mbororos through the education of its leaders and adolescents, so that they have the right skills and tools to shape their own futures and stand up for their rights.