Cameroon Needs Entrepreneurs Not Job Seekers- Dr. Fonche C. Abong
By Peter Tasi
The director of FONAB Polytechnic Bamenda, North West region,Dr Fonche Cosmas Abong has said, what Cameroon needs is entrepreneurs who can create jobs and not job seekers.
Dr Abong made the observation Saturday January 9. This was during the graduation of some 79 students that constituted the schools trainees for the 2019/ 2020 school year.
He boasted that in line with his thought, FONAB Polytechnic has stood the test of time in graduating entrepreneurs who do not depend on job seeking as education remains the backbone of every growing society’s economy.
During the graduation ceremony which was however a dual occasion, the school also matriculated 250 freshmen and women for the current school year.
In his key note address to the matriculating students, Dr Abong appealed for hard work and underscored the need for students to be ambitious.
He charged the students to be positive and realistic taking into consideration what the society needs. The director said, the institution is there to guide and orientate the students on the right path citing that it does not mean simply getting their certificates when they graduate but helping them in FONAB Polytechnic to succeed wisely.
To the 24th batch of graduates, Dr Abong prescribed the values of creativity and innovation considering that they had gone through constraints imposed by the coronavirus and the Anglophone crisis.
These, perturbed studies thereby leading to online teaching which had their lecturers adapting to the drastic changes to master online teaching and ensuring the proper follow-up of students during and after the impasse.
“First of all, I believe it is that necessary to make sure that during difficult moments we should do our utmost best for students to have their best in terms of academics. With the coming of COVID-19, we actually decided to use various media channels be it WhatApp groups, Google zoom to start up with that which we did and subsequently our ICT department developed a software which we have been using until now which has helped us a lot where we could pass on videos and even notes.
“In another form, students generally have tried their best to be participative because we ensured proper follow up since in academia these days to be candid that if you give online notes to students, all of them may not participate in it. As an entrepreneur, I know of the difficulties that young people are facing in the society of today in terms of getting jobs but what we have done to this 24th batch is that most of them should be entrepreneurs,” Dr Abong noted.
He further said: “When someone studies a professional, be professional so they are professionals especially in engineering, they would be able to be self-employed. Those who are in the business sectors, I believe they will excel well because we have trained them in all the required programs and software’s so that they can use in the society and be competitive over others in the same field,” FONAB Polytechnic director said.
The overall best graduating student of FONAB Polytechnic with a GPA of 3.96Tizi Stella said: “it wasn’t really easy to finish work get to school and get back home and carry out with family activities. Besides the main challenges, were the times in which we are living in and the COVID-19 that kept us home and could not really study. It wasn’t all that easy even though we had online classes which were not as effective as when we were in class with a teacher and asking direct questions. I want to say it was thanks to the grace of God and also hard work,” Tizi said.
Background of FONAB Polytechnic
FONAB Educational establishments as a whole was created in 1979 in Yaounde by Professor Fonche Peter, who, while being a lecturer at the University of Yaounde, started FONAB as the production of oil, soap and Omo.
In 1983, Professor Fonche was in Bamenda and created the FONAB soap enterprise in Bamenda. In 1989, Professor Fonche created the FONAB high school Big-babanki. In 1993, he created FONAB high school Bamenda and in 1996, he created FONAB Polytechnic which it is still a professional institution since it trains people ready for the job market.
FONAB Polytechnic is an institution of higher learning authorized to function by the Ministry of Higher Education and is affiliated to the University of Bamenda and other Universities.
Why people choose Fonab Polytechnic
The institution has five schools; the school of health sciences, school of business studies, school of education, school of engineering and the school of home economics.
Adding to its schools in operation, the institution prides itself for graduating entrepreneurs rather than job seekers to the job market.
FONAB Polytechnic for its 24th batch of graduating students, has so far sent out more than 10 thousand students are excelling in their chosen fields.