AIDA Nederland

Simon Mol

Simon Moleke Njie

Occupation: Writer, Journalist
Country of Origin: Cameroon
Country of Exile: Ghana, Poland

Simon Moleke Nije, pen name Simon Mol, fled Cameroon in 1995 due to a publication of one of his articles, which denounced a corruption scandal in his country. Initially seeking asylum in Ghana, where he was granted refugee status in 1998, Mol had to flee again after breaking a publication ban imposed on him in the country of asylum.

Prior to his flight from Cameroon Mol had been arrested at the airport upon coming back from a trip abroad and detained for two weeks. Accused of working for the Anglophone minority, Mol was barred from publishing in Cameroon. The south west English speaking region of British Cameroon joined a two-state Federal system, the Federal Republic of Cameroon in 1961. In May 1972 the separate institutions were abolished by a national referendum and, under a one-party system, the country was renamed United Republic of Cameroon. Since the 1980's Southern Cameroonian nationalism grew stronger and liberation groups began to form.

Government crackdown against these groups continues to this day, their main leader, Justice Alobwede Ebong is being held in detention since December 1999. Despite government restrictions Mol did publish an article alleging a government corruption scandal and was at this point in danger and forced to flee. In Ghana Mol resumed his career as a journalist working for an independent weekly and took courses to specialize in his field. In Cameroon he had interrupted his two year university degree in Media Studies due to the country's national education crisis. The Common Wealth Press Union and the Ghana Journalist Association assisted him upon his arrival. Threats of criminal charges were to be brought against him if he were to resume publishing, which he continued to do to earn a living. He was helped by human rights activists to secure false travelling documents so as to go to a place where he could resume writing. He was however arrested at the airport and detained for six weeks. After his release the Ghanaian Centre of International P.E.N. played a decisive role by appointing him as the official delegate for the 1999 Congress of International P.E.N. held in Poland. He applied for refugee status in Poland.

" As often as possible, I maintain a psychic tie with my culture, which forms a good dimension of my objective identity…it is a vital source of inspiration. As a writer I relentlessly promote my cultural heritage through my prose", Mol says. In Cameroon's Tower of Babel a literary piece currently being employed by the Warsaw University Department of Oriental Studies, Mol recounts the anthropological and social framework of a society living in a country that uses almost 300 languages for a population of just 13 million inhabitants.

Currently Mol continues to write poems and prose, which are regularly published in the Indian monthly anthology Poet International and other Indian, British and American reviews. He is also writing a book in diary form of which the following, From Warsaw to Room 134-Denbak, is an extract. He was appointed Honorary Member of the English Centre for International Pen.(1)

(1) Nicoletta Fagiolo, UNHCR, Geneva, 2000.