PETER NDUMBE

I do not know how to categorise you, mentor?, brother?, father?, colleague?, or Good Samaritan? Application file not seen at the secretariat, HOD permanently absent from work to hold departmental meetings – a prerequisite for advancement of recruitment documents. New HOD arrived but unable to control colleagues, and other underground forces fighting to make sure I was not taken on board. You stood your grounds and despite the blockade at the apex of the Institution, it went through following a protest letter you endorsed. Also thanks to the sane Minister of that era. You put in all your efforts for someone you never knew. You were simply doing your celestial job in a murky terrestrial environment. Unknown to you and me, events were still to come to amalgamate us. In 2006, you were moved to a place some considered a barren land and a purgatory for you. It was barren compared to where you were coming from but you turned it to an arable land. In 2009, I was brought in to work again with you. You transformed the establishment to the envy of many. As human beings, your actions appeased and hurt. Your busy schedule could not allow you settle down to comprehend the gymnastics of your environment. You trusted many but not all trusted your intentions. Taking up your last job was the last resort since your vision for the establishment was not shared by those you thought were visionaries. Following your temporary withdrawal due to health reason, I pleaded for your return because of the problems we were facing in 2011 and you acquiesce to looking into it. But, health problems could not allow you reconsider. You expressed your love for this country. Like Jesus, His people were ignorant and prosecuted him. You fought forcefully those who fought you and to many you were a fighter and a HERO. You have gone for a journey which seems long but the trails you left behind will remain forever. Let me end by saying “You came from an UNKNOWN origin, transited through an UNKNOWN territory, now you have gone to a KNOWN destination” Farewell as one day we shall join you.

Dear Prof Peter Martin Ndumbe,

The news of your passing away was unbelievable. It is only when I saw this website that the truth sank in. My last phone conversation with you when I learned  you were unwell, was very encouraging as you did assured me that all was  well and you were recovering. 

 It was in November 1997 at the Lobby of Hotel Ivoire Intercontinental, Cote d’Ivoire, just before the official opening of the International Conference on AIDS and STIs in Africa (ICASA) that I was introduced to you. You were so happy to meet a young Cameroonian who just completed his doctorate degree program and had an abstract accepted for presentation at this conference. My introducer also whispered to me that if I intend to return to Cameroon, then you are one of the persons I should talk to. When I returned to Cameroon in 1998, I immediately requested to meet with you. I came to your Camdiagnostix   office located within the then Ministry of Scientific Research.   After introducing myself  including my academic background and my request  to be   recruited to work at Camdiagnostix, you  immediately advised that  there is  an urgent need for qualified people like me  to teach at the Faculty of Medicine. You encouraged me   to apply for a teaching position at the Faculty of Medicine instead of a job at Camdiagnitix.  Shortly after this encounter, you were appointed Dean of the Faculty of Medicine; just about the same time that I deposited my application for recruitment.  In fact I was among the first set of lecturers that you recruited as the Dean of Faculty.

This was a turning point in my life as I had the opportunity to benefit from your mentorship. You had all the confidence in me and within my very first year as an Assistant Lecturer, you appointed me as the Coordinator of the third year medical program. This was a very demanding task, but you constantly called me into your office to guide me on how to get the job done.  One thing that you cautioned me about and that has stayed with me till today is that I should always be positive and optimistic in my approach to solving every problem that I encounter in life.  In addition to the coordinator’s job, you again appointed me to head the Scientists for Health and Research for Development (SHARED) project. This was a GTZ sponsored project to the Faculty of Medicine meant to set up an electronic system to collect data or research publications from scientific works carried out by lecturers and researchers across the country. This gave me the opportunity to improve my knowledge and skills in scientific research as part of my job was to collect scientific publications, summarize and circulate key findings to other colleagues and students who needed this information for their research and publications.

 A real moment came when you co-opted me to join a team of core faculty colleagues who assisted you in the organization and management of the famous entrance examination into the Faculty of Medicine. Prof you put sanity into the entrance examination into this faculty through transparency and merit in the conduct of the entrance examination.   This was the period when young brilliant Cameroonians who had no godfathers or connections could fulfill their dreams of becoming medical doctors. Prof when you were appointed dean of the Faculty of Medicine in Buea, I thought this was the end of my continues growth under your armpit. This was proven wrong when you immediately recommended and I was appointed Head of the Department of Medical Laboratory Sciences of the Faculty of Medicine University of Buea to work closely with him; a position I never held because I left the country just about the same time that this happened.

Beyond this, you and I have remained very close at both scientific and personal levels. Our very last physical encounter was at the World AIDS Vaccine Conference in Cape Town, South Africa, in October 2008. Your usual words of encouragement to me at this conference remained appreciated. 

Prof Ndumbe, as Graciano the Philosopher said, ‘The World is a stage where everyone plays a part’. You played your part very positively in this world. The Lord felt it was time for you to leave the stage. Thank you for all that you did to us. As a mentor, you touched the hearts and opened the path for young scientists to grow.

May your soul rest in peace.  

Dr George A. Alemnji, Ph.D., MPH.
Associate Director for Science & Laboratory Advisor
Global AIDS Program, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Caribbean Regional Office,   Bridgetown, Barbados, West Indies

Email: ikv3@cdc.gov

Peter, the Shooting Star

Now that we speak in tones past

A Star you were,

But a Star you are

And in memory, indelible will remain.

You shot for the stars, your likes,

Impacting people of all life’s stations,

Socially, academically, illuminating

Like a star, on the path of Excellence.

For us you are a Special Star.

Gone too soon, at the blink of an eye,

A flash of lightning in the dark of night.

Fare thee well,

Mr. SHOOTING STAR.

Isaac and Patty Musonge

Bokova , Buea

Where do I start? You would have been my lifeline in such a situation, but where are you this time?

I remember when in 1999, you had just been made Dean of the Faculty of medicine in Yaounde. One of the earlier challenges you had to tackle was the community health postings.  No one knew what would happen until the day you called a meeting with students. We would never forget what ensued: the era of “good news” as we fondly came to call it. Never had we been more excited about community health postings. I for one got the chance within a three-year period to practice community health in places as diverse as Kumba, Ekondo Titi, Bokova, Fontem and even Baka pygmy villages in the East; an experience that strongly shaped my interest in public health.

Prof, to work with you, was to quickly discover the virtues of rigor and attention to detail that bordered on obsession. Think about the rigor in research. With you nothing was left to chance. And of course I got to learn this sometimes the hard way. You made sure we spent time in the lab learning rather than being tourists. I will not forget in October 2001, after I had spent my whole summer implementing my thesis research in Kumba, I was happy to present to you my first draft of the thesis, only for you to look through and retort “Julius, you are going back to Kumba”. Flabbergasted, I asked “Why Prof, what have I done wrong?” because, knowing you, I had made sure that the work, at least in its reporting, was outstanding. “Nothing wrong, Julius, this is research – you need to confirm your findings and by the way thesis are not due until January [2002].” So off to Kumba I went for another two months of field work – an effort that paid as this led to excellent results in my final year assessments.

Paralleled with your rigor, were the great expectations you had for your students. Expectations that were so high that we often and still fear to disappoint you. Just as you expected sacrifice and promptitude in work, so did you ensure that the work was compensated. And not any type of compensation – compensation that was commensurate with the work done.

One form of compensation you cherished and valued the most was publications and writing in general.  The greatest smiles we could ever elicit in you was when we had succeeded to get one of our papers published by a reputable journal. This has always amazed me, as I thought to myself - here is an accomplished professor and renowned scientist, who has nothing to prove and yet is pushing us to write, write and write.  I later on understood that for you, it was not a matter of just publishing for the sake of publishing – you were a strong believer in the fact that the health of the populations could only be improved through research – publishing was a way of making available the evidence that would be used to improve health.

Talk about the compassion. In 2006, my father was ailing with prostate cancer and needed to be transported regularly from Bamenda to Yaounde for therapy. Knowing you were quite busy I hesitated to ask for your help. I still don’t know how you figured it out, but being the keen observer you noticed my distress and offered transportation for my father, a move that greatly alleviated his pain.   When I returned to Buea after schooling abroad, you took upon yourself to look for lodging in Buea, checking from house-to-house yourself just to make sure the quality was acceptable– in fact I still live were you had selected,  a reflection of your knack for quality.

And on and on I could go.

Prof, in our last discussions you again insisted on the need to pursue the research activities we had begun. In particular, I cannot count the number of times you pushed us to make sure work such as those of our recent graduates and the work on non-communicable diseases in Fako was written. Rest assured that is exactly what we will do.

Prof, let me end with these thoughts:

Some will say you passed away,

I will say you are here today.

For how can you who gave so much,

Ever think of being taken as such.

Your mentorship was flawless,

Rest assured your legacy is limitless.

Rest In Peace

Julius Atashili

May I put down my hat and then raise it for a fallen colleague whom I have never met. After going through through the slideshow and seeing his family, friends and students and the broad smiles on his face and having  read many of his articles when I was doing my dissertation during my MPH course, I knew he is a great health scholar born fortunately in my country. I went back to my personal collection of sayings which I hope to publish someday, I am sharing with you the sayings of some great men which I think match his life. 

1.  “The best preparation for tomorrow is doing your best today”

. Jackson Brown, Jr. He has done his best and I think the smile on his bereaved family members would be like his for all the legacy he has left for the global health  family, includng Cameroon his beloeved country.

2.       "You may not be a Picasso or Mozart but you don't have to be. Just create to create. Create to remind yourself you're still alive. Make stuff to inspire others to make something too. Create to learn a bit more about yourself."- Frederick Terral
His created works will live forever for to see and remember him always

3.       "The best way to measure how much you've grown isn't by inches or the number of laps you can now run around the track, or even your grade point average -- though those things are important, to be sure. It's what you've done with your time, how you've chosen to spend your days, and whom you've touched this year. That, to me, is the greatest measure of success."  R.J. Palacio
He has spent the days of his career and family life in a very touching manner

4.       Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle." Steve Jobs. He never settle until he finished all he wished to d for the family and profession, even if he could still have done more

"Life has got a habit of not standing hitched. You got to ride it like you find it. You got to change with it. If a day goes by that don't change some of your old notions for new ones, that is just about like trying to milk a dead cow." Woody Guthrie . He has milked life cows very well and his milk will remain forever

5.     "Life is too short. Grudges are a waste of perfect happiness. Laugh when you can, apologize when you should and let go of what you can't change. Love deeply and forgive quickly. Take chances. Give everything and have no regrets. Life is too short to be unhappy. You have to take the good with the bad. Smile when you're sad, love what you got, and always remember what you had. Always forgive, but never forget. Learn from your mistakes but never regret. People change and things go wrong but always remember... life goes on!" Author unknown. His years were well spent it is time for a change to happen in his life, for him to go to a higer life, I remember, someone said 'THERE IS LIFE AFTER LIFE'

6. "Opportunity does not knock, it presents itself when you beat down the door. “Kyle Chandler
He broke so many doors and entered there to leave his foot prints on the sands of time

7.  "Never stop investing. Never stop improving. Never stop doing  something new. Make it your goal to be better each and every  day, in some small way. Remember the Japanese concept of Kaizen. Small daily improvements eventually result in huge advantages." Bob Parsons. I guess we shall continue to reap from his huge academic, family and social investments.

8.  "Learn the art of patience. Apply discipline to your thoughts when they become anxious over the outcome of a goal. Impatience breeds anxiety, fear, discouragement and failure. Patience creates confidence, decisiveness, and a rational outlook, which eventually leads to success." Brian Adams
This man was as I can see from his works published on this website, a self-disciplined hard worker who has given a world outlook on Cameroon.

9. "Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago." Warren Buffett.
He has created many shade trees for us to sit under, including in his beautiful compound as I saw in the slideshow
As the accompanying funeral tunes, 'we see our departed love ones again, I believe that we will continue to see him any time we sit under any of those ornamental or academic treee he planted

'10. "I have seen what a laugh can do. It can transform almost unbearable tears into something bearable, even hopeful." Bob Hope

I saw in the slideshow that his laugh is very infectious, for the hard to smile or laugh, may they be inspired by this.

11. "Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail."  Ralph Waldo Emerson

I believe we are seeing and walking in the trails he has left behing.

For the bereaved family members, accept my deepest, sincerest condolences on this immeasurable, we can only say, it was well for him to go to the Lord.