For over two years now, western media and human rights organizations have alluded without convincing evidence that the continuous hosting of entertainment and sporting events in Saudi Arabia is an attempt by the Kingdom to “sportswash” its negative human rights reputation.

While these unproven allegations are being made in the West about the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, a man in Buea, Cameroon, with a questionable character, has been engaged full-throttle in “imagewash“.

This man is Rev Fonki Samuel Forba, the moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon who has been burning through money like wild fire.

Rev Fonki has been the moderator of the PCC since 2014 and has just over a year left in his official tenure, and his job description designates him as the spiritual leader of the institution he presides over.

The consensus among PCC Christians is that he has wrecked the church by robbing the institution’s finances with no limits and possesses no fear of God.

He has been accused by those close to him of possessing no iota of spirituality, and he has appointed, without justification, his henchmen to positions they are ill-equipped for.

Cameroon is a country not renowned for keeping statistics on anything. Still, a recent survey of PCC members in the Northwest and Southwest regions of the country returned that the moderator has an approval rating of 9.3%. Even in Akwaya, where he says he comes from, his approval rating was 16.9%.

With such dismal approval ratings, Rev Fonki is working hard to restore respectability to his battered image before he exits the stage next year.

A recent video which went viral on social media with Rev Fonki dancing and spraying cash around like a Nigerian scammer in a Lagos nightclub did not help him.

So, last week, the ‘chief scammer of Buea’ arranged with some like-minded crooks in a mushroom institution which has distinguished itself for shady academic quality to confer on him an honorary PhD.

The Protestant University of Central Africa in Yaoundé is one of Cameroon’s many institutions of higher learning, with lecturers and administrators who know little about academics, honesty, spirituality and humility.

This institution has never had a credible reputation, and it surprises no one with brains that they followed Rev Fonki’s wish to grant him his questionable degree.

The Reverend brought a few clowns to the sham ceremony dressed in Manyu traditional regalia claiming to be notables from Akwaya—a sad joke of a spectacle.

Watching a short clip of the charade unfold on Facebook invokes rage and many other strong emotions.

Apologists for Rev Fonki are now forwarding the video of the shameful commemoration stating that he is now an academic and honorary doctor.

No amount of “imagewash” by a man with no integrity and academic standing will change the facts.

In biblical days, Rev Fonki would have been sentenced by the highest court of the land to death by stoning and would have earned it for his contribution to wrecking the PCC, using exaggerated thievery as a weapon.

Today, people are required to address him as Rev Dr Fonki Samuel Forba. The world has changed for the worse. The “imagewash” Gospel, according to Rev Fonki, is here.Hallelujah!!

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai