The information that announced the passing onto eternity of Akamentso Ndhey Tening Mongwa gave me rare stupour, rare moment of unconscious steel shock. It is not really easy to quickly come to terms with such information that announces the abrupt death of someone you've spent many memorable years together, become close like brothers of the same family. Two of our common friends, classmates from CPC, Bali, who are now resident in Yaounde, broke the news, called me independently early in the morming to announce the bad news. It was more shocking, because for the past 2 years, 2 of us have lived in silence, as we didn't meet physically, as we always did in the previous years.
His death shocked me the more because we independently had nurtured plans to leave footprints on the growth of our village. He has succeeded very well, as a son of Pinyin, as his latest footprint is the translation of the Bible into Pinyin for Pinyin Christians. Down memory lane, I can remember him for lots of contributions he has made for our village. For instance at the creation of the PDO in 1978, he wrote the speech for the first President, and S. A Awa drew up the program of the day, and of course, as chairman, I drafted the constitution. I can say confidently that, knowing the modest man that Tening was, he is leaving the scene with a sense of fulfillment.
Memories of our being together for so many years are also fresh, and I cannot easily jump over the many periods we spent together as classmates at CPC Bali, our one-year together as teachers in Mission Schools in Bali, our long years in Yaounde as civil servants, and above all our memorable one weekend in Ottawa, CANADA, when as student of Linguistics at Yale University, in the US, I organized a welcome evening party in his honour. This is to say that Akamentso Tening Mongwa and I were close friends for over 50 years.
His departure to eternity is therefore a great personal loss. Whatever title, official or traditional that we each held, we always addressed ourselves by our birth names. But since death is intractably eminent, my duty today is to pray that our God should grant him space in the heavenly kingdom. Adieu Tening!