Leaping ever higher and higher summit-wise
And condescending never to aggressive urge but
Kneeling and nodding to the novelty value of
Bloodless builders of love as a bridge
Over age-old dissenting oceanic voices and
Miraculously melting menacing mountains.

Although fast eroding and giving way to Christianity, the traditional people of LakBom acknowledge the existence of a creator God or Supreme Being (Tar Nwi), ancestors who are believed to protect their living descendants, and a few other deities and spirits whose will is revealed through divination and oracles.

The people of LakBom live chiefly in Yamba Clan, Donga Mantung County of Southern Cameroons, and speak Yamba, the language of one of the three tribes of Nwa Local Government. Grouped into seven main quarters – Chichor, Machor, Kukan, Makwak, Massing, Mandak, and Gor

In LakBom, there is a strong attachment to the living, the dead, and the unborn, who are said to form part of the gamut of the population. The dead are seen as enshrined ancestors because they lived their lives well and died in a socially acceptable manner. In other words, they died naturally and were given proper burial rites according to the norms of the village. They are now believed to live in the spirit world where, on a daily basis, they mirror the world of the living, who must honor and pay tribute to them by way of regular sacrifices.

The Bom people are said to have originated from Tikari some 450 years ago. It is reported that when they left a place called Kimi in Tikari land, they settled briefly in the present Nwa Village before continuing their search for a more convenient environment, which they found in the current Bom Village. Here, they were attracted by palm trees and the fertile land, which they were already used to in Kimi. When the Bom people finally left their transit place in Nwa, the market which they had set up remained known as Tan Bom (Bom Market) up to today…Read more