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Mr. Kome Nelson Ebong (President of KMUB)
KMUB – Kupe Muanenguba Union Belgium – 43 members
Sonja: Can you present yourself Nelson ?
Nelson: My name is Kome Nelson, president of KMUB,resident in Ghent. I am from the South West province of Cameroon and I am 42 years old. I live in Belgium since 2001, married here and I am father of 2 siblings.
Sonja: Why did you decide to come to Belgium ?
Nelson: I came to Belgium because of political problems in my country . Upon arrival, I was made to settle in Ghent where I have lived since then.
Sonja: How came the idea to set up KMUB ?
Nelson: The idea of an association was born out of the acknowledgement that we were missing the sort of community life we were used to back home and strangely enough that we found ourselves in a completely new environment.
In the beginning the aim was to meet each other monthly to share our live experiences here in Belgium. Later we started to look beyond these only; to help each other in times of sadness and joy and sharing information about how to improve on our lot became part of our preoccupations.
Sonja: But I have the feeling that you do much more with KMUB ?
Nelson: As we grew ,we decided to go beyond our original goals ; exhibiting our rich cultural heritage as well as imbibing in the socio-political life of Belgium became part of the package we rolled out for all to witness and benefit from. Also important is that we decided to explore ways on how we could help our people back home.
In concrete demonstration of some of our objectives, and to drive home our age old tradition of giving freely in return for nothing, we organized a human resources day during which we exhibited our physical input.
The human resources day was localized at the premises of NATUURPUNT VZW in Ghent. Natuurpunt is an organization that works around Nature protection and conservation. During this day we renovated the whole Natuurpunt building by painting the walls. The women, on the other hand were busy taking away the garbage in the bushes. It was a nice day of interactive life with the people of Natuurpunt and an iota of our contribution to the local effort to preserve nature and the global drive to save our planet.
To show our concern for others in the social fabric in Belgium, we visited the RED CROSS OPVANGCENTRUM at Eeklo. In this opvangcentrum people awaiting a decision on their asylum applications are housed. We bought gifts and also offered a token for the inmates. We saw a video about the life in the centre and we got a round trip of all the facilities of the centre.
For KMUB ,it is incumbent upon us to know as much as we can about our host. In light of this, we visited the Museum of Contemporary art in Antwerp.
In perspective, we intend to visit the headquarters of the European commission building in Brussels. We are conscious of the fact our knowledge of the principles of these institutions helped us to reroute our sometimes exhilarating and lamentable journeys to Europe. We wish to discover the edifice that was a catalyst to our new challenge, where ‘the protection of human life and dignity', 'the right to express yourself’etc.are paramount.
Our next activity will involve a visit to the Federal Parliament in Brussels to learn about the functioning of the Belgian Monarchy and political system.
Sonja: When you look to the future of KMUB ?
Nelson: As an individual I look forward to that day when KMUB will pride itself of having made in-roads in Belgium. We want to make ourselves known and our impact felt. And hopefully, with the collaboration and support of FAAB,this can be achieved. As a group, the little drops we pour in the ocean should someday leave an imprint on the lives of one or more souls in kupe-muanenguba division(Cameroon).
Sonja:Thank you so much.
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