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# When Kom Spoke, Cameroon Listened. But Who Was Right?
- URL: https://www.bontehmagazine.com/when-kom-spoke-cameroon-listened-but-who-was-right/
- Published: 2026-09-08T21:03:03.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-08T21:03:03.000Z
- Description: The rightness or wrongness of a culture is defined by the people who live it, not by outsiders looking in.
- Author: Ankiambom Nkesa Nkesa
- Tags: Opinion

As July began to wane, something remarkable happened in the Kom kingdom that set the internet ablaze, at least on a national level. [The kingdom's revered monarch, Fon Clement Ndzi, transcended the corporeal realm](https://www.cameroon-tribune.cm/article.html/78998/fr.html/transition-in-the-sacred-heights-kom-fondom-mourns-disappearance-of-fon-ndzi-clement-mbain?ref=bontehmagazine.com).

Sons and daughters of the kingdom gathered at the sacred palace, men without their caps, both men and women topless, no one weeping for the Fon who had "just journeyed," to pay him his last respects, even as they took part in the rites that marked the enthronement of a new monarch. Kom was on the spotlight for a week and dominated public discourse.

Then came the reactions. Some questioned certain practices around the rites, calling parts of it inappropriate, even grotesque, out of place in the modern world. Others simply looked on with a judgmental eye, never pausing to ask why. Few thought to ask for context, to be briefed on Kom history before forming an opinion. [**Paul Watzlawick** famously wrote: ](https://www.google.com/search?q=The+believe+that+one%27s+own+view+of+reality+is+the+only+reality+is+the+most+dangerous+of+all+delusions.&oq=The+believe+that+one%27s+own+view+of+reality+is+the+only+reality+is+the+most+dangerous+of+all+delusions.+&gs%5Flcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOdIBCDEyODFqMGo5qAIBsAIB&client=tablet-android-samsung-ss&sourceid=chrome-mobile&source=chrome.ob&ie=UTF-8)

> [The believe that one's own view of reality is the only reality is the most dangerous of all delusions. ](https://www.google.com/search?q=The+believe+that+one%27s+own+view+of+reality+is+the+only+reality+is+the+most+dangerous+of+all+delusions.&oq=The+believe+that+one%27s+own+view+of+reality+is+the+only+reality+is+the+most+dangerous+of+all+delusions.+&gs%5Flcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOdIBCDEyODFqMGo5qAIBsAIB&client=tablet-android-samsung-ss&sourceid=chrome-mobile&source=chrome.ob&ie=UTF-8)

The truth of an assertion never felt so palpable like it did during that period.

 So is the Kom culture actually bad or good? [Cultural Intelligence for Leaders](https://saylordotorg.github.io/text%5Fleading-with-cultural-intelligence/?ref=bontehmagazine.com), a book on leading with cultural intelligence, unpacks a great deal about cultural nuances and gives readers a real understanding of how to approach cultural differences. It defines culture as:

> Culture consists of the shared beliefs, values, and assumptions of a group of people who learn from one another and teach to others that their behaviors, attitudes, and perspectives are the correct ways to think, act, and feel.

 That means the rightness or wrongness of a culture is defined by the people who live it, not by outsiders looking in. Who then am I to condemn the practices of a people I do not belong to? That kind of judgment is arrogance dressed as certainty. No culture is flawless, and Kom's is no exception, but every culture deserves to be understood before it is judged. Much of Cameroon's Facebook was not so gracious. Many rushed to label the Kom people and their tradition as backward.

Cultural intelligence begins with knowledge before judgment, curiosity before comparison. Everything that happened at that palace deserves to be understood by those looking in from outside. The forbidden tears protect the dignity of the throne, not the person. 

Bare bodies in mourning echo the wearing of sackcloth in the Bible, a language of grief older than any single culture. The new Fon fetching wood and water before enthronement is a reminder that he serves the people, that he performs one last ordinary act as an ordinary man before he accedes to the highest office in the land. From that moment, he is no longer ordinary. He belongs to the people he now serves.

Every society, from antiquity to today, has built its own machinery for handling death, loss, and joy, using the material handed down by those who came before. To say a culture is good is not to say every one of its practices is beyond question. Of course some are worth questioning. That is exactly why culture, at its core, is flexible and fluid, not fixed. 

The Kom people are not naive. They have intellectuals among them who know their culture was never written in stone, and several of its practices have changed over the years once they were no longer found useful. That is the beauty of culture. It looks rigid from the outside, but it rarely is.

The fondom ended its mourning. Its people returned to their farms and their business with a renewed sense of identity and belonging. In a country as fractured as Cameroon, there is something to learn from that kind of unity within a single fondom. It is the kind of unity the whole country needs. But it will only come when we feed our minds with the ideas that make that kind of thinking possible.