Community Voices

What stands out to me about BotangRecords is the way you create opportunities for young people to experience culture through music, including access to instruments and hands-on cultural immersion. Giving youth the opportunity to learn, create, and connect with African traditions helps keep our culture alive while giving the next generation something they can carry forward.

BotangRecords is an organization that does not just talk about supporting young people and culture; they show up for it. I have personally watched them stand behind young talents, including Akong Angel, who grew through WAPPCAM's programmes, supporting her musical journey not only with financial and technical assistance, but also with genuine encouragement and belief in her potential. They have extended that same generosity to WAPPCAM, supporting our holiday programmes and the young people we serve. Their work to preserve and share the Kom culture and African heritage, while keeping a strong connection between our communities in Cameroon and the diaspora, is something I deeply admire. I am truly grateful to BotangRecords for believing in our young people and our work, and simply being there when it matters.

It is very difficult to pigeonhole BotangRecords in a few words. For, it is many things in one. It is a school and promoter of African culture and tradition. It is arrestingly amazing in its expansive and panoramic vision of showcasing culture: African stories, music, folklore and indigenous traditional poetry. To young Kom people who were sired far away from their ancestral land, BotangRecords is a school where they go to drink deep down the fountain of culture and tradition. Besides, its broadcasts on many different topics is a byword of infotainment: the kind that virtually arrests its audience and sentences them to attentive watching until the curtains come down on the programme.

At a time when Kom tradition and cultural heritage face fast degradation, I see the prophecy of the revered Fon Jinabo II coming to pass. The great seer foretold that the revival of Kom culture would come from abroad, and that prophecy is being fulfilled today through the work of BotangRecords, which has undertaken the systematic recording and preservation of Kom culture in all its dimensions for posterity, from language and folklore to music, dance, rituals and ancestral history, archiving what was on the verge of being lost. I congratulate BotangRecords and urge them to keep up the momentum. Our children born and bred in the diaspora will grow up well-grounded in our culture and ways of life, even more than those born and bred in Kom land. Keep the Kom light shining here in the USA; while conflict and modernization have eroded cultural transmission at home, the diaspora is emerging as the new custodian of identity, exactly as Fon Jinabo predicted. I call on all sons and daughters of Kom to support this preservation effort, to ensure the Kom flame never dies.

BoTangRecords is deeply committed to discovering, supporting, and nurturing young talent in our community. One of its most meaningful contributions has been providing musical instruments, including guitars, giving young artists the tools to learn, grow, and build confidence. Beyond music, BoTangRecords helps preserve our Kom language and cultural identity, keeping our traditions alive both at home and among our community abroad. We sincerely appreciate and recognize BoTangRecords for its continued dedication to empowering young people and preserving our heritage for generations to come.

I am truly grateful for the work BotangRecords does to champion artists and celebrate Cameroonian and African culture. What stands out most is how BotangRecords builds bridges between communities abroad and people back home in Africa, bringing together culture, talent, stories, and shared identity across borders and generations. This is especially evident in the educational videos shared about the Kom people, both in the diaspora and back in Cameroon. BotangRecords has been a breath of fresh air, preserving cultural heritage while giving it a vibrant, contemporary platform.

BotangRecords has done something important by creating a space where Kom culture and the broader African cultural experience can be preserved, expressed, and shared with others. What I particularly value is the way BotangRecords connects our communities across borders by creating a bridge between where we are and where we come from, while giving artists and cultural practitioners a platform to tell their own stories. It is more than an arts initiative; it is part of the work of keeping culture alive and relevant for the next generation.