How many Cameroonians in the country’s different regions, speak or use one or both of the country’s official languages?
Data Source: Cameroon’s Central Bureau of the Census and Population Studies (Bureau Central des Recensements et des Etudes de Population), 3rd General Population and Housing Census, 2005.
Data Explanation:
Cameroon’s most recent census data (presented in the tables above) reveals that each official language remains predominant in the regions where historically (prior to reunification) it was most spoken. As such (and given that some persons are bilingual, i.e. use both languages), in the historically English-speaking Southwest regions the ratio of English to French use is 76 : 18 per cent , and in the historically English-speaking Northwest region, the ratio of English to French use is 69 : 13 per cent shaded in olive green. In all the eight other regions of the country, the ratios of French to English use show similar preponderance – 88 : 23 in the cosmopolitan Centre region, and 87 : 24 percent the cosmopolitan Littoral region , and as low as 34 : 5 percent in the North region , and 65 : 7 percent in the East region.
This data shows that cross-penetration of the second (that is, lesser-used) official language has occurred in all the regions. Yet, despite policy-makers’ objective of a personality-based bilingualism of citizens throughout the country, the preponderance of official language use still largely follows geographic or territorial lines: there remain significant concentrations of users of one official language in given parts of the country.