International ecumenical community development aid in bad hands: the case of the Bu health centre project of the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon

Abstract

The Bu Health Centre Project was initiated by the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon (PCC) and the Bu people and adequately funded by ‘Bread for the World’ (BW), a Christian aid organisation. It was a community development initiative aimed at improving the health of the Bu people. But the foreign ecumenical health aid, as evidenced by the final phase and attainments of the project, did not result in community development due to implementation constraints. This paper, based on primary and secondary data, provides evidence of the misuse of foreign ecumenical community development aid, showing that recipient churches engulfed by corrupt practices are more likely to improperly administer such funds. The Bu Health Centre Project in northwest Cameroon is used as a case study for examining the issue. The paper begins with a conceptualization of international ecumenical aid and community development given their centrality to the study. This is followed by a theoretical framework embedded in the current aid debate whose insight can shed light on why foreign aid fails to deliver. The paper goes on to discuss PCC-BW partnership in service provision in Cameroon, and pays attention to PCC’s presence in Bu. It further lays bare the genesis and execution of the Bu Health Centre Project, and rounds up with an analytical discourse for understanding why the project failed. The study sustains the argument that the failure to transmit the international ecumenical aid set aside for the Bu Health Centre Project into beneficial outcomes rests on the attitude of the donor agency, the recipient institution, and the traditional and civil authorities of the recipient community. Keywords : Ecumenical Aid, Community Development, Recipient Institution, Health Care, Misappropriation, Presbyterian Church in Cameroon, Bread for the World