Oscar Njang

Oscar Njang
NSA member	West Central Africa 1964 - 1965
ABM	Africa
Media

Oscar Njang was an early Cameroonian Bahá’í who helped establish the religion in Nigeria and served as a National Spiritual Assembly and Auxiliary Board member.

Biography

Njang was from Cameroon being born into the Bayangi tribe and he became a devoted Presbyterian Christian. He lived in Limbe in the early 1950's where he established a friendship with David Tanyi through visiting a bookstore he worked at. He briefly met Enoch Olinga through Tanyi shortly after Olinga pioneered to Cameroon as he was working as a taxi driver and was paid to help Olinga move from a hotel into the Tanyi home.

In 1955 Njang moved to Nigeria due to dissatisfaction with his extended family and community in Cameroon. He settled in Calabar where he met Peter Oban-Itchi who he knew from Cameroon and Oban-Itchi gave him a position as a supervisor on a palm plantation. After a few weeks Oban-Itchi shared a copy of the book Paris Talks with Njang which he had come across at another plantation which deeply impressed Njang although neither of them were aware of the Bahá’í community.

Inspired by Paris Talks Njang and Oban-Itchi established a Church in Calabar in June 1955 with services consisting of readings from Paris Talks with Njang elaborating on its themes. The church soon had a membership of approximately sixty however Njang and Oban-Itchi became disunified after Njang received a promotion at the plantation which Oban-Itchi complained to the plantation owner about. As they argued regularly Njang was transferred to a palm oil mill in Akpabeyo resulting in the dissolution of their church in February 1956.

In Akpabeyo Njang joined another church. Oban-Itchi found the address of Enoch Olinga in the copy of Paris Talks the two had used to address their church and wrote to him detailing their experiences and Njang was surprised when he received a letter from Olinga encouraging him to teach the religion. He shared the letter with his pastor who denounced the Faith as being from a false prophet and Njang wrote to Olinga then received a reply which responded to the accusation of false prophethood. After studying the letter Njang proclaimed the Faith at the Church inviting the congregation to join the new religion with five people leaving the Church as a result. When he wrote to Olinga again he received Bahá’í declaration forms with a reply which advised him to sign one himself and then invite the others to declare.

After formally becoming a Bahá’í Njang returned to Calabar between 1956 and 1957 and maintained a correspondence with Enoch Olinga which enabled him to deepen on the Faith. At some point he married Elizabeth Idang who was a member of the royal family of the Efik tribe and the first woman to become a Bahá’í in Nigeria.

Njang remained an active member of the Nigerian Bahá’í community and in 1964 he was elected to the National Spiritual Assembly of West Central Africa when the body was established, serving one term. In 1971 he accompanied Rúḥíyyih Khánum from Nigeria to Cameroon during her Great African Safari teaching tour of Africa. As of the early 1980's he had been appointed as an Auxiliary Board member for Propagation responsible for Cross River State in Nigeria.