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Brief History of the Diocese of Buea

The History of the Catholic Church in the Diocese of Buea started as far back as 1842 when Pope Gregory XVI established the mission of the two Guineas that included Gabon and Cameroon.

In 1846, when the area was erected as an Apostolic Prefecture with its See in Libreville, Cameroon was to remain within its jurisdiction. The Missionaries of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit entrusted with the Apostolic Prefecture of the Two Guineas instead limited their activities to Gabon and Cameroon was left out their missionary activity. In 1880, two Polish traders, Mr. Roozinski and Janikowski who established in Bota, now one of the oldest parishes in the diocese, invited the Spanish Jesuits who were working in Fernando Po to Cameroon. Attempts were made to found a mission in Cameroon though this was temporary halted by the political event of the time.
In 1890 the Pallotine Fathers took the challenge to evangelise Cameroon with the arrival of Mgr. Heinrich Vieter, Father George Walter, five Pallotine Brothers and one Seminarian who arrived from Douala on October 25.
Four years later in 1894, the Pallotine Fathers opened Bonjongo, the first parish in Buea Diocese. Within the next 16 years they opened four other parishes: Ikassa 1906, Sasse 1907, Bota 1908, and Ossing 1912 respectively.

In 1912 the whole of West Cameroon was handed over to the Sacred Heart Fathers of the German Province who consequently took over Ossing from the Pallotine Fathers in June 1913. The First World War brought the mission work of the Sacred Heart Fathers to a halt because the Germans had to leave Cameroon after the defeat of Germany in the war.

After the departure of the German Fathers, the Church was kept alive by a faithful band of Catechists under the leadership of Sango Mathias Effiem.

In 1917, the Vatican asked Mgr. Shanahan, Prefect Apostolic of Eastern Nigeria, to take charge of Cameroon West of Mungo. It was not until 1918 that he made a four-month trek through the Cameroons.

​The First World War ended in 1918 thus ushering a new chapter in missionary activity in the British Cameroon. Rome through the Prefect of the Propaganda Fide, took up contact with the Mill Hill Fathers of St. Joseph’s Society London to take up the work and property of the German Pallotine Fathers in the Southern Cameroons. All these negotiations lasted till November 1921 when Fr. John William Campling, a Scottish Mill Hill Priest as leader with Fathers Ben Robinson, Michael Morgan and William O’Kelly, were asked to take over missionary work in the Southern Cameroons.

This team of Mill Hill Missionaries landed at Victoria, Bota on March 25, 1922. Pa Sango Mathias Effiem was on hand to welcome them. Two stayed in Bota, one in Bonjongo and one in Sasse.

In March 1923 Sango Mathias Effiem came to Soppo with Fr. John Campling, Fr. Morgan and Soppo which was formally a German Military Camp was opened as a mission.

In December 1922 British Cameroons was made a Prefecture and on August 16, 1923 Fr. John Campling became the first Prefect.

​Fr. Peter Rogan took over from Mgr. John Campling in 1925. The Christian population at that time stood at about 40,000 and the first mission to be opened under him was Baseng in 1926. The first Soppo Church turned into Cathedral started in 1927 and completed in 1928. Fr. Rogan championed the opening of schools in the parish centres. Then followed by the vernacular school system and by 1937 over 43 vernacular schools had been opened.

In 1938 the first Secondary School for boys in the Southern Cameroons was opened in Bonjongo  against heavy opposition from the colonial government. It was transferred to Sasse the following year 1939.

In the meantime the faith was spreading and missions were  opened in Tiko in 1929, Okoyong in 1934, Fiango in 1936, Mbetta in 1937, Mbonge and Muyuka in 1943 and Tombel in 1947. Teacher training colleges and other Secondary Schools were opened.

Mgr. Rogan was committed to the training of the diocesan clergy. Thus the Holy Family Junior Seminary was opened in 1947 and graduates from there were sent to Bigard Memorial Seminary Enugu, Nigeria for final training into the priesthood.

The pioneer Diocesan Fathers were Aloysius Wankuy ordained in 1949, Lucas Atang 1956, James Toba, Ivo Ndichia and Henry Mesue ordained in 1958 and Clement Ndze ordained in 1960.

​0n April 18, 1950, Pope Puis XII raised Buea to a Diocese with Mgr. Peter Rogan as its first Bishop.  From that time up to October 1, 1961, the date of West Cameroon Political Independence, Buea was a suffragan See of Onithsha Archdiocese in Nigeira.

With the independence and the reunification of Cameroon, Buea Diocese became a suffragan See of Yaounde Archdiocese till Bamenda was erected to a metropolitan See.

Mgr. Jules Peeters took over from Bishop Rogan omAugust 24, 1962 when he was consecrated as the second Bishop of Buea. He made outstanding contribution to the advancement of Pastoral Work – the idea of the Conventions beginning with the first one in 1967 in Fiango, the formation of Parish Councils. He founded the Diocesan indigenous religious congregation, Sisters of St. Therese of the Child Jesus in 1963. He paved the way for the creation of the Diocese of Bamenda with territory detached from the Diocese of Buea.

​Mgr. Pius Suh Awa who was consecrated Co-Adjutor Bishop of Buea on May 30, 1971 with the right of succession took over from Bishop Jules Peeters as the first indigenous Bishop of Buea on January 29, 1973. He founded the Congregation of the Brothers of St. Martin De Porres of Buea in 1985.

​In 1999, at the request of Bishop Awa, Mamfe Diocese was created with territory detached from Buea and Mgr. Francis Teke Lysinge became the first Bishop.

​With the retirement of Bishop Awa on November 30, 2006, Bishop Immanuel Bushu was installed on January 30, 2007. He consecrated the Diocese to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Immaculate Heart of Mary, and the Divine Mercy. On March 15, 2016, Buea Diocese gave birth to another diocese, the Diocese of Kumba.

​The Diocese of Buea currently covers only Fako Division with a surface area of 2093 square kilometres with 37 parishes divided into seven deaneries.

On December 28, 2019, the Auxiliary Bishop of Bamenda, Mgr. Michael Bibi was appointed by the Holy Father, Pope Francis to look after the Diocese of Buea as Bishop Immanuel Bushu attained the retirement age for bishops. Bishop Bibi arrived Buea on January 2, 2020 and after taking care of the Diocese for over a year, he was on January 5, 2021 appointed the same Pope as the 5thResidential Bishop of the Diocese of Buea.

BISHOP PETER ROGAN - FIRST BISHOP OF BUEA 1950 to 1962

Bishop Peter Rogan, the first Bishop of Buea was born August 10, 1886. He was the second son in a family of six children; five boys and one girl.  His parents were Peter Rogan and Catherine Ormund. The family of the Rogans was a very extraordinary family.  All the five boys went to study for the missionary priesthood in Saint Joseph Society of Mill Hill for Foreign Missions, and the lone girl, in the family, Kathleen, entered a contemplative religious order of nuns. She became Sister Seraphine in the Redemptoristine Convent in Dublin, where she lived a very saintly life until her death.

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BISHOP JULES PEETERS - SECOND BISHOP OF BUEA, 1962 TO 1973

His Lordship Jules Joseph Willem Peeters was born in to a very believing Catholic family in Venlo, the Netherlands, on February 22, 1913. He was the fifth child in a family of seven children: three girls and four boys. His beloved parents, Henry Peeters and Maria Peeters – nee van den Homberg – gave all their children a solid Catholic up-bringing.

At an early age, the young Jules felt convinced that God was calling him to become a missionary of Saint Joseph Missionary Society of Mill Hill in Tilburg, the Netherlands.

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BISHOP PIUS AWA-THE FIRST INDEGENOUS HISHOP OF BUEA, 1972 TO 2007

He was born on May 4, 1930 in Bafut- Bamenda. He attended primary school in Mankon, Bafut and Njindom between 1938 and 1944. From 1945 to 1947, he was a teacher in Njindom. He entered the Junior Seminary in Sasse College in 1952 and in 1955 was admitted into Bigard Memorial Seminary, Enugu-Nigeria, from where he proceeded to Rome.

 On December 20, 1961, he was ordained priest in Rome. When he returned to Cameroon in 1962, he was appointed as curate of Sacred Heart Parish Fiango Parish, now the Cathedral Church of kumba Diocese.

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BISHOP IMMANUEL BUSHU- BISHOP OF BUEA 2006 TO 2019

The budding floret of a fourth life and providentially the fourth male child in the Catholic family of twelve children (seven boys and five girls) to late Bartholomew Bushu and Johana Wirsungnin, began in the night of July 31, 1944 in a great canyon settlement called Ngomrin, situated between Nkar and Sop villages in Bui Division of the North West Region of Cameroon.

Bartholomew Bushu and Johana Wirsungnin were among the first generation of Christians in Nso area now Kumbo Diocese. The child Immanuel Bushu was born 31 years after the arrival of Christianity in Nso land with the first church in Shisong, Sacred Heart Parish church Shisong, built by the German Sacred Heart Fathers in 1913.

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What They Say
What our Christians say about our Diocese

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Jack DoeManager

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Lisa WhiteChoreographer

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Michael DoeFashion Designer