Elected on November 26, 1956, André Fouda Omgba Nsi served as Mayor of the full-service urban commune of Yaoundé until 1967.
Fouda Omgba Nsi was born in 1906 in Djoungolo I; his mother Philomène Anaba and his father Omgba Nsi from Ebom, gave him a strict traditional education.
André Fouda studied at the primary school of Yaoundé then in 1921 at the higher school and in 1924 he won a title of postal clerk.
He joined the colonial administration and was assigned to the PTT of Kribi then Akonolinga.
In 1937 he joined Douala and became politically involved in the Jeucafra (Jeunesse Camerounaise Française) chaired by Paul Soppo Priso, of whom he became deputy.
During the war period he worked as a PTT operator for Free France.
In 1945 after the war, he was posted to Yaoundé and rewarded by De Gaulle with the medal of the French resistance.
On November 18, 1956, municipal elections were held in Yaoundé.
André Fouda suggested that the commune should be led by Mvog Ada for historical and political reasons.
On November 26, 1956, he was elected and became the first Mayor of the full-function urban commune of Yaoundé.
In 1967 he became the very first government delegate.
He was also Minister of Economic Affairs in the first government of Ahmadou Ahidjo in 1958.
André Fouda was a great builder of the city of Yaoundé.
According to his own words, he wanted to modernize Yaoundé which was in fact his village. His sometimes controversial choices and his actions gave a real boost to the capital city.
In the mid-1970s he drew up Yaoundé's urban plan, he set up the names of streets, avenues and certain places in the capital.
He traced and developed several districts including Essos, Emombo or Mvog-Mbi. It also imposed a unified color for houses along the road and prohibited fences over two meters.
In 1976 André Fouda laid the first stone of the future Town Hall which was built on the former site of the hippodrome stadium.
The building whose plans were designed by the French architect Armand Salomon, was inaugurated on October 14, 1978 by President Ahidjo.
André Fouda Omgba died on February 27, 1980.
His successor was Basile Emah, former Mayor of Mba Nkomo since 1959, he held the position from 1980 to 2001.
In the book entitled "André Fouda, First black mayor of the city of Yaoundé, emblematic figure of the fiftieth anniversary" published in 2014 by Presse monde editions, the author, his son Joseph Augustin Fouda gives a historical and biographical account of a part of the history of Cameroon through his father André Fouda.
Can I know by whom he was elected on November 26, 1956, not far from the years when most of the separatist leaders were eliminated?