Bishop of Obala
Bishop Sosthène Léopold Bayemi Matjei, Bishop of Obala, Cameroon, was born on 26 December 1964 in Matomb, in what was then the Archdiocese of Douala and is currently the Diocese of Eséka. He studied philosophy and theology at Saint Thomas Aquinas Major Seminary in Bambui, Bamenda, and at the Paul VI provincial major seminary of theology in Douala. He subsequently obtained a doctorate in philosophy at the Pontifical Urban University in Rome and a master's degree in pedagogy of priestly formation at the Salesian Pontifical University. He was ordained a priest on 12 February 1994 and incardinated in the Diocese of Eséka. After priestly ordination he held the following offices: from 1994 to 1996, first parochial vicar and then pastor at Saint Paul and coordinator of socio-charitable activities; from 1996 to 2000, studies in Rome for the doctorate in philosophy at the Pontifical Urban University and the master's degree in pedagogy of priestly formation at the Salesian Pontifical University; from 2000 to 2004, vicar general and pastor; from 2004, local collaborator at the Apostolic Nunciature in Yaoundé; and from 2005, professor of philosophy at the University of Central Africa in Yaoundé and assistant at Saint Vincent Pallotti in Nlongkak, Yaoundé.