Snapshots: An X-ray of Cameroon�s Democracy, Governance and Unification

29. CDC and the Privatization Palaver (I)

109 29 CDC and the Privatization Palaver (I) Friday November 2, 2001 In the late 1980’s, the Cameroon Government drew up a programme of economic privatization based on three parameters namely; to relinquish control over state-owned enterprises that were: a) No longer functional b) Functional but unprofitable c) Potentially profitable but poorly managed. Ever since the mid-1990s, government has embarked on a rather promiscuous privatization scheme predicated on a policy of nonintervention by government in the economic sector to the extent that strategic public infrastructures and utilities like potable water, energy, transport and communication, and agro-industry have been privatized or are in the process of being privatized. This policy of indiscriminate privatization for the sake of privatization, which is actively promoted by international organizations such as the World Bank, has been pursued in the mistaken belief that it is the sole qualification for joining the free market economy and by extension, the democratic club. Experts have observed that failure to accompany economic reforms with democratic governance constitutes a serious handicap to the development of a free market economy. Mr. John D. Sullivan, Director of the Centre for International Private Enterprise has drawn the conclusion that based on the experiences of the 1980’s and 1990’s, “there is no truth to the belief that markets will spontaneously emerge if government stops intervening in the economy.” He recommends that business must do its part to eliminating the corruption that is devastating to economic growth and poverty reduction. 110 The fact that Cameroon has been governed uninterrupted by a notorious kleptocracy for nearly two decades and championed the league of the world’s most corrupt nation; the fact that the government has adamantly refused to set up an independent and credible electoral machinery that would ensure free and fair elections; the fact that the country has plunged from the middle income bracket in the early 1980’s to the bottom league of highly indebted poor countries (HIPC) in recent times, coupled with the arrogance with which the regime has displayed its ineptitude in matters of good governance as if it were a badge of honour – all these facts and many more make a mockery of any claim to democracy. All the noise about privatization just because the regime wants to be seen to be in fashion amounts to mere cant and humbug. We are still light years away from a free market economy whose primary objective is to foster economic growth, provide equal opportunity and ensure a better standard of living. Any privatization scheme that is not selective, ignores public opinion, fails to consider the interest of affected communities and is identified as a sell out to foreign capitalist consortiums for the purpose of the stark naked exploitation is bound to provoke antipathy and is equally doomed to fail. The Case of CDC Now that the Yaounde government has embarked on a wild auctioning spree of the nation’s patrimony, it is appropriate to signal a warning with regard to the imminent privatization of the Cameroon Development Corporation, CDC, established by Nigerian Ordinance in 1947 in the Southern Cameroons. The creation of the CDC was guided by the political philosophy that “the transference of large areas of land to the control of an organization located outside the territory would be bound … to attract to the controlling body… the suspicion that it was in some way exploiting for outside interest the territory in which it was 111 operating and thus prejudice the profit of cooperation with local interests which would be vital for the success of any scheme”. This view was expressed in a report by the Colonial Development Corporation of Britain, which suggested that indigenous public opinion be given the opportunity of commenting on, and influencing corporate policy. The opposition labour backbencher, Mr. Creech Jones who led an investigation team to British West African territories concluded the report by stating that “trusteeship [of which the Southern Cameroons was a member] is cant and humbug unless it is implemented in constructive terms of development and social targets, and unless that development is for and in the interest of African people.” It can readily be understood why the original mission of the CDC stated that: “In so far as it is consistent with the promotion of the common benefit of the inhabitants of the Southern Cameroons, the corporation is also required to provide for the religious, educational and...