The international criteria and standards of “Doing Business” recognize in all and for everything, 20 recommendations out of the 90 successfully designed at the Cameroon Business Forum.
In the absence of CBF 2020, it is almost impossible to draw up an inventory of the implementation of the recommendations made since 2009. However, the results of the implementation of the said recommendations are disappointing. Ten years later, the execution of 150 recommendations out of a total of 200 adopted, hides a disturbing reality. 90 recommendations have “resulted in decisive reforms,” the Prime Minister explained in 2019.
But, according to Moïse Ekedi Endene, permanent secretary of the CBF and representative of the International Finance Corporation, a subsidiary of the World Bank, “only 70 successful reforms are eligible for the criteria of Doing business”. Worse, only 20 of these reforms have been recognized internationally, or 30% of the 90 reforms supposed to have been successful.
In addition, out of the 28 recommendations adopted in 2018, barely 5 have experienced satisfactory development. This involves the execution of 200 national standards stemming from international and regional standards, the recapitalization of the SME Bank, the acceleration of the payment of domestic debt for a cumulative amount of 40 billion FCFA… In addition, 15 recommendations have been implemented or are being finalized, 4 are being implemented and 4 have been simply ignored due to the unavailability of resources. Or an overall implementation rate of 64% of the 2018 reforms.
Several factors are behind this poor performance. Moise Ekedi Endene enumerates: lack of sufficient rigor, slowness in the decision-making process, excessive bureaucracy in the processing of files, poor appropriation of reforms by administrations, problems of governance, etc.
Several actions remain un-initiated, according to the permanent secretary of the CBF. This is the extension of the mybusiness.cm application in three regional capitals such as Bafoussam, Bamenda and Ebolowa; the establishment of the “Scada” system by Energy of Cameroon ENEO, the introduction of cash payment as a method of settling taxes and charges at bank counters; the creation of commercial courts.
Others, require “an acceleration of implementation, the information of the process of issuing trade registers and movable credit, the introduction of decidable commitments of building owners in the construction, the operationalization of a single point of control of goods at the exit of the autonomous port of Douala, the revision of the law on classified establishments ”.
Also expected, the appointment of the heads of the Caisse de depots et de consignation, the risk capital law, the review of the land tenure system, the electronic archiving of land books in the cities of Douala and Yaoundé, and the development of codes construction.