Bills on nuclear weapons, SMEs adopted by Senate

The bills on the physical protection of nuclear materials, Non-proliferation of nuclear weapons and the promotion of Small and Medium-size Enterprises were adopted on Friday in Yaounde.

The Senate has adopted three bills that were forwarded for second reading by the National Assembly. The bills were adopted on Friday June 26, 2015, in Yaounde, during a plenary sitting chaired by the Senate President, Marcel Niat Njifenji.

Before the adoption of the bills to authorise the President of the Republic to ratify the Additional Protocol to the Agreement between the Republic of Cameroon and the International Atomic Energy Agency for the application of safeguards pursuant to the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons signed in Vienna on 16 December 2004, and that to authorise the President of the Republic to ratify the amendment to the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials, adopted on 8 July 2005.

The Minister of Scientific Research and Innovation, Madeleine Tchuinte, in what looked like an oral question session, provided further clarifications to over a dozen questions from the Senators concerning the bills.

Minister Madeleine Tchuinte urged the Senators to adopt the bills in order to help the Head of State ratify them so that Cameroon should align to international law and show transparency in the handling of nuclear materials for pacific and development purposes.

The third bill that was adopted last Friday after an elaborate exchange between the Minister of Small and Medium-size Enterprises, Social Economy and Handicraft, Laurent Serge Etoundi Ngoa, and the Senators was that to amend and supplement some provisions of Law No. 2010/1 of 13 April 2010 relating to the promotion of Small and Medium-size Enterprises in Cameroon.

The bill ushers innovations in the SME sector to meet up with economic situations four years after it was enacted. After close to five hours of a laborious sitting, the Senate President expressed satisfaction for the adoption of the bills which he said are for the general interest of all the country.