Mayo Baléo Council wins Cameroon Students Challenge

A team from the Mayo Baléo Council in the Adamawa Region has emerged as the winner of the 2014 Cameroon Students Challenge competition.

The competition was organised as part of activities to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Special Support Fund for Mutual Assistance, FEICOM, under the theme: “Decentralisation in Cameroon: Between political visions, socio-economic stakes and security challenges”.

The team from the Adamawa Region emerged victorious after outsmarting that from the Yaoundé II Council.

The result of the competition was proclaimed by the grand jury after deliberations during the closing ceremony on December 4, at the Higher Teachers Training College Yaounde.

According to the jury, the team from Mayo Baléo showed proof of originality, work mastery, gender equality, bilingualism and adequate contribution to the theme of the celebration. Members of the grand jury were renowned academia led by Prof. Michael Ndobegang, Dr. Mathias Eric Owona Nguini, Dr Mathieu Mebenga, Dr. Vivian Chouala, amongst other.

The winners received the CSC trophy, with an FCFA 150, 000 and certificates of participation and other special prizes offered by FEICOM, Atlantic Bank and Light4all. The Yaoundé II Council team received a cash prize of FCFA 120, 000 and the third team from Dschang Council received FCFA100, 000.

However, in their presentations, the teams revealed that Councils have a lot of financial problems because they do not determine the amount of money collected from taxes that enter into their coffers. According to them, since the Central Government determines every penny that gets into the Councils’ coffers, it rather handicaps the decentralisation process instead of sustaining it.

The teams equally pointed out other problems that affect Councils; poor governance, corruption and communication problems between the Government, Councils, civil societies and the population. Insufficient funds were also identified as another major problem.

According to the teams, the insufficient funds have made most Council to divert their budgets for the payment of salaries to Council workers than investments. The teams added that there is also the problem of tribalism in the Councils as personnel are recruited based on their area of origin, relations and not competence.

The team Captain of the Dschang Council, Perpétue Ngo Lam, explained that the population needs to be sensitised on decentralisation, because, most of them participate unconsciously in the process as they pay taxes and other dues without knowing what the money is used for.

“We asked some roadside vendors why they pay the Council officials and they said they are obliged to pay.

As a remedy to these problems, the teams proposed that the Constitution of Cameroon should be reviewed. To them, the article on decentralisation in Cameroon is not clear and so the lawmakers have to clearly state how decentralisation needs to be applied and how it is to function.

They also proposed that an Animation and Development Committee should be put in place to act as the mediator between the Council and the population.