Opening paper presented by Tanyi Christian
During the civil society Forum for Democracy Meeting
US Embassy, Yaoundé 13/12/2011
My dearest and respected colleagues of the civil society, its once more a great pleasure to see us regrouping after one year of serious reflection and contribution to our national politics. It was about 14 months ago that we started meeting under the common vision of shaping our national politics by strengthening our democratic processes. Our actions constituted a major contribution to the fundamental human rights – that of being able to chose our leaderships freely and participate in our national governments.
Though few in number, we saw for the first time in Cameroon a new dimension of commitment, material, moral and financial sacrifices by the civil society towards a common goal. We agreed on basic principles and ideas, we moved together to high places and at times through risky grounds.
Today we gather to take stock of what we gained and loosed during those days before, during and after the presidential elections and to define a new direction as we reflect on the level of human rights issues in our country. We have come this far yet we have a long road to go.
Our actions and agendas are not defined or directed by any political party, government or diplomatic missions. As you know, we take full responsibility for what we say and do during our gatherings. I know this gathering of humble, peace loving and patriots have been misunderstood, mislabeled by those who fear what is good and people focused.
We continue to thank all those organizations and diplomatic missions who over the year helped host some of our meetings. We challenge the government to open up public meeting grounds to allow us hold our meetings if they panic about where we hold our meetings.
On our democracy
We all know the truth about the last election. We know it was far from free, fair and transparent. We observed and noted the shortcomings. We know that unless we have a truly credible and dependable electoral body, our democracy will remain a simple illusion.
When an individual is no longer a true participant, when he no longer feels a sense of responsibility to his society, the content of democracy is emptied and the society therefore moves quickly to a state of fear, terror and dictatorship.
Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. Even a superficial look at history reveals that no social advance rolls in on the wheels of inevitability. Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals like all of us gathered here today.
There can be no democracy without the respect of human rights or true human rights without true democracy.
We made significant engagement during the months and days leading to the election this year but somehow came short of making a remarkable finish. We slowed down and got divided by those who infiltrated our ranks. Thank God we realized this and are now regrouping and refocusing.
The presidential election is history but we have the golden opportunity to balance the ills of that election during the next twine elections in 2012. We must do all it takes to balance the powers of the executive with a strong legislative wing far meaningful than the window dressing assembly that we have seen in recent years.
My greatest fear is the level of violence that may come with the municipal and parliamentary elections if the same massive irregularities are allowed to happen. These two elections are more community-based than the presidential. The direction of the election can easily be influenced by the slightest irregularities at the community levels. Each voter knows the persons he/she is voting on a more personal basis and will not likely be indifferent in the face of any irregularity.
2012 therefore seem to be more demanding for us the civil society than 2011. We must talk less, engage more and take visible actions. To close the 2011 presidential election files, we will require the Supreme Court and ELECAM to publish the full detailed results by polling stations.
We must again engage with ELECAM to review performance of the last elections and take concrete actions to better the 2012 elections. As you know, there were many broken promises from ELECAM including an unexplained shut down of their website till today. The president and director general of ELECAM made statements relating to the shameful voters list mess. The truth remains the lack of political will of ELECAM to do well.
Last Saturday a new government was formed:
It is flooded with the same old names. It is the same big government and growing. At a time like this when our nation need to make significant advances in the quality of life of the citizens, big government is simply not the way forward. We need small, effective and efficient government. So we must understand that we will need to do more to keep this huge government under control, reduce waste, embezzlement and corruption.
We must have all read through the CONAC report, we appreciate the simple fact that they made such a report public but you may have realized that the published report is far less than expected as it fall short of key facts and investigations. CONAC must go above all obstacle to scrutinize the executive actions and policies, the legislative actions and policies to balance them we the nagging poverty at the grassroots. The special criminal court setup to handle cases of embezzlement will gain no public approval unless the fundamental problems linked with embezzlement are addressed such as the Non application or selective application of articles of our constitution. The starting point in the fight against corruption and embezzlement is the full implementation of article 66 and a critical review of the public servant pay package.
Unemployment is growing. Unfortunately our government still does not understand what it takes to create jobs. Simple economic knowledge will tell us that to create sustained jobs, we need to create worth. Worth is generated when the business environment is conducive and attractive to investors including among others, easy business registration, transparent and fair tax policies, stable political environment, independent judiciary and reduced corruption. This year we witnessed a politically motivated recruitment of 25,000 youths into the public service in addition to thousands recruited under the HIPC who are yet to have any salaries. At an average pay of 100,000, the new 25,000 will add 30 billion Francs CFA into the government pay roll each year. If instead the business environment was simplified to allow the same amount of money to be invested in youths at an average of 1 million per new small business, 30,000 new businesses would have been created. With each recruiting just one support staff, 60,000 Cameroonians will be in active employment generating worth which the state can then taxed. We the civil society have the responsibility to talk sense into our government at national and local levels.
The years of watching and ignoring are gone. We must start the long journey to a new nation where each individual can leave up to his/her full potentials and abilities. Such a road is definitely not going to be easy, smooth or without pains, but the end will be more enjoyable than the current suffering and dead spirits in this old nation.
In 2012 with more than 59 new ministerial positions and high profile post of responsibilities, multiplied by ten regions, divisions and sub divisions, we have a huge task to track down and report on the management of our state affairs and the tax payers’ money. Democracy does not end at having the right people in the right places. It includes holding the people accountable. I am sad that last Sunday during Cameroon calling, some of these appointed statesmen say they are accountable to the head of state and not to the Cameroonian people. The prime minister said “I am greatful to the Head of state and will work hard to serve him and then Cameroonians”. These are signals that we must do more to change the management of our state affairs from executive-based to people-focused.
Let me not take too mush of our time. I understand so well that all of us here know these things so well and are fully committed to contributing positively to better the conditions. Some say, change is hard to come and that what we are doing as civil society is a risky or difficult venture. YES, if everything was that easy, life will be a waste of time. I believe strongly that unless one has something so dear to his/her heart like the love for fatherland and citizens, there will be no reason to live. Based on this, we must work above self to serve our nation and its people while accepting any pains that may be unjustly inflicted on us for doing Good. This year, we must be ready to dramatize the ills of our political and democratic system as a way of bringing to focus the problems. It may not be easy.
- The need for a better communication unit for the forum harnessing mainstream media and the internet
- The need for a civil society assembly better structured to scrutinize government actions and policies
- The need to push for a more inclusive and open government
- The need for the civil society to design and implement a nation wide community sensitization on the creative selection of members of parliament.
- We need to engage ELECAM to define as early as possible all the mechanisms for the elimination of the multiple cards already in the hands of voters
- Civil society driven voters’ registration
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