Operation Epervier: Who is Fooling Who?

By Tazoacha Asonganyi

What is going on in Cameroon codenamed "Operation Epervier" has become a source of much fun. It is well known that mismanagement, corruption, and the embezzlement of public funds have been going on for a very long time, and that most barons of the CPDM regime are tainted with these ills. It is in full knowledge of this fact that there is no total onslaught against the scourges, since it would destroy all the barons and cronies... and with them, the regime! Better to play fast and lose with the expectant population: offer as the visible part of a huge corruption iceberg, selective probing, arrest, detention, trial, and imprisonment of some of the barons, most of whom are being humbled with temporary defeat for their involvement in a subterranean power game.

The recent outing of business magnet Yves Michel Fotso and the subsequent reaction of Biyiti Bi Essam, the Communication Minister, confirm the dictum that no secret is ever a secret! All tight secrets eventually become public knowledge because those in the know each usually tell one or two close confidants, so the information slowly spreads until sooner or later, the secret becomes known by all. This is why most of what Fotso said was already public knowledge. The response of the regime we are witnessing has more to do with the fickle nature of power in our setting than a determined effort to fight corruption and embezzlement of public funds.

The role of the Minister of Communication is not to stand in for the Attorney General but to ensure that the people are informed about the activities of the government; it is also to guard and promote the marketplace of ideas. Debate on public issues should never be inhibited on the unproven assumption that it will influence the course of justice; it is indecent for government to prohibit expression simply because it disagrees with the ideas expressed.

Further, at the end of the recent visit of the IMF evaluation team to Cameroon, Essimi Menye, the Minister of Finance declared over CRTV that the comings and goings of people from the international body are testimony of their effort to walk us like babies until we can know how to walk! Put in the context of the fight against corruption, we can say that corruption was allowed to go unpunished for over 20 years because, like babies, we did not know that it would spread and clog the whole system! And in spite of all the "help" to get us to walk, we have refused to see the importance of article 66 of the constitution on the declaration of assets, to the fight against corruption!

These ministers are making these declarations in a country where in the ‘50s and ‘60s there existed in one part of the country, a Commissions of Enquiry Ordinance (Cap 36 of the 1958 laws) which empowered the Prime Minister to appoint a commission of inquiry into any department of government to investigate possible wrongdoing, like corruption, embezzlement of public funds, favouritism, and others. Using these powers, the PM appointed such commissions, especially into the affairs of West Cameroon Department of Lands and Surveys (notice No. 90 in West Cameroon Gazette No. 13, Vol. 7 of 1 April 1967), into the activities of the West Cameroon Development Agency as from 1959 (notice No. 61 published in West Cameroon Gazette No. 14, Vol. 8 on 27 March 1968), and into the West Cameroon Electricity Corporation (notice No. 98 published in West Cameroon Gazette No. 20, Volume 8 of 30 April 1968).

The appointment of the commissions was always accompanied by terms of reference that always had the following proviso: "The sessions of the Commission will be open to members of the public. Any person who has any information that may be of assistance to the Commission should communicate such information to the Secretary of the Commission, Division of State Development, Prime Minister’s Office, Buea. Any person who wishes to give evidence before the Commission should also contact the Secretary to the Commission".

The commissions used as guiding documents, two important companions of every public servant, namely, the "General Orders" and the "Financial Instructions" . Their findings were submitted to the PM, and then made available to the general public. When wrongdoing was established, the files were transferred to the judiciary for due process to take its course.

"Operation epervier" is an attempt to fool the rest of us. Nearly fifty years after these Commissions, Biyiti Bi Essam is wrong in giving the impression that public debate on corruption issues would influence the course of justice; but Essimi Menye may be right in saying that we are not different from babies being taught how to walk! Babies or no babies, it is good for the regime to keep in mind that it is possible for future leaders of Cameroon to audit the goings-on in any area of government in Cameroon, during any chosen period since independence.