Cameroon EITI Committee Invents its Own Norms Dr. Livinus Njume Esambe from Dakar

The EITI standards is designed to promote good governance by enhancing transparency, strengthening accountability and facilitating public debate about the management of natural resources. Since it was first launch ten years ago, the EITI standards has established a common set of miles that governs what and when government and companies should disclose. Unfortunately, while the standard has metamorphosed in its fourth edition, the Cameroon EITI is inventing its own norms. This write-up would attempt to X-ray the Cameroon invented norms, à la Camerounaise, so to speak. ??????????

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In accordance of?Part 2 of the EITI Standard, where it is manifestly?clear that a significant aspect of the EITI Principles and EITI Requirements are not adhere to, by an implementing country,?the EITI Board will suspend or delists the country, Requirement (3.3). During the last visit of the validation team in Cameroon, we were handed a matrix of fifteen corrective measures to implement on or before October 1, 2023. Thereafter, the Cameroon government took a firm engagement to catch up with these exigencies but during our last visit to Dakar June 13-15, 2023, and after sharing our experiences with others countries like; Papua New Guinea, Gabon, Suriname, Argentina, Mauritania, Ukraine and Senegal, it seems to this investigator that the government’s engagement is a pipe dream.

The Protocol Participation of civil society engagement stipulates that ‘the civil society must fully, actively and effectively engaged in the EITI process’ and ‘that the government is required to ensure that there is an enabling environment for civil society participation with regard to relevant laws, regulations and administrative rules as well as actual practice in implementation of the EITI.’ Requirement (3.1 a & b). According to the second validation report, page 10,?the International Secretariat, recommended that, ‘the civil society constituency should address the concerns regarding constituency representation, including potential conflict of interest linked to perdiems and ensure more effective liaison between the CSO representatives and the broader constituency.’?Instead, of respecting scrupulously this recommendation, à la camerounaise has come up with an obnoxious Prime Ministerial Text designating six civil society organistions into the Multi-stake holder Group (MSG) with the lame reason that those designated by this degree has a wider civil society space and were founding members of EITI in 2023. While in?Dakar, a member of Gabon MSG,?Nziengui Marcellin who dismissed the Prime Minister’s disposition of CSO representativeness as not only ridiculous but also irrelevant to EITI Standards.

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In accordance to Requirement (2. 5) regarding ownership thresholds for reporting beneficial owners, lower thresholds for reporting the beneficial owners of oil, gas and mining companies enable the public to have a more comprehensive view of who benefits from natural resources. The EITI Standard now encourages countries to adopt an ownership threshold of 10% or lower. This means that any individual who directly or indirectly holds this or a higher percentage of shares of a company will be disclosed as a beneficial owner. Countries are required to request companies to disclose any politically exposed persons (PEPs) who directly and indirectly hold interest in a company, regardless of their level of ownership. To take corrective measures, the second validation report talks of self-censorship on the issue of beneficial ownership…which impeded the CSO’s work on independent monitoring of social and environmental impact of mining activities, given that it could not hold company accountable and had to publish its study anonymously. Whereas, the Cameroon EITI committee has adopted these definitions but the government of Cameroon has invented its standards in the inter-ministerial guide on beneficial ownership that talks of 20% threshold and professional secrets on ‘health concerns of the beneficial owner as well as security or defense,’

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?Requirements (3. 2 and 3. 3) of the 2023 EITI Standard shed light on companies’ cost as well as higher quality disclosures on production and exports. ‘Production and export data that is broken down by project or even by transaction, enables detailed analysis. It can help to identity and address risks related to revenue lost, such as underreporting of volumes or values.’ On June 02, 2023, the Cameroon EITI Committee made a significant progress by adopting cost oil and profit oil in its 2021 draft conciliatory report. What remains a steam in the tea cup is the lack of sub national transfer in the Petroleum Code.

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The second validation report indicates that there is self-censorship by CSOs and media on criticisms of SNH’s ‘direct interventions,’ due to fears of accusations of treason or sympathizing with Anglophone insurgents.?While in Dakar, we analyzed in a restrained group, the sales of oil between 2017-2020 by SNH where the results of the study revealed that there is, ‘a lot of inconsistencies and/or irregularities in the sales of oil in Cameroon.’ We also questioned SNH lawyer, Barrister Makon, on why sub national transfers of oil are not included in the Petroleum Code. He said, ‘ils ont enlevé, ?ils ont l’habitude de fáire ?a.’ This reporter then mounted the rostrum to question the reason d’etre of quasi-fiscal expenditure where SNH defends her action based on ‘security and sovereignty.

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The United Nations Special Coordinator for Development in the Sahel, Abdoulaye Mar Dieye said, ‘I have told Bretton Woods Institutions not to ?disburse funds generated from the sales of our natural resources to African governments on security concerns and repayment of debts, but they would not listen and keep on doing so.’ What guarantees security of every country is a ‘process designed?to create conditions of economic and social progress for communities.’ These involves the availability of all seasoned paved roads, safe drinking water facilities, youth employment, modern health and educational facilities, electricity, as well as recreational centres.’ On the disclosure of gas and oil contracts, the Cameroonian stakeholders have invented the ‘confidentiality clause’ and ‘anonymous clause’ as scapegoat principles. While in Dakar, Akere Muna said the confidentiality clause as well as anonymous clause are ‘dame nonsense.’ He argued that Africa needs to strengthen and make its judicial system stronger in the fight against corruption and Illicit Financial Flows.

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With all these inventions,?the Board has determined that Cameroon will have until a third Validation commencing on 1 October 2023 to carry out corrective actions regarding civil society engagement (Requirement 1.3), MSG oversight (Requirement 1.4), work plan (Requirement 1.5), contract and license allocations (Requirement 2.2), register of licenses (Requirement 2.3), contracts (Requirement 2.4), beneficial ownership (Requirement 2.5), state participation (Requirement 2.6), data timeliness (Requirement 4.8), distribution of revenues (Requirement 5.1), subnational transfers (Requirement 5.2), social expenditures (Requirement 6.1), quasi-fiscal expenditures (Requirement 6.2), public debate (Requirement 7.1) and review of outcomes and impacts of EITI implementation (Requirement 7.4). Failure to demonstrate progress in the third Validation will result in temporary suspension in accordance with Article 6 of the EITI Standard

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