Individual Corruption

According to Global Witness, villagers protesting against illegal logging and attempting to claim their rights were intimidated by the authorities.

Business Corruption

Global Witness reports instances of collusion between corrupt forest officials and the private sector. Moreover, logging companies are not adequately monitored. The export of certain timber in unprocessed form has been forbidden since 2002 in order to stop the dramatic loss of rainforest due to uncontrolled and illegal logging.

Political Corruption

According to the Transparency International Global Corruption Report 2008, corruption hampers the good management of natural resource revenues. The Ministry of Environment and Forests is rife with corruption, thus leading to a great loss of taxes for the government. Indeed, in 2004, a newspaper estimated corruption in this sector to have caused an annual loss of nearly USD 217 million.

In December 2008, the President of the NGO l'Association Citoyenne de Defense des Interets (ACDIC), Bernard Njonga, was arrested and in May 2009 convicted over allegations of breach of public peace when he organised a demonstration against alleged embezzlement in the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. The Postnewsline reports that according to ACDIC, government officials had embezzled XAF 1.2 billion from funds allocated for Common Initiative Groups (CIG) in the maize production by setting up fictitious CIGs. Bloomberg also reports of corruption in the agricultural administration. According to a December 2008 article by the news agency, a local official in Boyo asked a farmer for a USD 572 kickback to secure a government contract to provide plantain seedlings for other farmers. When the farmer refused to pay the bribe he was told that the contract would not be renewed.

For further information related to corruption in Cameroon's extractive industries, visit this profile's special page on the oil and forestry sectors.