A hue and cry has erupted within the Cameroon Bar Association on the difficulties faced by Common Law Lawyers in getting the English version of the Uniform Acts of OHADA, the Organization for the Harmonization in Africa of Business Law. The President of the Bar Council, Jackson Ngnie kamga, has reportedly called the attention of the Minister of State, Minister of Justice, Keeper of the Seals, Laurent Esso, to the matter.

Barrister Ngnie Kamga in a correspondence to the Justice Minister suggested that the Permanent Secretariat of OHADA should be made to provide reasons for the delay of the English versions of the Revised Uniform Acts. Correspondingly, Lawyer Roland Abeng,recently added his voice to the issue saying he plans to raise it up during celebrations marking the reunification of Cameroon on October 1.

Barrister Abeng Roland (seen here with the late Wangari Muta Maathai of Kenya) tempered undue excitement observing that his take has nothing to do with the secessionist movement, the Southern Cameroons National Council.  But he was however at a loss to note that a reunified Cameroon will on 1 October 2016 be 55 years old, and is not able to translate such an important text in the second official language.

Abeng Roland also hinted that the government must not continue to agree with those who argue that English-speaking Cameroonians were marginalized in the country and that “the question of the translation of the text concerns all Cameroonians including Francophones whose clients also include the Anglo-Saxon world doing business with Cameroon.”

The man of law wondered aloud that “even the State of Cameroon cannot provide this text to English-speaking investors who are courted to come and invest in the country.”

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai with files from Cameroon-info.net