Yaounde: CRADEC rallies stakeholders to brainstorm on integrity of public treasury.

It brought together Parliamentarians, members of the APNIFFT Caucus, representatives of the Ministry of Finance, decentralised collectivities, Civil Society Organisations, public finance experts among others. 

CRADEC officials the roundtable aimed at placing public treasury management at the heart of debates with decision-makers ahead of the DOB 2025.

This, they added, is in order to promote budgetary orientations that are transparent, equitable and aligned with the needs of citizens and gender-sensitive. 

The gathering, they said, was also to analyse current challenges in public treasury management, highlight risks of corruption, Illicit Financial Flows, and inefficiencies in resource collection and allocation.

They said it was also to propose concrete mechanisms to improve budgetary integrity on the dematerialisation of tax procedures, strengthening independent audits, strict application of Article 55 of the Constitution (financial autonomy of CTDs) and systematic integration of gender analyses into budget cycles.

It also aimed at strengthening parliamentary influence on budgetary policies through the participatory development of priority oral questions to be submitted during the 2025 DOB and produce and disseminate national advocacy to promote the integrity of the public treasury and generate concrete commitments.

Enter CRADEC boss 

Speaking at the event, the Executive Director of CRADEC, Jean Mballa Mballa, said through the roundtable, they intend to convey the message to prevent and combat corruption. 

“Corruption is a flaw that undermines the integrity of our national heritage,” he stated, adding that reports from National Anti-Corruption Commission, CONAC, and other organisations demonstrate that corruption “indeed affects the integrity of the public treasury”.

He said discussions touched on internal corruption and the fight against international tax evasion, “which often involves the recurrence of illicit financial flows, which are resources drained from State coffers”. 

“The third point regarding integrity is not about its purpose, but about ensuring that resources are well-managed and equitably distributed to serve the essential needs of the population. We are talking today about health, education, and the supply of energy, which is a critical issue currently facing Cameroon…,” Mballa Mballa said.

Rallying of the key stakeholders, he said, is “part of a strategic methodology” to convey the message.

“…we, as civil society organisations, cannot do this work alone. We must integrate other actors: parliamentarians, whose role is to produce and legislate laws; administrations, which should implement these legal measures through the executive; and civil society actors, who are responsible for public awareness and advocating things to function normally,” he explained. 

Integrity of public treasury essential

On his part, the President of the Parliamentary Caucus on Illicit Financial Flows, Senator Pierre Flambeau Ngayap, said the issue of integrity of the public treasury is essential as it involves transparency and integrity that are at the heart of governance. 

“If what is done by the public authorities is not known, is not presented in a complete way, the citizens will not be able to find and understand what the public authorities do for them. So, it is important for us, parliamentarians, to contribute to associate civil society with a good understanding of parliamentary procedures so that everything that the government does concerning public finances is well appropriated first by the parliamentarians themselves, then by the civil society which is organised, whose important steps are devoted to public action in relation to public finances,” he said.

Senator Ngayap noted that: “Every time we have the feeling that a government action is not clear or well understood, our duty is to question the government so that it can explain itself better about what it is doing for the benefit of the population”.

“We have a parliamentary network which is the African Caucus on the fight against illicit financial flows and taxation, which aims to ensure that national resources are not transferred illegally abroad, because everything that comes out illegally is a provision of the country in terms of self-financing capacity. The more our national resources are preserved in the country, the more we will have the capacity to develop our nation,” he stated.

This article was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3486 of Friday June 27, 2025