Bar Council president counts achievements, declares for second mandate.

Second mandate for greater realisations

The President of the Cameroon Bar Council, Bâtonnier Mbah Eric Mbah, has counted the achievements of his first mandate, which he says warrant him to be given another mandate.

The Bar President was speaking to journalists in Yaounde Wednesday.



His meeting with reporters came a day after he presided over the grandiose event to lay the foundation stone of the headquarters of the Bar Association.

A second mandate, President Mbah said, would enable him consolidate the achievements of his first mandate and push forward more innovations.

In the era of information technologies, the Bar President said he succeeded after 10 years of struggle, to relaunch exams to train pupil lawyers to become full-fledged lawyers.

He announced with glee that up to 2,016 young Cameroonian pupil lawyers are beneficiaries of the recent intake.

To improve internal administration, Barrister Mbah said his team succeeded in putting in place an archive system as well as activate the association’s website that had gone out of use for many years.

In addition, the Batonier said he succeeded in instituting a digital professional card, with multiple components for all lawyers. 

He explained that the new professional card allows lawyers to auto document their personal details, stating that it permits a lawyer to sit in the comfort of his/her home or office and process their documents, ask for official favours and carry out other essential transactions. 

The new professional card, Batonier Mbah said, serves not only for identification purposes, but will help the Bar to weed out charlatans in the profession. 

“Through the use of an inbuilt security button, the card is capable of sending out information incase a lawyer is involved in an accident. The card also sends a message and the location so that anybody nearby can come to the aid of the lawyer”, Batonier Mbah said.

During his first mandate also, Mbah said the Bar participated in the training of gendarmes, as he strives to mellow down the strain that often exists between legal practitioners and the security forces. 

In addition, he said his executive had worked with diplomatic services to make sure lawyers no longer find it difficult to be issued visas.

He said the Bar, under his leadership, worked with the Ministry of Higher Education to review the curricular of Law Departments in the different State universities.

Barrister Mbah insisted that henceforth, most Law Departments would be offering courses and training programmes that are not only in tune with the realities of the times, but that suit the Cameroon job market. 

Above all, Batonier Mbah said the laying of the foundation of the association’s headquarters is a milestone that has taken decades to be realised.

The envisaged edifice, he said, will give them moral ground to institute periodic visits to chambers to ensure that all lawyers have offices. 

He lamented that the absence of offices, or for lawyers to be moving about with offices in their briefcases, makes it cumbersome to locate and serve a lawyer with any legal notice when necessary.

Replies critics

Batonier Mbah explained that the resignation of the Bar treasurer had nothing to do with refusal to give him 400 million FCFA. 

Rather, he said the money was voted as startup capital to be given to the contractor who is in charge of the headquarters project. 

The Bar President said after they had verified to ensure that the company is capable of executing the project, the General Assembly voted that the sum of money be disbursed to enable the contractor start the work. 

He disclosed that the treasurer had said he did not see the possibility of the job being executed. 

He explained that was why he had to resign and allow his assistant to take over.

“I convincingly explained how this project can be realised. The Bar Council by a majority decision approved that the money be paid. It was not the Bar President who single handedly paid out this money. It was co-signed as provided for in the Bar constitution”, Batonier Mbah told journalists.

On the push to introduce online voting during elections tentatively fixed for January 18, 2025, Barrister Mbah said the introduction of such a new method cannot be done by one person, especially when that person is a candidate for the anticipated election.

Batonier Mbah insisted that if online voting is to be introduced, it should start with changing the constitution to include that method of voting. 

The appropriate voting application must be approved and tested for its appropriateness. 

“People to handle the equipment must be trained. And unless all these processes are undertaken, it remains premature to talk of introducing online voting during elections that are barely one month away, if the election actually holds as programmed”, the Batonier stated.

 

 Elections not likely to hold in January

Taking different parameters into consideration, the Bar President said it remains doubtful that elections tentatively fixed for January 2025, in accordance with the constitution, would hold.

He said there is nothing in place to guarantee that elections will hold in January, especially when the General Assembly President has suspended the convening of the assembly.

Even more worrying, Batonier Mbah said, is the prevailing climate where one of the aspirants is fighting to impose online voting. 
Barrister Mbah said such pressure to impose a new voting method does not only create suspicion, but would open the flood gates for an avalanche of litigations to pour in.  

 

This story was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3325 of Thursday December 19, 2024

 

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