To reduce poverty, financial exclusion: Government launches consumer protection caravan.

The Caravan was launched in Kribi, Ocean Division of the South Region on Thursday, August 14. This was during a ceremony presided by the Minister Delegate to the Minister of Finance, Yaouba Abdoulaye. He chaired the event on behalf of Minister Louis Paul Motaze.

The Minister Delegate said CIFIPRO is not just a slogan but an action plan to be implemented by stakeholders to reduce poverty and step up financial inclusion.

Yaouba Abdoulaye said CIFIPRO will help the most vulnerable persons in society make use of financial services to improve their lot. Services under the scheme, he said, are offered principally by banks, microfinance institutions, public and private sector financial services providers among others.

This, he said, explained the theme of the Caravan: “Savings, last mile financing and Protection of the Consumer of Financial Services: Strategies and Opportunities”.

The Minister Delegate said the same understanding informed the sub theme: “Sector structuring and last kilometre Financing; and Consumer protection in financial services: reforms, guarantees and prospects”.

He highlighted the role of institutions such as insurance companies, grouped under the Inter African Group of Members of Insurance Associations, CIMA; the Central African Banking Commission, COBAC; the Central African Financial Markets Surveillance Commission, COSUMAF to ease the Caravan

CIFIPRO, the Minister Delegate stated, has a roadmap which is stakeholders follow could go a long to beating poverty and guarantee inclusion in the use of financial services among Cameroonians.

Caravan expectations 

The City Mayor of Kribi, Guy Emmanuel Sabikanda, said government needs to put in place solid and appropriate legal instruments so as to ensure that guidelines are respected.

On behalf of consumers of the services of the Caravan, she stressed the need for the implementation processes to be clearly defined to avoid confusion. 

To also promote sanity during the implementation stages, the City Mayor advocated measures to protect consumers from unscrupulous individuals.

This, Sabikanda said, is to ensure unscrupulous persons don’t take advantage of the naivety and ignorance of consumers, to rob them of their resources.

Mayor Sabikanda, called on banks and other financial institutions to come up with services that appeal to grassroots populations. 

Without these, he said, not everyone will be able to avail themselves of the services of financial institutions. 

Failure to define guidelines, he said, risks jeopardizing the dreams of fostering social inclusion and national integration through poverty reduction and financial empowerment.

The City Mayo cited specifically the cumbersome way insurance claims are treated. Sabikanda said litigations often filed by certain persons rather result in the restrain of users and financial exclusion.

The City Mayor stated that such circumstances aggravate poverty among the most disadvantaged segments of the population.

Despite expressing such fears, he said “we are in support of this caravan today because we believe that it has potential to reduce poverty, and stimulate economic development of our towns and nation”.

This article was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3537 of Monday August 18, 2025