The Vice President of the National Anti-Corruption Commission, NACC, announced yesterday during a press briefing in Yaounde. Dieudonné Massi Gams, the Vice President of the National Anti-Corruption Commission, told pressmen yesterday at the Yaounde Conference Centre that from January 2 to December 31, 2009, NACC received 312 complaints on corruption and related offences. 238 of them have been investigated into. He also announced the imminent creation of a rapid intervention anti-corruption unit that will be expected to appear promptly on the scene of complaint to act.

During his presentation, he explained that since June 16, 2010, NACC has been working with its technical partner, Change Habits Oppose Corruption, CHOC, to set up the national strategy to fight corruption that will establish a clear and common vision as well as harmony in the fight against corruption.

“The methodology chosen by NACC required the organisation of sector-by-sector workshops and meetings to strengthen the pillars of integrity as an approach for the formulation of the national strategy for the fight against corruption in Cameroon,” said the Vice-President of NACC. He revealed that 10 sectors of activity and six pillars of integrity were chosen as priority based on some work that had been done by NACC in the past and the perception of corruption by experts. Laying emphasis on a participative sector-by-sector programming of its activities, workshops had been organised in 2009 with the transport, education, media and the business sectors.

He further explained that since June 16, 2010, NACC and the CHOC project have organised workshops in five sectors: health, forest and environment; public investment budget and public contracts; education as well as public finances. Four more workshops will be organised to target sectors like transports, decentralisation, the business climate as well as mining and extractive industries. As for the strengthening of pillars of integrity, workshops were recently organised for the civil society and the media. Four more workshops will also be organised to target the following sectors: the legislative system; the judiciary system and institutions fighting corruption; technical and financial partners and lastly the executive system. In all, 16 more workshops will be organised before September 4, 2010 so that the final document could be ready before September 24, 2010. He justified the sector-by-sector workshops approach on the need to know the manifestations of corruption in the different sectors of national life so as to ensure a more efficient fight. The conclusions of the workshop will be transmitted to the concerned ministries for appropriation, modification or eventual enrichment so as to produce a sector-by-sector strategy that will be realistic not bureaucratic.

The Vice President of NACC also expressed joy that the population were mobilised wherever NACC passed and the participants in the different workshops showed satisfaction and felt proud that they too were associated. NACC officials also used yesterday’s press briefing to present some of NACC’s achievements in the areas of investigation, prevention and cooperation. The Vice President called on all Cameroonians to change their habits and serve the nation without requesting more in addition to their salaries. He promised that common questions in services like “where is my 30 per cent?”, “what do I gain in this” will stop. “If we love this country then we must do what is right,” he ended. The press briefing was held in the presence of the representative of the Prime Minister and Head of Government.