The new General Manager, Franklin Ngoni Ikome Njie, was installed last Saturday by MINADER boss.

Franklin Ngoni Ikome Njie has officially taken up duty as the General Manager of the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC). While officially commissioning the new General Manager in a heavily attended ceremony last Saturday January 12 in Bota, Limbe, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development (MINADER) Essimi Menye urged him to implement a strict managerial programme that would stimulate productivity and competitiveness as well as make a value chain of its products.

Increasing productivity and competitiveness, improving workers social conditions, ensuring the security of the corporation’s investments, the expansion of CDC plantations amongst other things, are some of the challenges awaiting the 49-year-old Franklin Ngoni Njie, appointed at the helm of CDC by Presidential decree No 2012/631/ of 19 December 2012.

While congratulating him for the good handling of the corporation during the transition period when he served as Acting General Manager, Minister Essimi Menye enjoined the new CDC GM to embark on innovations which he said are at the forefront of the agricultural revolution as required by the Head of State.

Speaking earlier, the Government Delegate to the Limbe City Council, Motanga Andrew Monjimba, stated that the CDC is more than a corporation but rather a symbol of cultural and historical background of a people. Consequently, the CDC needs to be viable, prosperous and profit making. CDC, the Government Delegate went on, needs to boost production and cut down cost. Motanga identified transport cost to the Doula port as paramount adding that the cost would have been reduced if the natural Limbe Deep Sea Port is constructed.

Born on 4 April 1964 in Bokwai- Buea, Franklin Ngoni Njie, a Civil Engineer joined the CDC in 1996. From 1998 to 2002, he worked as Civil Works Services Manager in the Department of Technical Services. In 2002, he was promoted to the post of Director of Technical Services where he served until his appointment as GM last 19 December 2012. He is the fourth Cameroonian General Manager of the 66-year-old CDC with a labour force of some 22,000 employees. The erudite Civil Engineer has a daunting tasking of managing 21.970 hectares of rubber, 14.990 hectares of oil palm and 4.290 hectares of banana plantations which are the three main income-generating crops of the CDC. The new GM hinted pressmen in his first-ever interview as GM of the CDC that studies had been made with some problems diagnosed and strategies put in place for a better CDC.