The bills that include two to amend the 2014, 2015 Finance Laws were received by the Chairmen’s Conference and endorsed by a plenary sitting on Saturday, March 21, 2015.

Members of Parliament are already into business as seven bills from the Executive were received by the House on Saturday, March 21, 2015. The Chairmen’s Conference that began the day in camera was presided by House Speaker, Hon. Cavaye Yeguie Djibril who welcomed the Executive represented by the Minister Delegate to the Minister of Territorial Administration and Decentralisation in charge of Regional and Local Authorities, Jules Doret Ndongo. In all, seven bills that were declared admissible for scrutiny were later presented to the rest of the MPs in a plenary sitting by Hon. Cavaye Yeguie Djibril.

Bills Amending Certain Provisions of 2014, 2015 Finance Laws

The first bill is to ratify Ordinance No. 2014/2 of 10 December 2014 to amend and supplement certain provisions of Law No 2013/17 of December 16, 2013 which was the Finance Law of the Republic of Cameroon for the 2014 financial year. Under this Ordinance, the amount of non-concessional loans that the government was authorised to conclude the 2014 financial year was raised from FCFA 250 billion to FCFA 600 billion. The concessional loans, for their part, remained unchanged at FCFA 500 billion. The Ordinance was issued in accordance with the authorisation provided in Section 24 of the 2014, to enable government mobilise resources amounting to FCFA 925 billion, for the implementation of the Three-Year Growth-Acceleration Emergency Plan.

Meanwhile, the second bill is to ratify Ordinance No 2015/1 of February 6, 2015 to amend and supplement certain provisions of Law No. 2014/26 of 23 December 2014 which is the Finance Law of the Republic of Cameroon for the 2015 financial year. This Ordinance is to the effect that the maximum amount of public securities, in particular Treasury bonds, that the government is authorised to issue in order to finance development projects is increased from FCFA 320 billion to FCFA 900 billion.

Bill To Ratify OECD Convention on Tax Matters

The third bill is to authorise the President of the Republic to ratify the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Convention on mutual administrative assistance in tax matters in 1988, as amended by the Protocol of 27 May, 2010. The OECD Convention that Cameroon signed on January 27, 2014, is a multilateral instrument with the two-fold objective to enable the exchange of tax information in order to combat international tax evasion and avoidance, and to provide the possibility of assistance in the recovery of taxes abroad. The ratification will help boost tax yields and hence the country’s resources.

Cameroon and Turkey to Boost Security Cooperation

The MPs also received the bill to authorise the President of the Republic to ratify the cooperation agreement in the field of security signed between the government of the Republic of Cameroon and the government of the Republic of Turkey in Ankara, Turkey on June 19, 2014. Framed to help both countries cooperate in combating terrorism, organised crime, transnational crime and cybercrime, amongst others, the agreement will help build the operational and technical capacity of Cameroon’s security forces and, amongst others, ensure experience and information sharing in the fight against crime and terrorism.

Other bills that will be scrutinised by MPs include the bill to ratify the Protocol on the Preferential Tariff Scheme for the establishment of the Trade Preferential System among member countries of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference adopted in Istanbul, Turkey. The bill to amend and supplement some provisions of the December 21, 2010 Law to regulate Electronic Communications in Cameroon as well as the bill governing audiovisual activities in Cameroon will also be scrutinised.

The Ministers in charge of Finance, of Defence, External Relations and of Communication will be defending these bills that fall in their respective areas of competence before the designated committees whose incumbent bureaus were re-elected on March 20, 2015. Before closing the session, the House Speaker announced that questions had been received from some MPs for imminent Question-Answer plenary sittings with the Executive.