Cameroon’s audit chamber exposes vast untraceable public subsidies

In Cameroon, the accountability of public funds faces persistent challenges due to a lack of transparency. For the 2024 fiscal year, the Supreme Court’s Audit Chamber managed to track only a meager 3% of the total state subsidies allocated to public enterprises. This alarming statistic, detailed in its report on the execution of the finance law, underscores the significant information deficit hindering Cameroonian financial judges in their certification duties.

Report highlights poor traceability of public transfers

The financial jurisdiction, tasked with the judicial oversight of state accounts and public institutions, relies on supporting documents provided by authorizing officers and beneficiary entities. However, regarding the total volume of financial assistance granted to Cameroon’s public portfolio in 2024, only a minimal fraction could be linked to a clearly identified beneficiary and documented execution. The remaining 97% effectively fall outside the scope of verification for financial magistrates.

This figure is far from trivial; it strikes at the core of a structural governance issue: the state’s capacity to monitor how resources transferred to its various branches are utilized. State-owned companies, administrative public establishments, and entities with majority or strategic state participation receive substantial annual allocations, presented variously as balancing subsidies, investment grants, or tariff compensations.

Public sector under budgetary strain

Cameroon’s parastatal sector encompasses dozens of enterprises operating in strategic areas such as energy, hydrocarbons, transport, telecommunications, agro-industry, and water. Many are structurally dependent on state financial support to sustain their daily operations or meet financial obligations. Prominent examples include the National Hydrocarbons Corporation (SNH), Camair-Co, and Sonara, whose financial difficulties frequently necessitate high-level government intervention.

Amidst tight public finances, compounded by the imperative to keep the budget deficit below thresholds agreed upon with the International Monetary Fund (FMI) within the current program, controlling the flow of subsidies becomes a critical public policy objective. The economic and financial program backed by Washington specifically emphasizes transparency in financial flows between the Treasury and public entities, viewing it as essential for credible fiscal consolidation.

The Audit Chamber’s findings emerge despite Yaoundé’s commitment, as part of its public finance management reforms, to enhance the reporting of accounting information from public enterprises. The establishment in 2017 of a dedicated directorate within the Ministry of Finance, tasked with monitoring the state’s portfolio, was specifically intended to bolster this oversight. Yet, concrete results have been slow to materialize.

A challenge to budgetary sovereignty

Beyond mere accounting practices, the inability to document the destination and actual use of nearly all public subsidies undermines several strategic initiatives. It restricts the scope of parliamentary debate on the budget settlement law, diminishes the Supreme Court’s role as an early warning system, and deprives multilateral donors, notably the World Bank and the African Development Bank (AfDB), of reliable data to calibrate their budgetary support.

For private investors, particularly those involved in public-private partnerships or concession contracts with Cameroonian public entities, this opacity introduces an additional risk factor. The quality of sovereign credit is also measured by the robustness of internal control mechanisms for budgetary transfers. Nevertheless, by publishing these observations, the Audit Chamber fulfills its watchdog function and publicly demands compliance. The message to the executive is unambiguous: without substantial improvements in information reporting, the certification of state accounts will remain incomplete. Practically, this necessitates the widespread adoption of a standardized accounting framework for public enterprises, the enhancement of budgetary information systems, and the effective enforcement of sanctions against defaulting leaders.