By Noela EBOB BISONG
The General Manager of Cameroon Development Corporation CDC, Franklin Ngoni Ikome Njie, has pleaded with the Corporation’s workers to maintain calm and patience as they await salary arrears owed them. In a press interview in his office last November 12, the GM said CDC Management is very aware of the situation of its workers and what they are going through.
He was reacting to a strike action which took place earlier on November 12 in some units of the Corporation’s work force, with demands of unpaid salary arrears and irregular payment of wages/salaries. Videos circulated online of some CDC workers on the streets in Tiko, Penamboko, Idenau and some other areas where the Corporation is located, telling of their hardships.
Franklin Njie told the press that, “It is a known-problem; it has been the subject of a good number of working sessions with the state and other stakeholders.”
reassuring workers that all is being done to settle their salary arrears
The GM explained that, “Progress has been made; the State has decided to take over the salary debt for the period 2018 to December 31st 2022. It is a total of about FCFA 35.7billion, which has to be disbursed in two installments. A Convention to that effect has been signed. One of the big problems that the workers have is that for the basis of the Convention that was signed, management had a meeting with the workers and told them the progress that has been made and there was reason for workers to have expectations that the first part of the payment will be paid latest September ending. Unfortunately that expectation has not been met; not because of the fault of CDC Management or Government, (Government has taken a decision and stands by it!)”, he maintained.
Franklin Njie detailed that, “What has caused the delay was that the Commercial Bank that was retained for the execution of the content of that Convention encountered issues of Conformance and Capacity which made it that the decision had to be revisited. That is what has taken a lot of time, for other commercial banks to manifest their interest, carry out negotiations with them and submit them to hierarchy for due diligence.”
He said, “We have lost a lot of time, and what I can say is that, the process is quite advanced; there is the proposal that has been identified to be likely suitable, the finishing touches are being done for the concrete proposal to be put in front of the competent authority (Minister of Finance) for the Convention. The result of all of this exercise will be the Convention between this commercial financial institution, CDC and the State represented by the Minister of Finance.”
Following the Tuesday strike action, The SUN gathered that CDC Management called the leaders of the five Trade Unions operational in the Corporation for frank talk. “We had a meeting and the Unions and Management have resolved that it is imperative for us to do all it takes for serenity to be re-established in CDC because we need that to achieve what we want to achieve”, the GM told the press.
In a Tuesday, November 12 statement released by Management and signed by CDC GM, Franklin Njie after the meeting with Trade Union leaders, it read in part that, “Management understands the demands of the workers and the difficulties they go through…Management is reassuring workers that the State and other Stakeholders are very conscious of the need for the urgent treatment of this matter. Thus, workers should not allow the challenges to cause distraction and agitation at this point where much has already been achieved towards the payment of salary arrears…we are calling on the workers to stay calm, maintain an optimistic spirit and exercise patience”, it read.
When asked how much longer workers shall wait to receive the first part of the arrears, the GM simply said, “I call for serenity without giving a time frame, there are technical issues which have to be looked into by the competent persons”.