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Over the 2017-2018 period, the Cameroonian government is planning to surface a total of 1,615 km of new roads, the Minister of Public Works, Emmanuel Nganou Djoumessi, announced during a press conference organised on 14 February in the capital of the country.

To reach this objective, approximately 1,000 km of roads will be asphalted this year, the Prime Minister, Philémon Yang, revealed while presenting the economic, political and cultural programme of the government for 2017 to the parliamentarians. This was in November 2016 in Yaoundé.

In this regard, a global envelope of FCfa 461 billion will be injected this year in the road construction, renovation and maintenance works in the country. Some works to be undertaken as part of the emergency plan launched by the government will necessitate FCfa 100 billion, FCfa 12 billion will be transferred to local governments, while the contribution from the budget of the Ministry of Public Works will be FCfa 312 billion.

In other words, in 2017 and 2018, the Cameroonian government will largely exceed its commitment to asphalt an average of 300 km of roads per year. This commitment comes with the ambition the public authorities have of reaching the target of 8,500 km of surfaced roads in Cameroon by 2020 (against slightly over 6,000 km currently). Which will in reality correspond to only 17% of the national road network.

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Rita Akana

18.Feb.2017

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Union Centrale des Coopératives Agricoles de l’Ouest (UCCAO – Central Union of Western Agricultural Cooperatives), one of the most important coffee producers’ group in Cameroon, is planning to invest FCfa 400 million to upgrade its roasting and ground coffee production plant, we officially learned.

To achieve this, this cooperative society just signed with the Cameroonian government an agreement enabling it to profit from the customs and tax incentives provided in the 2013 law on promoting private investment in Cameroon. A text which offers exemptions of 5 to 10 years, during the installation as well as the production for the benefitting companies.

With its range of ground coffees, UCCAO is one of the flag-bearers of the Cameroonian coffee on the international market. This cooperative society for example won the “Gourmet d’or” during the international origin roasted coffees competition organised in June 2015 in Paris, the French capital.

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Rita Akana

15.Feb.2017

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The Cameroonian subsidiary of South African telecoms operator MTN just bettered its mobile money services by now offering mini-statement on mobile transactions.

“We thought that users may need to know, as is the case with an ordinary bank account, what they do as transactions: deposit, money transfer, withdrawal, bill payment, etc”, explained a MTN Cameroon manager. According to him, this innovation contributes to the transparency of the service. “Users can know what is happening with their account in real time and it is free. You just need to enter the required code and follow the instructions on the mobile phone screen. And this mini-statement can be printed”, the source adds.

This new service follows the one enabling users to check their bank account via mobile phone. Since September 2015, it is even possible for the clients of Afriland First Bank holding MTN Mobile Money accounts to make financial transactions between their bank and mobile accounts. MTN Cameroon claims over 2.6 million users for the mobile financial transaction service.

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Rita Akana

12.Feb.2017

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As the internet blackout in the North West and South West Regions extend to a month, Cameroons main opposition party, the Social Democratic Front, SDF has resolved among other things to launch a complain to the appropriate courts of law to have users of internet service compensated for being deprived off this service by the government.

 While calling on the government to reinstate internet connection in the North West and South West Regions as a matter of urgency, the first vice president Honourable Joshua Osih, speaking after a National Executive Committee, NEC, meeting noted that cutting internet facility in parts of the region is in violation of the civic rights of citizens of Cameroon.

While the government continue to be silent as to the reason behind the shutting down of internet connection in the Anglophone Regions, the blackout which came barely two hours after the Cameroon Anglophone Civil Society Consortium was banned is seen by political observers as a move by the government to prevent the sharing and receiving of any information concerning the current political atmosphere in the two English speaking regions.

 

These days in the South West and North West Regions, all financial transactions are now carried out in the neighboring French speaking regions of the country while reporters of both the broadcast and print media faced an almost impossible situation filling in reports from these regions.

MTN, Orange, Nexttel and Camtel, the main mobile telephone and internet service providers in Cameroon are reported to be acting on instruction of the government as explained by a senior official of one of the leading communication company in the country. The official who pleaded for anonymity told this reporter that it is within the governments’ rights to come in and regulates the sector from time to time. Backed by the license they issued to the mobile/internet service providers.

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09.Feb.2017

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30-year-old Bongajum Lesley Ndzi, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Bonga Juice, has won the Global competition for Entrepreneurs emerging as the lone winner of four from Africa.

Bongajum Lesley, an entrepreneur by practice though a graduate of Biochemistry from the University of Buea was among the 18 lucky winners selected worldwide as the winners of the 2017 NexGen in Franchising Global Competition.

Raising the flag of Cameroon as the after emerging as its sole winner, the CEO of Bonga Juice, a restaurant and fast food chain with headquarters in Buea offers premium fresh fruits juices/smoothies, salads and fresh healthy food. His vision, take the brand throughout Africa thus sharing in the Bonga experience. An opportunity which he says is now more than ever a reality thanks to him emerging victorious and thus inscribing his name on the international franchising organisation.

The social entrepreneur who has being running his business for over five years now told this reporter in Buea that he was pushed into the business because it did not only provide an opportunity for him to earn a living but to put some money in the hands of local farmers, to create jobs for the youths as he currently employs dozens of them and equally to provide a healthy option for denizens of the towns he is based in.

Currently present in two cosmopolitan towns of Cameroon; Buea and Douala, Bonga juice made up youthful and dynamic team hold tight to their commitment to uses only fresh foods and vegetables produced locally so as to empower local farmers in Cameroon.

 About the NexGen in Franchise

The NexGen in Franchising Global Competition is an annual convention that culminates a year-long campaign in which more than 400 young entrepreneurs submit their franchise business plans for a chance to be among the top 18 winners.

With a cash prize valued at some 6.000US Dollars (not cash), selected winners are guaranteed a passed into the international franchise organisation (currently having more than 40.000 members), an opportunity to attend the international franchise annual convention which took place this year in the fabulous city of Las Vegas, USA, mentorship and follow-up be already established organisation free of charge for two years among others.

Open to entrepreneurs’ ages 21-35, the NexGen in Franchising Global Competition is a worldwide program that engages young entrepreneurs seeking careers and business opportunities in the franchising industry.

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Amos Fofung in Buea

09.Feb.2017

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Google Code-In is a yearly hacking competition organized by Google and for the 2016 edition, the Grand Prize Winner for the competition is Collins Nji. Collins also happens to be the first Black and the first African to win this competition.

Collins participated in this competition at a very bad time. He lives in Bamenda, Cameroon, and during the period of the competition, the government of Cameroon had banned internet connections from the North West and South West Regions of Cameroon for political reasons, leaving businesses and students stranded. However, Collins prevailed over such limitations by enrolling, participating and winning the competition as the international Grand Prize Winner.

The Google Code-In is a competition for Pre-university students aged between 13 to 17 where students are given a variety a variety of bite-sized tasks to hack open source software.

With the crippling Internet shutdown which occurred in the English Cameroons for some weeks now; Collins Nji a 17 year-old Upper Sixth student at the Government Bilingual High School Bamenda succeeded in emerging as the first Black and African Grand Prize Winner for the Google Code-In 2016 contest.

Collins a product of the Silicon Mountain tech ecosystem was particularly affected by the Internet blockade imposed by the Cameroon Government. He was forced to travel to nearby Bafoussam to submit his solutions and return to Bamenda to continue working despite the risks involved.
On January 30th Google announced the winners of this year’s contest; Collins is the first African to have won this competition. As a result, he will be traveling to the Google Headquarters in Mountain View, CA to meet the Google Open Source team and other members of the Google Software Engineering team for a tour of Silicon Valley finest.

He will have the opportunity to meet other like-minded hackers from all over the world for an intense week of intellectual and cultural exchange.

With the damaging effects of the Internet shutdown in the English Cameroons during the past few months Collins Nji’s performance is laudable and we highly encourage all English speaking Cameroonians to be inspired by example. In his own words “When GCI started I was anxious and nervous to some extend… I had to find ways to turn my nervousness into creativity and fun. Participating was super exciting and really exhausting,  and at the end, I discovered that I gained a whole new level of experience in the Open source world.

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Rita Akana

08.Feb.2017

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