EITD Research

    Cameroon Public Utilities Forum

Courts   

Courts are there to help us, in society, determine guilt or innocence of persons accused of crime and impose punishment on those found guilty, as well as give authoritative decisions in civil disputes between private individuals, and also between private individuals and the state. Courts constitute one of the three powers of our state or government. They exercise the judiciary power, and operate in conjunction with the other two powers of state, the executive power (exercised by 'the Government') and the legislative power (exercised by Parliament). The legal rules that courts work with come from Parliament, and to some extent from courts themselves. Decisions of courts are implemented by the Government, and can trigger actions in Parliament.

Courts are to weigh matters of contention as it were in a balance, and help to clarify or settle differences. This requires impartiality, fair treatment of all contending parties, and continuing allegiance to consistency in the rules expressed in law, which should determine the acceptability or repugnance of attempts to admit specific facts of specific cases within the legal framework. This entails intensive understanding of the body of legal rules, which should compel courts to thoroughly attend to requirements of law in their decisions.

Law becomes meaningless without effective courts to interpret it and apply it to specific facts of specific cases consistently. Much of this is evident in Cameroon, where legal ambiguity appears almost everywhere, together with interpretation deficiencies of courts, continuing directions to or interference with courts in their deliberations from other parts of state and society, and widespread public dissatisfaction with the legal performance of courts.

Courts in Cameroon are noted for trivial and repeated adjournments, poor timekeeping, little documentation and learning, and much bribery and corruption. Our test case before the Kumba court of first instance, for example, is still to be heard and has already been adjourned as part of a mass adjournment of cases on Tuesday April 29, 2008, in court 2, with 2 magistrates present in their chambers and the disappointment of the several contending parties. Bringing our test case to the point of hearing in court has involved great inconveniences, hardships and immense financial sacrifices. Without the money and seeming endless time to spare, getting a hearing (not to mention reasoned impartial decision) in court becomes impossible!