Editorial: Embezzlement in councils; When SDOs are accomplices

A whirlpool of scandals bordering on embezzlement, fraud, misappropriation, swindling, scam and rip-offs is flooding through the sluice gates of councils.

They are municipalities supervised by senior divisional officers with the purpose to ensure transparency and accountability in the management of municipalities which are often referred to as grassroots governments.

Shouldn’t the scandals ignite some fire fighting reaction from the Biya administration if emergence by 2035 and decentralization are worth the drum beats?

There are credible complaints that money allocated to provide essential potable water in the Muyuka municipality was paid for no work done. A junk caterpillar bought without going through tenders for 30MFCFA was supplied to Alou council for 150MFCFA together with a used vehicle paid for as a new one.

In Buea, 150MFCFA is reported to have been “missing” from the council and just last week, Tubah councillors said 26 MFCFA was used to transfer council furniture within a distance of one kilometer. The cases of theft in councils using several subterfuges is alarming in communities notorious for bad roads, poor and insufficient drinking water, on-off electricity and dilapidating classrooms.

The common denomination in some of the councils is identical. The scandals are being exposed in councils whose former mayors were flushed out of office at the last municipal elections and are no longer on seat to cover their filthy tracks. So what is the guarantee that those who survived for another term have not fortified the locks on their cupboards?

All 360 councils in Cameroon are supervised by senior divisional officers who are supposed to ensure that the scam and misappropriation of public funds do not occur in their municipalities. But the reverse based on the verifiable complaints is the trend. Shouldn’t the rate at which incidents of malfeasance are cropping up in councils make the supervisors accomplices? Does the case in the Tubah council not tally with that preposition?

Nguéle Nguéle Felix, the SDO for Mezam division has suspended a commission of inquiry set up by Tubah in which he is the supervising authority to probe how former SDF mayor, Stanislaus Sofa spent some 26 MFCFA to transport few office furniture from the old office to the new one.

The distance between the two points is only a few kilometres and some councillors say the work could have been done for just 50 000FCFA at the most. Where was the “supervisory” SDO when a contract of 26MFCFA was awarded to transfer the equipment when the law stipulates that contracts from five million francs most pass through advertised tender?

That is a key question the commission would have searched for answers but what has raised eyebrows is that the SDO has “suspended” the commission without a time frame.

His warp logic is that it was not properly constituted. As council supervisory authority, where was he when the council was setting up the commission? What was his advice when such a huge amount for a small council like Tubah was being allocated to transfer furniture?

Was the amount programmed in the budget of the council or it was a special allocation which the supervisor approved for the questionable contract? If truly the SDO felt the commission was not properly constituted, why did he not order that the correction be made immediately or invite other authorities like CONAC or the supreme state audit to do the investigation?

Does suspending the work of the commission not give the impression that the SDO might have benefitted from the rip-off?

The councillors were embarrassed and flabbergasted when in presenting his record of stewardship, Sofa who notoriously refused to leave office after being voted out said he spent a tidy 26M FCFA to transport council office equipment.

One of the deputy mayors told reporters that “only some files and few items were transferred because the cupboards and most furniture we have in the new chambers were constructed in here”.

Such theft of tax payers’ money is not exclusive to Tubah council or those of Alou, Muyuka, Buea et al where alarms have been raised. Numerous others may never be exposed if councils are not frequently audited by independent authorities like the supreme state audit, MINAT/D, the audit bench of the supreme court and CONAC.

Such audits must be regular and when credible allegations of irregularities are made by the populace and councilors, the auditors must act with dispatch. The allegations should not end on council chamber storming debates and pages of newspapers.

Even when CONAC is called in like in the case of Alou where the scandals are legion with the supply of used equipment as new without tender, immediate action is not seen. That gives the impression to the affected communities that the cheats used some of their illicit wealth to oil the palms of investigators.

Giving the scandals in councils and the improving democratisation process, isn’t it time for SDOs who were made supervisors of councils during the one party system to be stripped off that role? Haven’t the various scams in councils given justification that SDOs are not effective supervisors?

Are some not even retarding development in councils they supervise, often demanding huge allowances for attending council sessions and for signing council budgets?

Why should councils be “supervised” in the first place when they are truly governments at local levels and its councillors elected based on a specific programme of action? Doesn’t the number of scandals in councils cripple the legitimacy and effectiveness of SDOs as supervisors, many of who are the problems instead of the solution?

With the Biya regime’s pet project to lead Cameroon to emergence in 2035, the transfer of all ministerial development budgets to councils next year and given the vortex of scandals in councils, some radical reforms are needed to block the flood gate of stealing from municipal chambers.

Senators must also live up to their legal responsibility to ensure that cases of malpractices in their regions are promptly investigated and culprits brought to book so that Cameroonians can have the feel good effects of emergence and decentralisation.