Cameroon to extend banking secrecy to MFI

The Cameroonian government is currently refining a draft law to extend banking secrecy to all Micro Finance Institutions (MFIs) in the country, according to a statement by the National Credit Council.

Literally, bank secrecy is the obligation of the banks not to disclose to third parties the information on the bank accounts of their clients, except to institutions such as justice, financial investigation agencies, etc.

Over the years, bank secrecy has become controversial, since it has developed mechanisms to natural or legal persons to hold bank assets of more or less anonymously. In many cases, these assets come from embezzlement of public funds, various trafficking or corruption.

The extension of banking secrecy to microfinance institutions in Cameroon is certainly due to the dynamism of this sector in the country, with about 500 of the 800 MFIs identified in the CEMAC area.

In addition, the size of some Cameroonian MFI equals that of some commercial banks. An example is CAMCCUL, the first network of MFI of the country which gave birth to Union Bank of Cameroon and the volume of assets equals that of the Cameroonian subsidiary of BGFIBank.