Civil Status System: Modernisation operations underway

A national training seminar for personnel of the civil status registries was launched yesterday, September 21, 2015 in Yaounde by René Emmanuel Sadi.

Inadequacies of the present civil status systems such as insufficient qualified personnel, documentation errors; irregular supply of civil status registers and poor conservation of archives as well as population indifference towards civil status services will soon be history in Cameroon.

It is against this backdrop that the government through the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralisation has embarked on a nationwide operation aimed at modernising the system.

On this premise, the Minister of Territorial Administration, René Emmanuel Sadi, launched the national training seminar for officers and secretaries of civil status services, in the presence of the French ambassador to Cameroon, Christine Robichon.

According to the minister ,the complete overhauling of the civil status system is conducted through a methodical approach that began with the collection of useful data and information, the legal and institutional reforms, the sensitization and training of actors, the execution of the project and supply of materials and the eventual computerization of civil status data.

All of these, he stated, is aimed at placing the system at international level and rendering it more solid. By so doing, the MINATD boss opined will guarantee the security of Cameroon’s nationality, while recalling steps already taken by government towards achieving the goal.

The nationwide training which ends in February 2016 is the third lap of the modernisation drive. At the end of the operations that befits from technical and financial support from France and Germany, civil status data would not only be reliable for government development planning but would also be computerised.

Thus, Minister René Emmanuel Sadi stressed the need for the integration of civil status into school programmes at all levels while urging all stakeholders to play their different roles in the modernisation drive.

French ambassador, Christine Robichon said her country is supporting the project with FCFA 1.23 billion because it aims at improving the quality and reliability of the Cameroon civil status system which is a condition sin-qua-non for democracy.