From 25 to 26 October 2021, the first-ever pan-African country conference was held at the Hotel Merina in Yaoundé, Cameroon, under the theme: Combating Illicit Financial Flows to Bridge the Growing Inequality Gap in Africa. About a hundred citizens, coming from multiple and diverse backgrounds and professional affiliations responded to the call.
The Africa Mining Vision (AMV) is a pan-African policy framework established by a network of initiatives at regional, continental and global levels that aim to transform Africa's mining sector for its sustainable development.The vision, supported by its action plan for implementation, is motivated by the disconcerting observation that although African countries have significant mineral resources, they rank among the poorest in the world.
Tax treaties play a key role in the context of international tax cooperation. On one hand, they encourage international investment and thus global economic growth by reducing or eliminating international double taxation on cross-border income; on the other hand, they strengthen cooperation between tax administrations, particularly in the fight against international tax evasion and illicit financial flows.
According to a report on Illicit Financial Flows which was published by the African Union and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa indicating that the African continent loses on average 50 billion USD per year in terms of Illicit Financial Flows, the Consortium composed of ADIN, Afroleadership, CRADEC, DMJ and TI-C, has developed a study on illicit financial flows in international trade in Cameroon as part of the project "Strengthening budgetary governance for the provision of sustainable basic services in respect for the preservation of the environment ”, project funded by the Delegation of the European Union within the framework of Cameroon-European Union cooperation.
On September 30, 2020 in Yaounde, the results obtained from the said study were presented to the public to understand what opportunities the State is losing through the IFFs.
Law n ° 2019/023 of December 24, 2019 on the finance law of the Republic of Cameroon for the financial year 2020 has been available since the end of 2019 and its implementation started in January 2020. Due to the health crisis, the said law was revised from 4.951.7 billion FCFA to 4.409 billion CFA francs, ie a decrease of 542.7 billion corresponding to -11.0%. It is in this context that CRADEC, member of the Civil Society Reference Group for the Transparency of Public Finances in consortium with REACH-OUT was appointed by COSADER, to organize and run an information campaign on the Law. 2020 Finance Committee and its announced Budget Collective and serve as a dissemination space for the 2020 Citizen Budget in the South-West region.
On the sidelines of the pre-validation workshop of the study on IFFs, the Task Force as well as the members of the consortium and the project implementation team, had a day of capacity building in understanding and use of tools; and influence and mobilization of other stakeholders in the monitoring of tax equity and IFFs for optimal mobilization of budgetary resources in Cameroon.
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