The Cameroonian’s Decentralization Code and the Production of Implementation’s Regulations by the Government: Pressing Theoretical and Practical Questions put to Stakeholders.

Abstract

The issue in this article is the evaluation of the impact of administrative regulations on the implementation of the decentralization process in Cameroon. This issue is highlighted by a double delegation stemming from the Constitution which while adopting decentralization form of government delegates almost all the powers of putting the process in motion to Parliament. From the observations and analysis of the laws adopted by Parliaments, loopholes are deliberately left by the legislator to be filled by the Executive Power by way of regulations. The bond of contention is that such delegation is left without giving the time frame for that to happen nor setting standards for the content of such implementing regulations. These unfettered powers delegated to the Executive is part of the political game unfolding under a de facto one party system. It creates an avenue for the obvious resistant of the entrenched centralization as opposed to the very purpose of the decentralization process. The outcome is that Executive Power paradoxically imposes the pace of decentralization process to the point of frustrating an array of key provisions of the decentralization code. All of these, contrary to the intentions manifested in the Constitution on the model of decentralization, creating local governments.