Free Cameroon Now

“A senseless strike!” Vincent Ndumu Nji, Government Delegate. Bamenda City Council Mr Government Delegate, during the traders’ strike of 12 July over increased market shed rents, you were in a conference in London. So, how did you feel when you got the information? Well, I felt a little bit worried in the sense that, you can easily agree with me that it was a senseless strike! The first thing about it is that, as a business man operating within the premises of a municipality, when you go on strike, the strike should be about something beneficial to you, because closing your shop or activities for one day causes you to lose money. Secondly, we had had a lot of discussions with the representatives of the traders of all the four markets here. All of us agreed on the necessity, given the means that are required to run this market, to bring up some of the market rents to the minimum official rates provided by the 2009 law on council fiscal revenue. So, I say it was surprising in the se...

T he strike action organised by Bamenda traders last July 12 has come and gone. It is now time for those affected to draw lessons. The following paper goes beyond the arguments and counter arguments for and against the strike to demonstrate that both striking traders and the BCC authorities actually have convergent interests. Last July 12, an estimated 3,000-man crowd of traders protesting increased market stall rents by the Bamenda City Council, stormed the North West Governor’s office, prompting a crisis meeting of the administration, the Bamenda City Council authorities, the Mayors of Bamenda I, II and III Councils and representatives of the striking traders; a meeting which resulted in the Secretary General of Bamenda City Council announcing a suspension of the price increase. The trader’s ire had been provoked when, in attempting to renew their rents as due from July 1, they were informed that as per instructions from the Government Delegate, rents were henceforth only rece...