Centres for Arbitration and Mediation (CAMs)

Justice is currently a basic demand of the Cameroonian people. The Judicial branch is hampered by the over bearing power of the executive, and its organisation and functioning, which are very inadequate to the country's needs.

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There are several areas that need to be improved and can be summarized as follows:

•  deficient access to justice,
•  inefficiency of the system,
•  lack of independence of the judiciary,
•  cumbersome and prolonged judicial proceedings,
•  inadequate judicial inquiries,
•  non procedural time limits, and
•  arbitrary sentences.

The poor functioning of institutions, the obsolescence of many laws, and the absence of basic guarantees relating to judicial authorities have led to a widespread dysfunction of the institution.

The existing justice system in Cameroon is not functional to serve the needs of the Cameroonian society in general and the rural and indigent communities in particular. This situation, has created a climate not favorable for the development of individual and community wealth.

In this context it is imperative to create out of court options to resolve disputes.

The central aims of the CAMs project are:

1. to improve the timeliness and quality of dispute resolution on the local level
2. to help improve the work of the Quarter Councils
3. to ease the strain on the urban judicial systems
4. to reduce detention time and eliminate costly bail payments.
5. to reduce and or eliminate the incidences of jungle justice and arbitrary killings

The GCI CAMs are instituted within existing local structures that were already handling local and petty disputes. This includes quarter and community or village councils. Astudy of the structures revealed that they could play a fomidable role in resolving low level disputes and contributing to valuable peace that is essential for the development of wealth.

This programme has been evaluated by Leanne Johannson