The ceremony took place on Friday, 12 April 2024, and was presided over by the representative of the Head of State of Cameroon, Prime Minister Joseph Dion Ngute. Among front-line authorities attending the event were Mrs Marie-Laure Akin-Olugbade, Vice-President of the African Development Bank in charge of Regional Development, Integration and Service Delivery, Representative of the President of the African Development Bank Group, the Director General of the Central Africa Regional Office, as well as AfDB Governors for Central African countries and many other development partners
The ultra-modern building housing the AfDB Group’s Regional Office for Central Africa is located in Golfe neighbourhood, right in the heart of Cameroon’s political capital. Built on six floors and covering a 3,600 m² surface area, this state-of-the-art building is close to several other diplomatic representations and provides a number of amenities for the comfort of the staff working there. The official commissioning of these premises was an opportunity to hail the dynamism and vitality of economic cooperation between the AfDB Group and Central African countries in general and Cameroon in particular. In her opening address, the AfDB President’s Representative highlighted the stakes involved in establishing the AfDB Regional Office in Central Africa.
As she explained, this office meets the Bank’s policy of devolving operations to its customers. The Office is expected to assume a pivotal role in the coordination and implementation of the AfDB Group’s activities. It is intended to foster strategic dialogue with governments,
ensure more effective on-site monitoring of projects, provide more tailored responses to the specific
needs of countries and an opportunity to strengthen partnerships with regional institutions, civil society organisations and the private sector. As such, Marie-Laure Akin-Olugbade invited the authorities of countries covered by the Office (Cameroon, Congo, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, CAR, DRC and Chad) to seize the opportunities offered by this Office to enhance AfDB cooperation with Central African countries, whose portfolio to date amounts to roughly CFAF 11,000 billion (US$ 18 billion) for 600 projects.
Cameroon’s Head of Government, in his turn, praised the establishment of the AfDB Regional Office in Central Africa, in a context marked by the ongoing operationalisation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). “This office will contribute to completing major and integrative projects, inline with the political orientations set by the sub-region’s Heads of State,” Joseph Dion Ngute said. In his opinion, AfDB is a major strategic partner for Central African States, in view of the nature of its interventions. These target a wide range of areas, such as social and economic facilities (ICTs, energy, transport), governance, support to the productive sector, etc. In Cameroon, AfDB’s cooperation portfolio encompasses a number of projects, including the development of the Ring Road, the opening-up of the industrial zone of Kribi, and the asphalting of Grand Zambi-Kribi, Gobo-Pouss, Kumba-Mamfe and Bamenda-Enugu roads.
This cooperation enabled the construction of the bridge over Cross River, which links Central Africa (Cameroon) to West Africa (Nigeria). The Prime Minister reiterated “the utmost importance that the Head of State gives to the full development of this institution in our country”. The land title for the plot (4,000 m² of State private property) on which the permanent headquarters have
been erected was delivered to the Bank’s officials. This translates one of the commitments made by Cameroon in the agreement to build the headquarters of the Regional Office, signed by the two parties in July 2019 in Yaounde.
The Head of State’s representative expressed the wish to see, erected on the site, “a beautiful building reflecting the fruitful partnership between AfDB and Central African States”. During the ceremony, a funding agreement worth CFAF 133 billion had been signed between the Minister of the Economy, Planning and Regional Development, Mr Alamine Ousmane Mey, AfDB Governor for Cameroon, and the Director-General of the AfDB Regional Office for Central Africa.
The agreement aims at implementing the Territorial Development and Private Sector Promotion Project in the Far North Region. The project’s objective is to contribute to the regional planning, improvement of the transport system and promotion of the private sector, with a view to the emergence of an integrated and sustainable development pole in the region.
It is worth mentioning that the cooperation portfolio with AfDB comprises 26 projects, with cumulative commitments estimated at around CFAF 1,400 billion. These projects match the priorities of Cameroon’s government and AfDB’s High 5s.Throughout her stay in Cameroon, the AfDB Vice President unveiled her institution’s ambition to double the performance of its cooperation portfolio over the next five years, with new projects in line with the NDS30 guidelines, especially in the energy, transport, digital, agro industry, urban development and governance sectors.
«It is worth mentioning that the cooperation portfolio withAfDB comprises 26 projects, with cumulative commitments estimated at around CFAF 1,400 billion. »
By Adonis ABONDO
Source : Emerging Cameroon
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