THE GENEALOGY OF CAMEROON'S COLONIAL DEBT NEGOTIATION

Abstract

Negotiation is a process of communication and exchanges between at least two parties whose object concerns the organization of a relationship or the settlement of a problem between them. During the decolonisation, France and Cameroon decided to share the assets and liabilities located on the territory of Cameroon. This distribution, a consequence of negotiation, started before independence, was the way to peacefully settle questions of the State’s debts. Alexander-Nahum Sack, jurist and specialist of the State’s succession, thinks that negotiation is the appropriate way to peacefully settle financial issues such as infrastructure management and colonial debts during the territorial separation of the former colonial power from the former colony. This historical essay therefore intends to show that, instead of asking for cancellation, France and Cameroon authorities agreed for distribution after several negotiations. So, the imputation of the debt contracted by France in Cameroon on January 1, 1960, is the consequence of an agreement. It is within this framework that on April 16, 1957, the two parties set down in a first document which was to serve as a compass for subsequent meetings, the legal bases relating to the postcolonial management of foreign investments in Cameroon, while laying down the milestones for their future bilateral cooperation. Based on a variety of documentation, the aim is to show that France and Cameroon, after negotiations, have choosen the distribution of the existing assets and liabilities. France, like Cameroon, as well as international creditors, had an interest in agreeing. Cameroon had to negotiate, so as to make a good impression with Foreign Direct Investors and external creditors needed Cameroon's cooperation for the protection of localized investments on its territory. Even though those debts were incurred in the exclusive interest of Cameroon under French administration, it agreed to negotiate.