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Cameroon: Camair Staff Appointed to Head Sinking Company
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The Post (Buea)
24 March 2008
Posted to the web 24 March 2008
Joe Dinga Pefok
The Cameroon Air Lines Company, CAMAIR, has a new Manager in charge of the daily running of the airlines.
Adolphe Sammet Bell, one of the company's employees, was on March 19, given the "honour" to head the company's operations as Director Delegate in charge of exploitation. In the new management organigramme of the company, which Finance Minister, Lazare Essimi Menye, presented to reporters on March 13, the Director Delegate will run the day-to-day activities of the company and prepare it for privatisation / liquidation.
The Director Delegate is under the two Liquidators of the company, Bekolo and Partners that will be in charge of financial affairs and a Co-liquidator, yet to be appointed, who will be in charge judicial matters.
Bell who is an engineer by training, has held many posts at CAMAIR, which include that of Sub-Director of Maintenance. Before his new appointment as Director Delegate, he was the Controller General at CAMAIR headquarters at Bonanjo.
Following the appointment of the Director Delegate, the seal that was placed at the company's headquarters, was later that afternoon removed for work to resume. It is worth recalling that following the termination of the functions of the Provisional Administrator of CAMAIR by a presidential decree on March 11, the headquarters of CAMAIR was sealed. But some offices considered sensitive remain sealed.
Difficult Mission
Observers have expressed doubt if there is much Bell can do to rescue the sinking house, by at least making it attractive for privatisation. CAMAIR today owns barely one plane, the Dja (Boeing 767-300). For several years now, the company has rented planes from other companies, but has become notorious for defaulting in payments.
This has attracted a lot of litigations abroad. Things had gone so bad that the Government was forced to suspend the Dja from all international flights.In early February 2008, the Dja was grounded for a number of days because no company was willing to borrow fuel to CAMAIR.
CAMAIR was said to owe Total, which is its major supplier of fuel, over FCFA one billion. A report disclosed that CAMAIR owes over FCFA 2 billion in fuel alone to companies.On March 21, the new Director Delegate announced that the company with a total of three planes, two of which are on lease, would resume local flights that evening.
But while the company was inviting clients to come and buy tickets so that some money could enter the coffer, nothing positive was still being said about the several clients who had bought tickets, but could not travel either because the Dja was suspended from making trips to Paris, or because the activities of the company were suspended from March 11 to 19.
Gross Mismanagement
Created in 1971 by the then Head of State, Ahmadou Ahidjo, after he pulled Cameroon out of Air Afrique for the sake of national pride, he made the newly created airlines a source of pride for the nation. CAMAIR reportedly at one time had over a dozen planes of different sizes, and was a force to reckon in the continent and beyond.
CAMAIR, because of gross mismanagement, soon turned from being an asset to become a liability and a major source of shame to the nation. Biya, in 2000, appointed Yves Michel Fotso from the private sector to take over as General Manager of CAMAIR, but he failed to produce the results and was sacked in 2003.
He is presently at the Littoral Appeal Court, with charges of defamation against a London based auditing firm, SYGMA Finance, which reportedly accused him of having ruined CAMAIR with bad management, including embezzlement.
Thomas Dakayi Kamga, who took over from Fotso in 2003 as General Manager, was reportedly nothing better. He reportedly owed many months of areas and reportedly spent time trying to discredit his predecessor.
When Ngamo Hamani took over management of CAMAIR from Dakayi Kamga in February 2005 as Provisional Administrator, he too spent much time criticising what his predecessor did.
Total Debts Unknown
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Highly placed CAMAIR sources reveal that one of the major problems that Bell and the Liquidator in charge of Financial Affairs, Bekolo and Partners, are to face is identifying the real debts of the company. It is said that for quite a number of years, successive General Managers, including the Provisional Administrator, have not come out clear about the total debts of the company.
Personal conflicts between the successive bosses of CAMAIR is said to be partly responsible for the muddle, as the tendency has been for a serving General Manager to try to expose his predecessor as a crook. It is also said that many General Managers of CAMAIR have over the years promoted the confusing in the issue of debts; a situation which they exploited to embezzle.
CAMAIR owes just much and to so many creditors both at home and abroad. With this situation, it is very difficult to move the company forward.
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