The economist and statistician Dieudonné Essomba was invited this morning on the antennas of ABK Radio to speak about the strike of secondary school teachers and the resolutions taken by the government in favor of them.
The Cameroonian government intends to pay 59 billion FCFA to teachers. However, the strikers are demanding 180 billion in debt. "The problem of teachers is not administrative or financial, it is an institutional problem. Even if the debt is paid to them, this problem will resurface," said Dieudonné Essomba.
For the economist, "When we are in a unitary state, social sectors such as education and health are not the responsibility of the central government but of local authorities." Moreover, "Teachers should have imposed themselves in the 2010s, they waited too long. Now there are priorities like the crisis in the North-West and South-West and in addition the country is very indebted."
According to Dieudonné Essomba, Cameroon's domestic debt amounts to 4,000 billion FCFA. "It's excessive! There are several trades that complain, all civil servants and public officials are creditors of the State," he laments.
