Le régime juridique des étrangers au Cameroun

Paragraph 2 - Foreigners in space under- regional

March 16, 1994, the Heads of State of several countries (Cameroun, Gabon, Central African Republic, Guinea Equatorial, Chad, Congo-Brazzaville) signed the Treaty of Ndjamena creating the Economic and Monetary Community of Africa Centrale (CEMAC). This treaty came into effect on February 05, 1998 at the time of the 33e Sommet of the Heads of State^48(*), following the decision to put an end to the Customs union and Economic of Africa Centrale (UDEAC) created in 1964^49(*).

The operation of the CEMAC rests on the principle of freedom of movement of the people (A), the capital, the goods, and the services^50(*). It is under the terms of this principle that it regulates the migrations of the workers in the States left (B). In addition, the latter signed certain agreements intended to facilitate the integration of the people (C).

A) Freedom of movement of the people

It is the leitmotiv of any Community institution. It does not have a direction as long as the nationals of the States left cannot move inside its territorial framework. This is why the CEMAC was fixed for objective, the establishment of a narrower union between the people of the Member States in order to harden their solidarity geographical and human. The parts with the treaty began to support the migrations as well as the right of establishment and residence within the community. Much more, in order to guarantee the existence of one  citizenship CEMAC, they instituted the passport-CEMAC.

Indeed, in accordance with the bearing treaty creation of the CEMAC and the subsequent texts like with the verbal lawsuit of work of the third Session of the Council of Ministers held on September 17, 1999 in Ndjamena, in Chad, this body adopted in its meeting of July 20, 2000 the N°1 Payment/bearing 00-CEMAC-042-CM-04 institutions and conditions of attribution of the passport-CEMAC. It is an instrument of freedom of movement of the people within the community. It is intended to the nationals of the Member States. The rules related to its impression, its management and its delivery come under the responsibility of each part to treaty CEMAC^51(*). Unfortunately, this decision forever applied so far^52(*).

Beyond the general principle of freedom of movement of the people, a particular stress is laid on displacements of a category of migrants, namely, that of the workers.

B) Migrant worker

The question of the migrations of the workers is in the middle of realities of Africa Centrale and especially of zone CEMAC. Indeed, with a view to carry out freedom of movement of the people and considering the need for fighting against the brain drain towards the occident, the Member States defined the rights of the workers in displacement in the under-area. This concern appears besides within territory CEMAC like a dynamics impossible to circumvent, even a social, cultural and economic need for these people and their families.

In Douala, in Cameroun, from the 03 to March 07, 2003, the O.I.T for Africa Centrale coordinated it  tripartite seminar on the migrations of the workers in the countries of the CEMAC^53(*). The director of the Office of the O.I.T for Africa Centrale exhorted the CEMAC to be implied fully in the process which will have to lead to explicit and coherent policies national and regional between them as regards respectful regulatory instruments of the right of the workers. It comes out from this seminar that it falls on the States to protect migrant worker. They must ensure a decent work to them by recognizing and protecting their fundamental freedoms work. It is in particular about the equal treatment, of the elimination of the forced labor and work of the children (in fact of the migrant children), of the freedom of the workers as for the organization and with the negotiation of their working conditions.

The respect of these rights constitutes, indeed, the best rampart against discrimination, the exploitation and xenophobia. Also the Member States engaged, at the end of this seminar, to protect the rights of migrant worker and the members from their families.

In logic to always guarantee the rights and freedoms from abroad within the zone, the interested countries concluded certain agreements.

* ⁴⁸ Sous-régional seminar the ILO/GICAM/UNIPACE on the role of the organizations of employers in sous-régionale economic integration. This seminar was carried out under the high patronage of the International Office of the O.I.T for Africa Centrale, Douala, Cameroun, August 28-29, 2001.

* ⁴⁹ It should be noted that the Member States of the CEMAC are found in a broader diagram of integration,  with knowknowing, the Economic Community of the States of Africa Centrale (CEEAC). It is about a sous-régionale organization created in 1983 and continuing inter alia objectives freedom of movement of the individuals. It gathers the eleven following States  : Angola, Burundi, Cameroun, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, R. turnover, the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Sao Tome & Principle as well as Chad. Between 1990 and 2000, this institution however had great problems which weighed on its operation. Also, at the time of the 33e Summit of the Heads of State evoked previously, the decision was made to carry out its reorganization. But while waiting for that that is effective, we present only the right-CEMAC.

* ⁵⁰ Relative with this study, we will treat only principle of freedom of movement of the people inside zone CEMAC.

* ⁵¹ Conclusions of the third Session of the Council of Ministers of the CEMAC, Ndjamena (Chad), September 17, 1999.

* ⁵² See will infra, Second part, Chapitre II, Section II  : «  The weakness of the Community legislation  ».

* ⁵³  Tripartite seminar on the migrations of workers in the countries of the CEMAC, Douala, Cameroun, 03-07 Mars 2003. ( http://www.izf.net).