The six-member Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC) held its summit on Sunday in Bangui, the capital of Central African Republic, in what local analysts say an attempt to revive regional integration, which trails behind other regions of the continent. One of the key steps taken at the summit was the appointment of new officials to the regional financial and monetary institutions following the scandal of bank embezzlement.

"This summit established notable developments on the issue of distribution of positions … and adoption of the idea of geographical rotation following alphabetical order, especially on the governorship of BEAC (Bank of the Central African States)," Mathias Eric Owona Nguini who teaches political science at the University of Yaounde ll told Xinhua.

At the summit also attended by observers from International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the International Organization for the Francophonie (OIF), the leaders appointed Lucas Abaga Nchama from Equatorial Guinea to head BEAC based in Yaounde for a mandate of five years, in replacement of Philibert Andzembe from Gabon, who was appointed in July 2007. The Development Bank of Central African States (BDEAC), which is based in the Congolese capital Brazzaville, appointed Michael Adande from Gabon at the top post to replace Anicet Georges Dologuele from Central African Republic.

The CEMAC leaders announced that there will be judicial proceedings against those "who were involved in the misappropriation" in the financial scandals that were unearthed in 2009 in the institutions. Speaking to Xinhua on telephone from Bangui on Monday afternoon, the director of the CEMAC common market, Andre Guy Sinclair Tekpa, said the heads of state had equally demanded an audit of all CEMAC institutions. The rules of appointment to BEAC were defined in 1975 at Fort- Lamy in Chad during a summit of the then Central Africa Customs Union (UDEAC), which gave birth to CEMAC. According to the rules, the post of the governor of this central bank was supposed to be named by Gabon.

This accord was respected until Equatorial Guinea started demanding reforms of the sub-regional institutions in recent years. Equatorial Guinea is the third oil producer in Africa after Nigeria and Angola. "We are living in a new era which is characterized by questioning of the established mode of running the community’s affairs, that which we call Fort-Lamy consensus which brought about this kind of distribution of positions by the countries," said Joseph Vincent Ntunda Ebode, a geostrategist and head of Research and Political Science studies at the University of Yaounde ll.

"This questioning signifies the growing power of Equatorial Guinea, which for the last three years has been asking for deeper reforms on CEMAC rules. We can say that the Bangui summit is the beginning of these reforms with general satisfaction of Equatorial Guinea," he added.

The analyst said this development came after the death of Gabonese president Omar Bongo Ondimba in June, who personally represented the only founder member of the Fort-Lamy compromise. The new trend shows "the common desire by the sub-regional leaders to acknowledge that Equatorial Guinea deserves more than having a regional parliament," Ebode noted. Initially planned for the end of November and then postponed to Dec. 14, before the Bangui summit was finally opened amid a series of concerns beyond the problems of BEAC and BDEAC, observers say.

The future of the Air CEMAC airline was one of the urgent topics as it is expected to be launched during the first quarter of this year. But there appeared no sign of a breakthrough over a joint venture with South African Airways (SAA), which became the strategic partner after the withdrawal of the Royal Moroccan Air (RAM) and then later the Belgian Brussels Sn.

SAA offered a distribution of 49 percent while demanding 51 percent from the regional states, against the bloc’s proposal of 40 percent and 60 percent agreed upon in January 2009 in Libreville. The decision of the CEMAC leaders only reached at the designation of the Air CEMAC headquarters in Brazzaville, where BDEAC is also based. Although the director of the CEMAC common market played down the proposal by SAA, observers believe that the summit hardly showed any progress on the issue.

"If the principle of Air CEMAC is confirmed, then we must wait for its implementation, especially its exploitation logistics, which include the infrastructure, the flying gadgets and personnel. The geography of the capital has not yet been specified and therefore the matter has not been definitively accomplished," Nguini pointed out.

"I do not think that the decision to create an airline company by the sub-regional states could be based on the designation of the headquarters. If we could be talking of having gotten the required capital and even mobilized the human resource, then we would be talking of remarkable and substantial progress," Ebode noted.

According to the latter, "as long as each country has its own airline company or does not wish to abandon its company, then we cannot say that there is political will to see Air CEMAC flying within the sub-region. This is because, we know that the majority of the countries in the sub-region have their companies that are flying." This raises the question : "How then do we think that the establishment of Air CEMAC will constitute a priority for them while the national priorities include revival of the national airlines?"

For example, there are Camairco (for Cameroon), Air Gabon (of Gabon) and Touma-Air Chad (for Chad). Other stalled issues include the free movement of people and goods. The N’Djamena Treaty, which instituted CEMAC, has accomplished little since taking effect in June 1999 in terms of the circulation of the community’s passport. The discussion of issue has been put off to the end of March from the initially fixed deadline of Jan. 1. There are fears in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea about being invaded by the nationals of other countries within the region, among other issues of concern.

"Community integration of the CEMAC zone has a history of permanent postponement. What this means is that this integration has remained more of a hollow slogan than an achievable fact," Nguini said in his analysis. He even saw the Bangui summit as "an occasion where the CEMAC heads of state attempted to revive the regional integration process, but which would not be effectively followed."

Ebode touched upon another sensitive issue. "With a peaceful resolution of the different problems on the border between Cameroon and Nigeria, a prevarication which was never finished in the process of integration in Central Africa will suddenly swing Cameroon to West Africa, a zone where she already geographically finds herself because of not only the interests that link her to the Guinean gulf, but also the bilingual nature of the country which is found between Central Africa and West Africa."

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