“UK Companies Are Good, Trustworthy Partners”

What is your assessment of the Economic Partnership Agreement between Cameroon and the United Kingdom?
It is obviously a key agreement. What is essential for me is that we obviously rolled over the existing agreement with the European Union. That is the starting point. Effectively, what you then do is develop that between you. So it is a bilateral development between us. Actually, what is interesting is that early this month we had the second committee meeting for the Economic partnership agreement. So that now allows us collectively to develop that together to reflect the trade objectives we have together. And I think what is essential is that Cameroon companies by large have complete tariff free access to UK market which is still one the largest economies in the world.

How can this agreement be strengthened so that it benefits the local population?
I travel around Africa. My job is to represent the UK across the continent. One of the things that strikes me all the times is that UK Companies are good investors and partners. They want to employ people and run programmes locally. So, what we are doing is creating mutual prosperity together with that is sustainable for the future. UK companies are good and trustworthy partners. We have a lot of respect for relationship and they are good employers and good investors. That is how we generate prosperity not just in Cameroon but also in the UK as well. This is all about building prosperity together. 

This economic agreement is being implemented at the same time as the African Continental Free Trade Area. Don't you think that the agreement with Great Britain could disrupt the implementation of the AfCFTA?  
I don’t think so. Actually, the UK is the strong supporter of the AfCFTA. We were the first country outside of Africa to sign a memorandum with the AfCFTA. Certainly, we have been partnering and providing support to the AfCFTA like technical capacity building. I have personally had a number of discussions with the AfCFTA. What we want to do is to liberalise trade. The primary objective of the AfCFTA is to promote Intra-African trade. That is what creates value. That is high value added trade than just exporting outside of the region. The level of intra-African trade is much larger than other regions. From my perspectives, the EPA is a specific bilateral relationship which provide access into the UK market. The AfCFTA allows the building of African supply chains without having to lose those preferences. We share absolute that same objectives. It will take time for the AfCFTA to develop and over time we may want to flips those relationships to reflect the new realities of the AfCFTA as it develops. That is a long time. So I don’t see any conflict tool between the EPA and the AfCFTA. I think we have the same objectives in mind. One of the things that I have been looking to is look for where UK companies are manufacturing in African context to be able to trade under the guided trade initiative. 

There is also the question of c...