Workers of the Cameroon Development Corporation, CDC are planning to halt activities at the company’s plantations and offices in the South West region from the 12th to the 15th of October 2021 over unbearable working conditions.
Leaders of four CDC workers’ trade unions including EAWU, SDEAPEM, and CAAWOTU have endorsed and given their unfailing support to the declaration of the strike action in a release issued Tuesday Wednesday September 22.
According to the release, the strike action will see a halt to activities in all CDC plantations, factories, mills and offices in the South West region.
The workers who suffer from the consequences of the escalating Anglophone crisis in the region are planning to stage the strike action over unbearable working conditions including the old-age poor wages issue.
Due to the insecurity brought about by the Anglophone crisis in the region, many workers are reported to have abandoned their duty posts, meanwhile others were laid off, leading to a drop in productions at the Plantation.
The workers that were maintained do not receive frequent salaries, a situation that has always prompted strike actions at the plantations over months of unpaid salaries and allowances.
The CDC, second largest employer in Cameroon after the Government is currently facing an unprecedented crisis resulting from hostilities between defence and security forces and separatists confronting themselves in the close to five years old Anglophone crisis that has crippled the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon.
Workers of the corporation have often been targeted, harassed and killed by armed separatists in that part of the country, making things very difficult for the institution.
The crisis has severely affected the establishment and has caused a drop in the overall production of rubber, banana and palm oil in Cameroon, with banana exports witnessing an 8% drop in 2020, according to the government.
By January 2019, the corporation had already lost FCFA 35 billion due to the adverse economic impact of the Anglophone crisis.
During the cooperation’s board meeting in Douala recently, the Chairperson, Hope Sona Ebai appealed to Government support to the “ailing” establishment’s revival.
Ariane Foguem
