Cameroon’s cdec: a strategic financial engine for infrastructure development

Like many African nations, Cameroon has experienced a tightening of access to conventional external financing over recent years. This includes multilateral concessional loans, official development assistance, and increasingly costly international bond markets. In response to this challenge, the strategic mobilization of domestic savings – both public and private – has emerged as a crucial imperative for national development. This vital role is precisely what the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations (CDEC) is designed to fulfill. Operationalized on January 20, 2023, through a presidential decree, the CDEC came into full effect fifteen years after its initial legal establishment by a 2008 law, as highlighted by financial expert Patrick Duprix Anicet Mani.

1. A proven blueprint: lessons from the french Caisse des Dépôts

The French experience with its Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations (CDC) offers a compelling model, demonstrating how dormant savings can be transformed into a powerful engine for structural development. This is achieved through three core mechanisms:

• The centralization of regulated funds (such as Livret A savings accounts, notarial funds, and inactive accounts) within a secure public institution.
• The strategic conversion of short-term deposits into long-term loans, underpinned by the robust guarantee of the State.
• The creation of a significant leverage effect, where every euro of centralized savings directly fuels critical infrastructure projects, including social housing, urban renewal initiatives, fiber optic networks, and essential transport systems.

The Cameroonian CDEC is meticulously designed to mirror this successful architecture. Its fundamental mission involves collecting, safeguarding, and ensuring the long-term profitability of resources that typically remain idle, strategically directing them to support key public policies and national development objectives.

2. CDEC’s progress: measurable momentum

Available data confirms that the CDEC has already established considerable momentum:

Legal Framework and Mobilizable Resource Categories

The foundational 2008 law and its 2011 implementing decree delineate the CDEC’s resources into four distinct categories: deposits (including funds held by notaries and inactive bank accounts), administrative consignments (such as guarantees for public contracts), judicial consignments (like bail bonds and judicial settlements), and a fourth assimilated category.

Coercive Collection Mechanism

To ensure robust resource mobilization, a Prime Minister’s decree, issued on December 1, 2023, has mandated banks, insurance companies, notaries, and court registries to transfer their consigned funds within a specified timeframe. Non-compliance with this directive carries severe penalties, including external audits and late interest charges calculated at the BEAC’s marginal lending facility rate plus an additional two points. This stringent legal framework is vital for securing the progressive increase in CDEC’s financial resources.

Three-Year Results

Director General Richard Evina Obam recently announced that, three years after becoming operational, the CDEC has successfully centralized over 151 billion FCFA (approximately 260 million USD). While this figure is substantial, it still represents a fraction of the identified potential, with earlier estimates suggesting that more than 1,000 billion FCFA lay dormant within the Cameroonian banking system.

3. The infrastructure transformation vehicle: the banking subsidiary

A critical component for realizing CDEC’s ambitious infrastructure development goals is the planned creation of a dedicated banking subsidiary, for which a feasibility study was initiated in February 2025. This subsidiary is explicitly designed to:

• Assist the State, decentralized territorial communities (CTD), and enterprises in raising capital to finance crucial infrastructure projects.
• Provide essential support to Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) aiming to participate in public procurement processes.
• Streamline initial public offerings (IPOs) and facilitate the evaluation of new business opportunities.
• Offer long-term financial products, including tailored loans, guarantees, and leasing solutions, specifically adapted to the needs of Cameroonian stakeholders.

It is this strategic function that structurally aligns the Cameroonian CDEC with the