A Reflection on Corporate Governance of Banks: It's Role in the Protection of Customers Under Cameroonian Banking Law

Abstract

Corporate governance as it triumphs the business market today all over the world is a vital and a developing discussion. This has been as a result of a great financial crisis which was experienced by the world without the exception of Cameroon in the late 1980s and the early 1990s. Since then, there has been an incessant search and fight for better mechanisms in the management of corporations, especially financial institutions because of their importance in economic growth. Within the banking sector in Cameroon, this saw the light with the enactment of a Corporate Governance regulation in 2008 by the CEMAC legislator. Following this, the subject of corporate governance has come to be a serious concern, positioned on the protection of shareholders and other stakeholders and the management of potential conflict of interest. With the specificity of banks, the general issue about corporate governance is the promotion of good management practices and the protection of the entire banking system from financial crisis. In order to accomplish this, the legislator has to do everything possible to ensure the stability of the banking system in general and individual banks in particular, because failure in one will obviously affect the entire banking system. It is established in this write up that, effective practice of corporate governance in banks is done through a prior and meticulous selection of persons to run and manage a bank in Cameroon and a subsequent application of policies and strategies established by the board of directors.