Questioning The Quality of Services in Cameroon And Its Implications On The Consumers: An Evaluation under The Cameroonian Law

Abstract

Consumer protection is an essential aspect of citizen’s life in the nation, thus most state is directly involved in the protection of their citizens from defective product through the enactment of consumer protection law. The Cameroon society is plagued with poor quality services on a daily basis thus questioning the quality of such services is an obvious reality with regards to its implication on consumers. Nevertheless, consumers are protected by numerous legislations, but most consumers are ignorant about this and even when aware of the protection under the legal system they are reluctant to take necessary measures to protect their rights. In Cameroon, consumers are protected by numerous enactments such as the OHADA Uniform Act Relating to General Commercial law, the 2011 consumer protection law, 2006 Advertisement law, the 1990 law relating commercial activities repeal by 2015 law on commercial activities with the aim at modernizing the mechanisms put in place for the supervision of commercial activity in the state. Also, consumers are covered by rules of contract law and the rules of liability under negligence with regards to English law, liability under criminal law, the penal code, and the new criminal procedure code. Therefore, the laws protecting consumers in Cameroon is scattered and depends on the colonial heritage of the country. With the enactment of the 2011 law on consumer protection in Cameroon, it is not still very certain whether other rules applicable to consumer protection mostly in the Anglophone part of the territory are still applicable. This and other inconvenience have made most consumers not to seek redress from the courts with respect to defective products. Thus, it is very common to find consumer rights been infringe and no redress obtained especially with regards to the provision of services. This article articulates the weaknesses of the protection of consumers against poor quality services in Cameroon most especially with the absence of a comprehensive and harmonized legislation in the domain of consumer protection. Most essentially, the article aims at evaluating the multiplicity of the laws of consumer protection before and after the enactment of the 2011 consumer protection law in Cameroon.