The Right to Work for People with Disabilities in Cameroon: A Myth or Reality

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is to investigate how effective are the regulation put in place for the protection of vulnerable workers in general and disable persons in particular in Cameroonian labour law with regards to ILO standards, to off root some of the various impediments involves and to provide measures on how to deal with it. In connection with our above objectives we adopted an in-depth content analysis which is based on primary and secondary sources of data collection imperative to the study. In Cameroon as in many other African countries, access to the job market is difficult and constitutes a major pre-occupation for many young qualified persons with disabilities. Measures to deal with this difficulty/barrier for persons with disabilities (the most vulnerable group) are found in the decree of 1990 in its article 11 (1) But despite her effort, the rate of enforcement mechanism for labour law is still not satisfactory at all. As a matter of fact, there still exists some sort of workplace exploitation such as disabled workers not receiving the correct payment for equal work done, overdue salaries, workers being unfairly dismissed, exposure of workers to unsafe working conditions, instances of disabled female workers being sexually harassed at places of work. Although anti-discrimination measures serve to eliminate barriers prior and during employment, it is still a fact that there are still some prejudices against persons with disability brought by social stigmatisation. These prejudices affect persons with disability even before they meet employers. An imposition of quota obligation upon employers is one among the ways to facilitate the “meeting” of employers and job seekers with disability.