(Business in Cameroon) - Young business lawyer Jacques Jonathan Nyemb is no longer the spokesman of employers’ organization GICAM’s president, Célestin Tawamba. His termination was personally announced by the said president in an official communiqué signed on July 12, 2023. 

"Groupement Inter-Patronal du Cameroun (GICAM) wishes to inform its members, public authorities, partners, and national and international public opinion that Mr. Nyemb Jacques Jonathan has been removed from the position of spokesman for the President he was holding. Mr. Nyemb Jacques Jonathan is no longer authorized to speak on behalf of the President of Gicam, nor to represent the organization," the communique reads. 

Mr. Nyemb's termination was announced a day after Gicam's members approved, on July 11, 2023, the proposed merger with Ecam (Entreprises du Cameroun), to which the lawyer is firmly opposed. The lawyer expressed his opposition to the merger project on May 5, 2023, during a Gicam board meeting in Douala. This aroused the anger of Célestin Tawamba.

After expressing his opposition, Mr. Nyemb initiated a series of workshops for the reform of Cameroonian employers’ associations. This led some observers of the national economic scene to suggest that the young business lawyer - who is well acquainted with multinationals, notably French- has his eyes set on the presidency of Cameroon's employers' association.

It is worth noting that GICAM members opposed to the merger are not basically against the idea of a merger between the two parties. They are rather suspicious of the “merger-creation” model that will see a new entity created instead of the “merger-absorption” model.  They believe that the preference given to the “merger-creation” model is a ploy by GICAM President Célestin Tawamba to seek a new mandate because if the statutes are to remain as they are now, he is not eligible for re-election for a third term, per GICAM's statutes.

BRM