The Common Law Division of the Supreme Court of Cameroon: An Assessment

Executive Summary: This policy brief is part of a wider British Academy funded project entitled ‘(Re)Constructing Judicial Institutions for Conflict Transformation: The Common Law Division of the Supreme Court of Cameroon in Perspective’. The project investigates the role of the newly established Common Law Division (CLD) in the Supreme Court of Cameroon, in engineering positive social change. The CLD was created in 2017, in response to a socio-political conflict which began in 2016 and subsequently degenerated into armed conflict. The events were triggered by concerns relating to the marginalisation of the inherited English common law practised by Cameroon’s English-speaking minorities within Cameroon’s bijural legal system. The government’s stated objective was to address the lawyers’ grievances by creating the CLD to accommodate the common law at the level of the Supreme Court, in areas where national laws had not been harmonised. This was particularly important in the context of considerable obstacles encountered by common law lawyers and litigants in accessing the Supreme Court.

The project investigates the extent to which the CLD addresses the fundamental concerns relating to access to the Supreme Court and the representation of the common law within the Supreme Court. Results are drawn from qualitative in-depth interviews with thirty-two participants. This policy brief outlines the key findings from the research. It contributes new empirical evidence on the agency of institutional (re)construction on conflict transformation in Cameroon. In particular, it provides significant qualitative insights into the functioning of the CLD, the perception of common law lawyers regarding the CLD and their experience of using that institution. This is the first qualitative research on the CLD.

The brief is intended to stimulate policy debates on the general outlook of the Supreme Court and the CLD in particular in relation to its accessibility to common law litigants in both substantive and procedural dimensions of the common law as understood and practiced in the two common law regions of Cameroon. The brief is also intended to inform developmental support from Cameroon’s international partners on key areas in enhancing the Supreme Court and the CLD in particular.