Further reading Lucien Ayissi, Corruption et gouvernance (Corruption and governance) (Yaoundé: PUA, 2003) Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Lutte contre la corruption: Impossible n’est pas Camerounais? (The fight against corruption: nothing is impossible in Cameroon) (Yaoundé: PUA, 2002) Pierre Titi Nwel, ed., De la corruption au Cameroun (On corruption in Cameroon) (Yaoundé: Gerddes-Cameroun and Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, 2001) Babissakana and Abissama Onana, Les débats économiques du Cameroun et d’Afriques (The economic debates in Cameroon and Africa) (Yaoundé: Prescriptor, 2003) Notes 1. ‘Mise en oeuvre du programme national de gouvernance’ (Implementation of the national governance programme) (Yaoundé, December 2003). 2. Cameroon Tribune (Cameroon), 1 December 2003. 3. Available at www.transparency.org/surveys/index.html#barometer 4. Cameroon Tribune (Cameroon), 26 December 2003.
Canada Corruption Perceptions Index 2004 score: 8.5 (12th out of 146 countries) Conventions: OAS Inter-American Convention against Corruption (ratified June 2000) OECD Anti-Bribery Convention (ratified December 1998) UN Convention against Corruption (signed May 2004; not yet ratified) UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (ratified May 2002) Legal and institutional changes • A law adopted in March 2004 (Bill C-4) restructured the office of the Ethics Commissioner so that it is now a body of parliament. Established in 1993 to provide advice to members of the lower house of parliament and investigate allegations of ethical violations, the commissioner previously reported to, and served at, the discretion of the prime minister. The same bill created a parallel post of Senate Ethics Officer for the upper house, which had long resisted such regulation despite its much-maligned reputation. The bill finally passed the senate when an informal compromise was reached by which the prime minister would appoint the ethics officer from a shortlist prepared by the chamber itself. • New campaign contribution limits passed in 2003 as part of Bill C-24 came into effect in January 2004. In addition to a C $5,000 (US $3,870) per party cap on individual contributions, the most notable restriction is a ban on corporate or union contributions to parties, except for a C $1,000 allowance for donations to constituency associations or individual candidates. As partial recompense, a scheme of increased public financing was implemented. The bill also closed a loophole in the elections law that allowed parties to pay workers, claim them as an expense for tax purposes and then have the workers
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