The warring parties reached a peace agreement Tuesday April 14, 2020 following a crisis meeting chaired by the Senior Divisional Officer for Boumba and Ngoko, Valérie Norbert KUELA.
The payment of salary arrears of workers of the Saw Mill was top on the agenda of separate meetings chaired by the SDO, one with the management of the enterprise and the other with the striking workers.
The management of the enterprise agreed to pay three months salary arrears to workers especially those on technical leave due to the Coronavirus pandemic.
The payment would only begin in three weeks time as proposed.
A proposal endorsed by the workers who did not hesitate to thanks the SDO for his rapid intervention in the affair that could have degenerated to something else given that the top management of the enterprise was absent when the protest move was launched.
The Problem
The workers of Cameroon Timber have gone for about three months without salaries and have been grumbling silently.
With the outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic, some of them were sent home on technical leave making things more difficult for them.
Monday April 13, 2020 the workers then decided to make their voices heard by protesting against the delay in paying their salaries.
That is how they workers attacked their staff members (mostly expatriates) taking them hostage and forcing others to take refuge in the forest for hours.
Some installations of the enterprise were also brutalized in anger.
Informed of the situation, elements of the National Gendarmerie in that locality were sent to arrest the situation.
In the mix up, two people (workers) were brutally injured and rushed to the Moloundou Hospital where they are presently responding to treatment.
“We have been sent home now plus our salaries not paid, this could be a style of dismissal since we hear rumours that the company wants to reduce it’s workers” a worker told News Upfront.
The Senior Divisional Officer for Boumba and Ngoko then planned separate crisis meetings with the warring parties which was the first instrument for a peace deal that finally saw the light of day Tuesday April 14, 2020.
News Upfront tried in vain to talked to the General Manager of the enterprise.
The Enterprise
Cameroon Timber is a Saw Mill enterprise in Kika, Moloundou Sub Division of the Boumba and Ngoko Division in the East Region of Cameroon.
It is owned by Madam Rose Ngassa, who is Mayor of the Tombel Council in the South West region of Cameroon.
Since she bought over the defunct enterprise from French Nationals it has been from one problem to the other.
In 2018, workers of the enterprise complained of salary issues but which was not directly linked to Madam Ngassa who just took over management of the enterprise.
In her patriotic spirit, despite inheriting an empty enterprise with virtually no installations and poor working conditions, the General Manager, Rose Ngassa in 2018 pleaded with the staff to give her time to raise the standards of the enterprise for it will automatically play well on their working conditions and take home package.
By Louvier Kindo Tombe / John Ndoumba Mouelle
