IslamicFinance.de

In Cameroon, only one bank (Afriland First Bank) and three microfinance institutions practice Islamic financing. Yet, the appropriation of this type of financing can considerably contribute to the development of financial inclusion in Cameroon. To raise awareness about the topic, the Ministry of Finance and the UNDP organized a forum on the theme "Islamic financing: contribution to Cameroon's economic growth and to the achievement of sustainable development goals". According to Finance Minister Louis Paul Motazé, Islamic financing promotes financial inclusion and it can also constitute a complementary lever for economic growth by attracting foreign investment from Middle Eastern countries.

La Société internationale islamique de financement du commerce du Groupe de la Banque islamique de développement (BID) est satisfaite de sa coopération avec le Cameroun. Aliou Barki Kane et le ministre camerounais en charge de l’Economie, Alamine Ousmane Mey ont passé en revue le portefeuille de coopération avec la BID. Aliou Barki Kane a déclaré que 560 millions de dollars ont été tous décaissés, remboursés et les bénéfices ont été mesurés à travers les intrants agricoles et également la commercialisation du coton à travers la Sodecoton. Barki Kane a ajouté que la coopération avec le Cameroun a été fructueuse et les fonds ont été mis à la disposition des bénéficiaires finaux.

The Cameroonian subsidiary of the Pan African banking group Ecobank now offers to its clients the "Mudaraba saving account", which follows the rules of Islamic finance. Ecobank Cameroun thus joins on this segment Afriland First Bank, a credit institution with Cameroonian majority shareholding, which went into Islamic finance some years ago, with the Islamic current account (compte de dépôt islamique - CDI). On 20 February 2015, this Cameroonian bank officially opened a branch focused on Islamic finance, with the support of the International Company for the Development of the Private Sector. During the first year of operation of this specialised branch, Afriland First Bank was planning to collect around FCfa 3 billion, based on the 20% of the Cameroonian population of Muslim faith.

Afriland First Bank, the Cameroonian banking institution, has set high fundraising and loan approval targets for its Islamic finance clientele. Indeed, according to Youssoufa Bouba, the bank’s Director of Specialised Finance, Afriland First Bank is aiming to achieve 3 billion FCFA in Islamic checking accounts. Bouba goes on to state that the bank intends to grant 2 billion FCFA in loans at the same branch. These goals depend not only on the size of the Muslim population in Cameroon (the institution’s target market), which represents 20% of the population there, but also on the products the bank implements with private sector support provided by the Society for International Development (SID).

Cameroon's Afriland First Bank has launched the Central African state's first Islamic window. Afriland, which has offered an Islamic deposit account since 2000 to help Muslims perform their pilgrimage to Mecca, will offer a range of common types of Islamic financing contracts. These include murabaha, musharaka, mudaraba and ijara. The lender developed the Islamic window with assistance from the Islamic Corporation for the Development of the Private Sector (ICD). Afriland, founded in 1987, now operates subsidiaries in Equatorial Guinea, Sao Tome and Principe, Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Zambia, South Sudan, and Guinea.