The paradoxes of the Cameroonian Constitution of 18 January 1996

Constitutional production is deficient in Cameroon. After half a century of constitutionalism, Cameroon’s constitutional texts do not shine in terms of their intelligibility and clarity. A reading of the various fundamental laws that the country has known reveals paradoxes that hinder the entrenchment of constitutionalism. The Constitution of 18 January 1996, which is the subject of this study, is not immune to this observation. It is true that it has modernised the institutions and the State, but there is room for improvement in its writing. Between silence, ambiguities, contradiction and confusion, it abounds in numerous paradoxes that are perceptible both in the constitutional semantics and in the options of the constituent. Oscillating between advances and setbacks, coherence and inconsistency, this text allows us to perceive the basis of the tribulations of Cameroonian constitutionalism.