(Business in Cameroon) – Cameroon plans to hire 2,860 new civil servants in 2025, marking a sharp drop of 39% compared to last year. The reduction amounts to 1,832 fewer positions than in 2024, when the country recruited close to 4,700 people.
Details of the plan were shared in an internal government memo sent by the Secretary-General of the Prime Minister’s Office, Séraphin Magloire Fouda, to the Minister of Public Service and Administrative Reform, Joseph Le.
Out of the 2,860 positions, 1,555 will be filled through standard recruitment procedures. These include 910 roles to be filled through direct competitive exams, 180 through training programs outside the National School of Administration and Magistracy (ENAM), 230 through ENAM itself, and 235 through direct selection tests.
In addition, 750 jobs have been set aside for special recruitment. These include 150 positions in the newly created universities of Garoua, Bertoua, and Ebolowa; 500 for the prison administration; 80 for the Ministry of Scientific Research and Innovation; 20 for graduates of the Institute of Economics and Finance. Another 555 spots will be opened for public servants through professional exams.
Separate from these civil service recruitments, the government will also hire and formalize contracts for 4,144 health workers as part of a presidential initiative to improve access to medical services.
This recruitment drive is taking place while the government continues to weed out fraudulent public servants. Since launching a massive personnel audit in 2018, known as COPPE, thousands of fake or non-compliant workers have been stricken from the state payroll.
The latest round of dismissals, announced on March 5, 2025, affects 232 employees. That brings the total number of public workers removed since 2018 to 4,556.
The COPPE audit, conducted between April and June 2018 by the Ministry of Finance, uncovered nearly 10,000 ghost workers and helped the country save about CFA 30 billion per year starting in 2019.
