Press release on the manifest refusal of orange money to open an orange money mobile account for the collection of funds for our electoral campaign.

PRESS RELEASE ON THE MANIFEST REFUSAL OF ORANGE MONEY TO OPEN AN ORANGE MONEY MOBILE ACCOUNT FOR THE COLLECTION OF FUNDS FOR OUR ELECTORAL CAMPAIGN.

Since the launch of the collection of funds for my electoral campaign on 30 January 2025, many militants and sympathisers have been requesting that the CRM provide them with the details of an Orange Money mobile account so that they can contribute. Given the almost daily persistence of this request and the impossibility for the CRM to provide them with an Orange Money account, we are informing the public of the reasons why we do not have an Orange Money account to date.

– The CRM first applied for an Orange Money account in December 2024 at the Orange branch located in the Mendong district (Simbock crossroads) in Yaoundé. Two weeks after submitting his application, the CRM learned that it had been rejected without any reason being given.

– On 14 January 2025, the CRM submitted a new application at the Orange branch in the Bastos district. All the physical documents requested were produced by the CRM, thoroughly checked and received by an Orange Money agent.

– The following day, 15 January 2025, Orange Money informed the CRM that the documents received the day before had to be retransmitted by the CRM in digital form because the files scanned by Orange Money were « a bit blurry ». Orange Money also informed the CRM that its National President needed to complete and sign an additional form, which had not been sent the previous day. Following these two requests, the CRM produced both the scanned documents and the form completed and signed by its National President.

– Numerous reminders from the CRM to Orange Money on 24, 27, 28 and 30 January 2025 and on 5 February 2025 regarding the outcome of our case went unanswered; each time, the Orange Money agent asked us either to wait until next week or to remain patient.

– On 6 February 2025, we received notification from Orange Money that our application for a mobile account had been rejected on the grounds that « the legal representative’s identity card is unclear + the customer contact form, duly completed and signed, is missing ». The new form referred to here by Orange Money is different from all the forms filled in until now by the CRM (National President and National Treasurer) and, above all, Orange Money never asked the CRM for it until 6 February 2025. Following this initial rejection, the CRM nevertheless produced a second time the scanned National Identity Card (NIC) of its National President as well as the new form completed and signed by the National President.

– On 27 February 2025, the CRM wrote to the Director General to ask why Orange Money was refusing to provide the service without a legitimate reason. The correspondence has remained unanswered to date.

– On 6 March 2025, the CRM received a second rejection of its application for an Orange Money mobile account. The reason for the rejection this time was « Absence of the PV of the December 2023 convention electing Mr KAMTO Maurice as national president of the CRM ». For the record, the minutes described by Orange Money had not been requested by the CRM either when its application was initially submitted on 14 January 2025 or when its application was first rejected on 6 February 2025. Orange Money has so far given no explanation as to why this ambush operation was carried out against the CRM.

– The PV of the election of Maurice Kamto as National President of the CRM at the December 2023 Convention requested by Orange Money were sent to it on 11 March 2025. Since then, no action has been taken on our request for an Orange Money mobile account despite repeated reminders.

CRM militants and sympathisers should therefore be aware that the CRM has spared no effort to obtain an Orange Money mobile account to collect funds for my election campaign.

In the violent adversity as well as the hatred that the regime in power in Cameroon has for the CRM, we must now admit that certain multinational companies, such as Orange/Orange Money, are behaving like supplicants of the Cameroonian dictatorship by denying Cameroonians, in their own country, services to which they are entitled.

Done at Yaoundé, 21 March 2025

Maurice KAMTO

Candidate of the MRC and the APC for the forthcoming presidential election