GENERAL INTRODUCTION

The Advanced School of Translators and Interpreters (ASTI) has a curriculum that requires all students to partake in a practicum. This practicum is meant to give these students the opportunity to gain practical skills in an actual working environment. It is also meant to help in sharpening already existent knowledge and skills.

Each student is therefore compelled to complete an internship in an administrative institution of their choice. I completed this practicum exercise at the National School of Local Administration. This was my first experience as a translator in a professional setting. The two main goals I had in mind when I started this internship were; to gain maximum skills in translation so as to become a professional translator and to gain adequate knowledge in the translation of financial and banking related terminology.

Upon the completion of the internship, a written report of activities is required from every student. This report entails every activity carried out during the practicum period accompanied by a thorough explanation of how these activities were carried out. This report thus consists in three chapters;

Chapter one presents the host institution which is the National School of Local Administration (NASLA), its history, Missions and Structure.

Chapter Two aims at presenting how the practicum was organised, from week One to week Six. It entails all the activities I undertook throughout the internship and how productive I was.

Chapter Three, which is the last chapter presents the appraisals of the practicum, the lessons I learnt, the challenges I faced and the possible solutions and recommendations.

CHAPTER ONE

HOST INSTITUTION: THE NATIONAL SCHOOL OF LOCAL ADMINISTRATION

The focus of this chapter will be a brief history and the missions of the host institution, the National School of Local Administration.

1.1 History, Missions and Structure of the National School of Local Administration

1.1.1 History of the Ministry of the National School of Local Administration

As early as 1960 when Cameroon got its independence, officials became aware of the need   to improve the methods of administrative work; the cost of running the administration was almost consuming the entire budget of the State.

On January 8 1996, the constitution of Cameroon gave birth to decentralisation. Article one of the constitutions stipulates that Cameroon is a unitary decentralized state, which meant that Regional and Local Authorities would be delegated some degree of power and resources to manage their affairs. That constitution has been gradually implemented. Regions were created, the senate representing councils was set up, and the administrative and functional autonomy of councils has been assured.

However, many have described the decentralisation process as slow paced. Reason why the minister of communication ISSA TCHIROMA BAKARY granted a press conference on April 12 2017 to explain that the decentralisation process was on the move and almost complete. He said 97 percent of competences in the law applicable to councils has been honoured as planned, and that the state was accelerating the process even more.

The national decentralisation board chaired by the prime minister, the inter- ministerial committee of local services and the national committee for local services are all following up steps taken. The state has and continues working on improving management skills of local authorities. Government is presently working on demarcating the competence of regions and that of the state and putting in place some legislative dispositions to fill in management gabs.

The expression territorial community refers to the decentralization that is called the territorial; the expression “public policy,” with respect to it, returns to the state.

With regard to African countries, the debate around the decentralization, although old, has taken the magnitude toward the end of 90 years. The foundation of the accentuation of this debate has been the approximation of the government of the local actors for involvement of the latter in the decisions of public policy for a better efficiency of the actions undertaken.

In the specific case of Cameroon, the decentralisation has been endorsed by the Constitution of 1996 which made this country a unitary decentralized state. This implies the recognition of the existence of local communities and the maintenance of the unity of the state.

Eight years later, a series of legal text have brought clarification on the objectives assigned to decentralization and the territorial communities whose emphasis is on the promotion of development at the local level. Furthermore, the laws of the decentralization of 2004 have redefined the relationship between the central government and the local authority in matters of public policy.

In order to effectively trigger the decentralisation process, NASLA previously known as CEFAM was built.

The pace of decentralisation has been hastened with a new code from Cameroon. A code means all laws and regulations pertaining to local governance have been put together in one document for easier reference and uniformed action on the ground. In the South West Region, 31 Local councils and two city Councils of

Limbe and Kumba stand to benefit from the new dispensation. In addition, a Regional Council is expected to be set up. Pundits value and measure the new dispensation on local governance either yards or metres. The varied degrees of appreciation only point to the primacy of the matter. Some of the fundamental questions to examine include; which executes local governance action on the field? How and where will the actors be trained? To attempt and answer to these concerns one may be tempted to trace the roots and strength of local governance in Cameroon to the British creation in Buea during the colonial period called Local Government Training Centre (LGTC). In 1997 this centre was transformed into an institution that trains all staff for local government in Cameroon with its French acronym (CEFAM).

This transformation followed the 1961 plebiscite by which the then Southern Cameroon voted to join the Republic of Cameroon to achieve its independence. Subsequently, a 1972 referandum came to cement the union of boy sides and in 1977 a decree institutionalised CEFAM. Since 1977 CEFAM has trained and refreshed some 5,000 personnel of local governance for the 360 local governments called Councils spread through the 10 Regions of

Cameroon. The then Director of CEFAM, Mathieu Hagbe, gave the figure specifying that those who received Diplomas from CEFAM have averaged just 3000 and the rest were refresher-trainees.

The National School of Local Administration (NASLA) makes its entry into the family of Administrative and Public Professional Establishments through Presidential Decree No. 2020/111 of 2 March 2020. It has legal personality and financial autonomy.

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