La laïcité au Cameroun : pratiques religieuses et rapport(s) au travail dans les services publics

The Cameroonian state advocates secularism. Yet, more than 50 years after the country's independence, the issue of secularism remains quite complex and ambiguous in terms of public ownership and various interpretations observed. Starting from this logic, the religious manifests himself without limits, and on varied and differentiated scales, in the different spheres of daily life. In public services, for example, it takes the form of the omnipresence of objects and places of worship on workspaces and in professional interactions between public servants and users. Although officially deviant, this practice is the result of the real need for public servants to bring their religions to the workplace in the name of secularism and freedom of religion. Because of the apparent confusion between secularism and freedom of worship, religion is positioned in public services not only as an element of social marking, but also as a tool for claiming identity, religious mobilization and guiding the conduct of public servants and users. This reconfiguration of the social relationships between public servants and between public servants and users calls into question the cardinal requirements of the public service, in the administrative sense of the term. Consequently, this article uses data from direct observations in Yaounde, the capital city of Cameroon, and semi-directive interviews with users and public servants in five ministries, focuses on the analyses of the relationship that exist between individuals and secularism. It emerges that the preponderance of religious facts in public services is part of a questioning of the administrative and professional ethics of public servants, and of the various considerations of the notion of secularism by Cameroonian society in general. Although the latter are contradictory, its multiplicity and consequences constitute a proof of the religious cohabitation, the conciliation and the sharing of subjectivities in the jobsite, and at the same time a breach of the performance and efficiency of public servants in Cameroon.