A driver pays at a toll station on the Kribi-Lolabéon Expressway in Cameroon on 30 July

The Yaoundé-Nsimalen Expressway was partially opened to traffic on 5 January by Célestine Ketcha Courtès, Cameroon’s minister of housing and urban development. Due to its enormous size and importance, the high-speed motorway connecting the Cameroonian capital with its international airport has drawn much public attention.  

The expressway was built by China Communications Construction Co. (CCCC), which is showcasing Chinese technological know-how through this infrastructure. Its commissioning will help to reduce traffic congestions in this metropolis of around 4 million people, where getting around during rush hour is usually a challenge. 

The minister applauded the country’s government and the Sino-Cameroonian partnership, saying, “I thank the head of state, who personally supported this project, and I would also like to thank our Chinese friends for the quality of the construction, which is a fruit of a solid friendship between Cameroon and China.”  

CCCC specialises in building highways, bridges, and other megastructures. It has subsidiaries on all five continents. The company, which was ranked among the top 500 publicly listed enterprises in China in 2014, has an annual profit of close to 20 billion yuan ($2.75 billion). The technological competence of CCCC is evident in the remote community of Nsimalen. 

An important artery  

The government decided to build an expressway in Yaoundé in order to ease traffic congestion in the capital, which houses all of Cameroon’s national and government institutions as well as several companies, drawing many Cameroonians to visit or live there.  

The city recently had a population shift that saw a significant increase in road traffic. As a result, the capital’s principal roads are always heavily congested. This is a handicap that severely restrains economic activity, which unquestionably hinders the growth of the city. 

As part of plans to make the country an emerging economy by 2035, the authorities have started a massive urban development push in a number of cities, and the Yaoundé-Nsimalen Expressway is a key project among the development initiatives. The expressway connects Nsimalen International Airport to the centre of Yaoundé. 

The Yaoundé-Nsimalen Expressway is 23 km long and will cost a total of $300 million. The motorway is split into two parts. The rural part is roughly 11 km long and contains two three-lane carriageways with four layers of bitumen on the road surface, three interchanges, and three overpasses. 

The urban segment is 12 km long and consists of three sections. The first section in the urban zone spans from the Three Statutes crossroad to the overpass in the rural area at the Ahala crossroad. It has two interchanges. 

An overpass will also be built to connect the portion from the Ministry of Finance to the building of National Investment Corp. of Cameroon. This will enhance traffic flow while also assuring the fast mobility of the high-level officials’ motorcades. 

The expressway project is consistent with the top leadership’s desire to build ultra-modern infrastructure in Cameroon’s major cities. According to Courtès, this infrastructure is part of a larger development plan that includes the Yaoundé bypass, which will filter traffic and facilitate transportation inside the capital. 

A section of the expressway between the urban centre of Yaoundé and its international airport of Nsimalen  

Socio-economic impacts 

The expressway will cut the journey time between Yaoundé and Nsimalen to only 15 minutes, compared to 46 minutes in the past. Eventually, it will allow the development of new business zones along the section leading to the airport and at the entrance to the city.  

Constance Odile Mbatoumou, a former senior official with the Cameroonian administration and currently a member of the Consultative Committee of the China-Africa Institute, whose mission is to make Sino-African cooperation fruitful, said that this expressway is important for two reasons. First, the airport is the gateway to the country, and second, as Yaoundé is the seat of central government institutions, it must be equipped with infrastructure worthy of the Vision 2035.  

She argued that in this competitive world, Cameroon must match the global development standards of countries aspiring to emerge. Therefore, the China-Cameroon relationship is a blessing: It offers perspectives and tools for the implementation of the Vision 2035. The face of the country has changed, jobs have been created, and the impact of infrastructure on growth is perceptible. 

Mabelle Ewande, a laboratory technician in a construction company in Yaoundé and a resident of the Ahala neighbourhood, which is located along the expressway, is full of praise for the infrastructure.  

“The expressway is magnificent. I appreciate China’s contribution to the development of road infrastructure in Cameroon in general. Except that, for this beautiful motorway, it will be necessary to build overhead passages for pedestrians who have difficulty moving from one side to the other. A motorway is a high-speed infrastructure and therefore requires all safety measures. I hope that the authorities will think about this,” she said. 

Boris Menye, a resident of Meyo, a neighbourhood along the expressway, believes that the infrastructure will improve the local residents’ living conditions. 

Apart from the motorway that improves traffic flow, the neighbourhood has also benefitted from other community-level amenities such as drinking water boreholes developed during the construction of the project. According to him, China’s contribution to Cameroon’s development is clearly visible. He observed that their work is of good quality and that deadlines are always met.