Mary Concilia Anchang

Mary Concilia Anchang is one of the finest and most contemporary lawyers in Cameroon and the Central African region. She is passionate, vibrant and very engaging. She is widely traveled and offers a rich multiple cultural background. A senior partner at Onambele, Anchang & Associates, she has in the past 29 years of legal practice, demonstrated consistency, resilience and dedication in her work.

She is the pioneer accredited Intellectual Property Attorney with jurisdiction in 17 member States of the African Intellectual Property Organization (OAPI) since 1994.

She is an arbitrator and past country court member at the International Court of Arbitration of the International Chamber of Trade and Commerce ICC-WBO Paris, where, upon her appointment, she became the pioneer female African appointed to the Court since its creation in 1923_ a mandate she ran from 2006 to 2010. She equally is a past founding member of the National Committee of ICC Cameroon.

She passionately combines the practice of law with the vision to contribute towards Africa’s economic renaissance through the creation of solid public private partnerships (PPP). She believes that without an adapted unified business model to develop the continent, the emergence of Africa will continue to stagnate. She believes that how the bilateral and multilateral binding agreements are enforced is critical. 

 

She finds interest in experimenting new business concepts that should set new standards in the practice of law with new legal frontiers to oblige a shift in the paradigms of the African economy.

In 2015 she founded the African Chamber of Trade and Commerce (ACC) as a vibrant and comprehensive vehicle to consolidate businesses. The need to build adapted ecosystems to change the paradigms through agribusiness, ICT, technology, energy, capacity building, health, education, finance, tourism, leisure, culture, commerce, R&D, IP etc. through entrepreneurship is her target. 

 

Through ACC, Mary has created two bi-annual events and an incubator project to benchmark the African cotton, textile industry in garments and accessories.

1. The ACC Economic Day (AED) was created in 2017. It has witnessed 2 editions with a remarkable participation of the local and international community

2. The International Forum for Production and Transformat ion of Cotton, Textile, Garments and Accessories (FICOTA) was launched in 2018, it has witnessed two editions with expert speakers from all over the world. Its third edition is earmarked for 2023.

3. The African Fashion Incubator Project (AFP) was launched on February 5th 2021 in Yaoundé Cameroon to benchmark cotton production and transformation from textile into garments and accessories.

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In her strife to add value to the African cotton value and supply chains, Mary has gained the active support of the International Organization of “la Francophonie” (OIF) through its Densification and Diversification project called DEDICOT. Also, from this effort, partnerships have ensued with countries like Zambia, Tanzania, Egypt, Ghana, Central Africa Republic, Mozambique, Zimbabwe,
France, USA, Vietnam, Germany, Italy, Cambodia who have bought into the FICOTA project.

Post SICOT (Salon International du Coton et du Textile du Burkina Faso) 2018, in which she participated as a panelist, and the 2018 FICOTA event she organized in Kribi Cameroon, she was selected in 2019 by OIF to take part in the first brainstorming meeting of the OIF DEDICOT workshop organized in Egypt to define the cotton value chain roadmap.

She was further selected by the Egyptian government to take part in a training workshop on cotton processing and technology organized by the Egyptian cotton research institute and EAPD in early March 2022.

Later in March 2022, she was selected to attend the 1st Economic Mission of the OIF in Vietnam and Cambodia in March 2022, and has now been selected to take part in the 2nd edition organized in Central Africa (Gabon - Libreville and Rwanda- Kigali) running from 06 -13 July 2022.

Since 1995, she has attended over 75 conferences, meetings and trainings at national, regional and international levels, to empower herself with skills, integrity and the stamina necessary to project useful persuasive thoughts and arguments, in order to advocate on issues for Africa’s development. 

Mary has developed a long standing collaboration with the African diaspora settled in all parts of the world especially in America, Europe and the islands, to ensure that they can meaningfully impact the African continent with their ideas and values.

Sitting as Executive Chair of the ACC, she is leaving no stone unturned to source funding necessary to finance African businesses such that, they are able to face global competition. She advocates for youth and gender employability. She believes that the African youth and women has a considerable role in improving the social and economic standards of the Continent.

She is presently working to create a sustainable cotton out grower project in The Zambia, which will help to meaningfully impact the African cotton value chain from the farm to the market in all its ramifications through the FICOTA project.
 

Articles and publications:

•  The Role of IP in Africa 2019

•  Article on ” le Paradoxe de la Pauvreté de Pays Africains” 2020

•  Interview on ” Face à la Chine l’Afrique doit faire attention” 2020

•  “A tribute to George Floyd” 2020

•  Profiled in RISING WOMEN IN AFRICA 2020 & 2021

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Hobbies include, but not limited to, travel, writing, music, dance, storytelling, sports, charities as well

as youth mentoring

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