Cameroon or Eswatini
Two countries side by side across the same rows as the full comparison. A dash means the value is missing: fields are not filled with guesses. about the data
| Cameroon | Eswatini | |
|---|---|---|
| Salary in IT | — | — |
| Citizenship | — | — |
| Partner can work | — | no |
| Parents | — | — |
| Pets | no trouble | — |
| Pet limit | no limit | no limit |
| Quarantine | no | — |
| Residence permit fee | — | — |
| Rent, 2 bedrooms | $ 807 · estimate | $ 341 · estimate |
| Basket | $ 34,0 | $ 21,1 |
| Life expectancy | 63.97 | 64.26 |
| Homicides/100k | 6.76 | 13.68 |
| Natural hazards, 0–10 | 3.5 | 1.8 |
How the two sets of routes differ
Long-stay routes in this reference: Cameroon — 10, Eswatini — 18. Types present in both: work, study and family. Eswatini adds: investment and retirement.
Fees, thresholds and deadlines
Cameroon: fees range from 75,000 to 750,000 XAF. Routes with no fee: 1. Routes with a published decision deadline: 5; the shortest is 3 days. Eswatini: fees range from 600 to 6,000 SZL. Routes stating an income threshold: 1; the lowest is 5,000 SZL a year.
Beyond the first permit
Permanent status: Cameroon after 4 years, Eswatini after 10 years.
Cameroon in brief
Cameroon is a country with very dirty air and a marked price gap between its two main cities. On the World Bank scale from −2.5 to +2.5, political stability stands at −1.56, rule of law at −1.25, control of corruption at −1.22 and government effectiveness at −0.80. Life expectancy is 63.97 years, health spending 79.10 dollars per person a year, and basic water access reaches 71.41 per cent of the population. Mean PM2.5 concentration is 55.6 micrograms per cubic metre, one of the worst figures in the sample. Homicides run at 6.76 per 100,000, road deaths at 10.6 per 100,000, and the Gini index is 42.2. Natural risk overall is 3.5 out of 10 on INFORM and almost entirely water-related: floods 6.7, droughts 3.4, coastal hazards 2.6, whereas earthquakes are at 0.1 and there are no cyclones or tsunamis at all. The immigration framework has been published by the agency in full and rests on a single rule worth grasping in advance: the right to work is conferred not by the residence card but by the visa. Only the long-stay visa opens the right to paid activity and to study, and it is also a mandatory condition for the residence card. The employment contract, moreover, is endorsed by the labour minister before entry. The agencies state the visa issuing standard differently: the foreign ministry says 72 hours after pre-registration and 24 hours under the expedited procedure, DGSN says no more than 48 hours. The residence card is valid for two years and is renewed twice, the resident card for ten years; under decree No. 2025/059 of 28 February 2025 it is obtained after the SECOND renewal of the residence card, whereas the former section of the DGSN site spoke of the third. There is also a direct route through marriage, but here too the agency's texts diverge: the new section writes “the spouse of a person of foreign nationality”, the former one “the spouse of a Cameroonian citizen”. In both documents the fee depends on the applicant's nationality rather than on the type of document, and a separate rate is set aside for the French. What is not in this data: the agency publishes a processing standard only for the visa, but not for the residence card or the resident card; city populations are not given, because no official source separating the city from the region was found. The rent gap between Douala and Yaoundé is taken from the source as it stands — it is reproduced across all the lines, not just one, and the source offers no explanation for it.
Eswatini in brief
Eswatini runs to extremes in both directions. **Unemployment at 34.2 percent is the highest in this guide**, youth unemployment at 54.33 is third highest, and the Gini coefficient of 54.6 is the third highest figure — though it dates from 2016 and is flagged as stale. And at the same time **natural threats here are almost absent**: overall hazard is 1.8 out of 10 on INFORM, the seventh lowest among 168 countries — there is no sea, so no coastal hazard and no tsunami at all, earthquakes are 0.1, flooding 1.8, cyclones 0.2, and only drought at 4.7 is appreciable. Life expectancy is 64.26 years, health spending 296.05 dollars per person per year, water access reaches 80.37 percent of the population, and PM2.5 stands at 16.75 micrograms per cubic metre. Homicides run at 13.68 per 100,000 and road deaths at 24.7. On the World Bank scale, control of corruption is −0.79, rule of law −0.86, government effectiveness −0.78 and political stability −0.73 — appreciably better than most of its neighbours in this part of the guide. A one-bedroom in Manzini rents for 134 euros a month, among the lowest in this guide. The immigration framework is described by three Ministry of Home Affairs documents, and the ministry publishes all three itself: the Act of 1982, the Regulations of 1987 and the service charter. The Act sets ten classes of entry permit, A to J, and nine of the "useful" classes carry the condition "of benefit to the country" written into their very definition. The employer must confirm that the vacancy was advertised at full page, and during the assessment the localization department checks that the skill is not available inside the country. The charter prints the standard step by step: up to thirty minutes to lodge the documents, up to three days for vetting by the police and the localization department, one day for the committee, one day to issue the outcome — about five days for a temporary permit. For a visa: five minutes to receive it, two days for police vetting, one day for approval. Settlement is class J, and the road to it is unusual: ten years of continuous residence AND a completed "Khonta" under Swazi customary law — the act of pledging allegiance to a chief — AND proof that the person applied for citizenship and was not refused. A class J holder, like the class I person of independent means, loses the permit on taking up any employment, paid or unpaid. Family runs through the dependant's pass, which a citizen of the country may also request; the pass expires thirty days after the dependant takes up employment. What is not in this data: the processing time for a citizenship application — the charter states outright that the Citizenship Board determines it after going through each application. The procedure for bringing in cats and dogs is described neither by a national source nor by other countries' veterinary authorities. City populations are not given: no official source separating the city from the region could be found.
Other comparisons
Cameroon or… Nigeria · Rwanda · Tunisia · Algeria · Tanzania · Kenya · South Africa · Angola
Eswatini or… Gabon · Madagascar · Sierra Leone · Uganda · Zambia · Lesotho · Mozambique · Republic of the Congo
More on each: Cameroon · Eswatini. Build your own comparison — up to four countries
This material is for reference and is not legal, tax or immigration advice. Visa rules, tax thresholds and prices change. Before deciding anything, check the official sources and consult a licensed professional in the relevant country.