Burkina Faso ENAM Greffier common mistakes
Burkina Faso ENAM Greffier · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
Reciting the conditions of divorce or filiation from memory without linking each condition to the article of the Code des personnes et de la famille that establishes it, so that the answer is a general essay rather than a legal demonstration.
Candidates revise civil law by reading summaries and never practise citing the applicable text; under exam pressure they reproduce the summary and lose the marks attached to legal basis.
What to do instead
Build a one-page table per civil-law topic (marriage, divorce, filiation, succession, property) with three columns: rule, article number, one-line consequence. In every practice answer, write the article reference immediately after the rule before developing the facts.
Confusing the roles of the juge de la mise en état, the juge des référés and the tribunal itself, and therefore filing or describing a procedural act before the wrong organ or at the wrong stage.
The procedural timetable is learned as a list of steps rather than as a chain of competent authorities, so candidates cannot say who does what at which moment of the instance.
What to do instead
Draw the life of a civil case as a horizontal timeline with the competent organ written above each stage (assignation, mise en état, référés, plaidoirie, jugement, voies de recours). Redo the timeline from blank paper weekly until it can be reproduced without notes.
Treating the elements of an offence as a single block, so that the answer asserts guilt without separately establishing the legal element, the material element and the moral element for the specific offence charged.
Candidates memorise offence definitions as sentences and never practise the three-element decomposition, which is precisely what the correcteur is looking for in a cas pratique.
What to do instead
For each of the ten most examined offences (vol, escroquerie, abus de confiance, coups et blessures, homicide, faux, corruption, viol, détournement, recel), write the three elements in three separate lines with the qualifying fact for each. Apply this grid to at least two cas pratiques per week.
Mixing up garde à vue, détention provisoire and contrôle judiciaire, giving the wrong maximum duration or the wrong authority competent to order each measure.
These measures are studied in the same chapter and share vocabulary, so they blur together; candidates also rely on remembered durations rather than on the current text.
What to do instead
Prepare a comparison table with rows for the measure and columns for the authority that orders it, the maximum duration, the rights of the person concerned and the remedy available. Verify each duration against the current Code de procédure pénale before the exam and mark any figure that has been amended recently.
Describing the greffier's tasks as generic secretarial work (accueil, classement, dactylographie) instead of naming the authenticating acts: tenue des registres, rédaction et signature des actes, conservation des pièces, délivrance des expéditions et copies, assistance à l'audience.
The profession is often learned through observation in a single service, so candidates reproduce what they have seen locally and miss the statutory core of the office.
What to do instead
Write a one-page fiche on the statut du greffier listing the authenticating functions with the text that confers them, then a second fiche on the registers kept by the greffe (rôle, registre des audiences, registre des actes). Recite both aloud until the authenticating verbs come automatically.
Confusing the organisation of the ordre judiciaire with that of the ordre administratif, and placing the Cour de cassation or the Conseil d'État at the wrong point in the hierarchy of courts.
The two orders are studied in separate chapters and the candidate never builds a single comparative map, so the hierarchies merge under pressure.
What to do instead
Draw two separate pyramids side by side, one for each order, naming every jurisdiction from first instance to the supreme body, with the competent court for appeals indicated on each level. Add a third column listing the matters that fall to each order.
Answering an administrative-law question by invoking the principle of legality in the abstract without identifying the type of recours (en annulation or de plein contentieux), the délai de recours and the authority before which it is brought.
Candidates learn the theory of legality but not the procedural gateway, so the answer is correct in doctrine and unusable in practice.
What to do instead
For each of the main administrative remedies, prepare a card stating the act challenged, the type of recours, the time limit, the competent court and the effects of a successful action. Practise by classifying ten hypothetical acts into these categories.
Describing the procedure of redressement or liquidation as a single sequence, without distinguishing the opening judgment, the période d'observation, the plan and the liquidation, nor the roles of the mandataire and the juge-commissaire at each stage.
Insolvency is revised from headlines, and the actors are memorised as a list rather than attached to the stage at which they intervene.
What to do instead
Build a stage-by-stage table of the procédure collective with columns for the stage, the competent organ, the role of the mandataire, the role of the juge-commissaire and the rights of the créanciers. Then write a model answer for a small business in difficulty using only the table.
Answering a labour-law question on dismissal or on social security benefits by asserting the rule without stating the délai de préavis, the indemnités due or the competent institution and its time limits.
Candidates treat labour law as general principles and neglect the quantified and institutional details, which carry most of the marks in a cas pratique.
What to do instead
Create a numeric fiche per topic (préavis, indemnité de licenciement, congés payés, accident du travail, prestations familiales) with the figure, the legal basis and a worked example. Recalculate one example per topic without looking at the fiche.
In the administrative drafting exercise, producing a letter or a procès-verbal that lacks the compulsory formal elements (identification of the authority, reference, date, objet, signature block) or that mixes narration of facts with the decision itself.
Candidates write as they would write an essay, and they have never compared a model act with its statutory formal requirements, so the structure is improvised.
What to do instead
Memorise two templates, one for a lettre administrative and one for a procès-verbal d'audience, with the fixed headings in order. Practise rewriting the same set of facts into each template within a strict time limit, then check the headings against the template before considering style.