The Emmanuel Macron administration in France is currently constituting a small clique of senior army officers in the presidential guard in Yaoundé to propel Franck Biya to fill the anticipated vacancy that will be created soon by the demise of his father, Paul Biya, president of La Republique du Cameroun, Cameroon Intelligence Report has gathered from reliable sources in the French capital, Paris.

In La Republique du Cameroun, the National Assembly, the Senate and the Constitutional Court are all dominated by the ruling CPDM crime syndicate that is ever ready to endorse any French backed coup.

Paul Biya is a personal friend to nearly all prominent French politicians including Francoise Mitterrand, Jacques Chirac, Francoise Hollande and the disgraced Nicolas Sarkozy. The 88-year-old has been in power for more than 38 years, thanks to a 1984 coup, systematic electoral fraud, the faithful allegiance of an army packed with supporters and members of his Francophone Beti Ewondo ethnic group, solid Western support (especially from Paris), and corrupt management of Cameroon’s meagre economic resources.

The Cameroonian constitution has been rewritten so many times so that the old butcher in Yaoundé could become president for life.  The revisions have hampered all main opposition candidates including Fru Ndi and Maurice Kamto and it is now helping the Biya family to clear the way for Franck Biya, who was appointed Special Adviser to his father some years ago.

Franck Biya has never been put in charge of anything in Cameroon. He only mismanaged a vast family empire in timber with an estimated value of several billion CFA francs.

While all eyes are on Franck Emmanuel Biya, presented as a potential successor and next president of La Republique du Cameroun, supporters of Badjika Mohamadou Ahidjo, son of the first head of state have reportedly announced a big rally in Yaoundé slated for July 21 2021.

Our Yaoundé city reporter who contributed to this report noted that for the moment, the initiators of the Badjika Mohamadou Ahidjo Yaoundé rally are unknown to the general public.  But what we do know is that for several weeks now, a curious armed group- the Movement for the Liberation of Cameroon (MLC) has been threatening the Biya regime from the Far North Region.

However, this so-called pro Badjika movement has announced its presence in the nation’s capital at a time when the Franck movement has been openly asking Franck Biya to declare himself a candidate for the 2025 presidential election.

According to French Cameroun political elite, Prof. Mathias Eric Owona Nguini, the MLC aims to create a hybrid war to cut Cameroon in two, between the north and the south in order to make the country ungovernable.

To Owona Nguini’s theory, the north would include the regions of Adamaoua, the North and the Far North as well as part of the East.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Joe Biden’s administration, which is keeping a close eye on the Anglophone crisis, has nominated human rights expert Christopher Lamora as ambassador to Yaoundé. The diplomat, who is plugged into Democratic networks, will have his work cut out mending fences with President Paul Biya.

The roasting of a baby on February 11, 2021 in Batibo in the North West region of Cameroon seems to be shocking to millions around the world, but very few people remember that the burning of homes during an insurrection or insurgency in Cameroon is a government policy which dates back to the days of the marquisard movement in East Cameroon.

The burning of a baby in Batibo on the country’s Youth Day by government army soldiers is a clear reminder that peace and stability are still illusory in Cameroon though the government is giving the impression that things are stabilizing in Southern Cameroons.

The roasting of vulnerable people is nothing new during this conflict that has already sent more than 7,000 Cameroonians to an early grave. 

Kwakwa and Ngarbuh are still fresh in many minds. In Kwakwa, an old woman and a sick old man were roasted alive by army soldiers who are supposed to protect innocent civilians.

In Ngarbuh, government troops gunned down scores of people and set homes ablaze, leaving many calcinated in their homes. These were young children and pregnant women who had nothing to do with the insurgency that has been playing out in the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon for over four years.

The government clearly holds that burning the homes of the poor and innocent people will cause the population to discontinue its support to the insurgents even when it has not been really proven that the population is supporting the fighters.

From every indication, it is also clear that the population has been caught between the devil and deep blue sea. The same population is being threatened by the Southern Cameroonian fighters when the fighters feel that they have been betrayed by somebody.

 Africa Intelligence and Cameroon Intelligence Report

As Chad’s president, Idriss Deby, exits the political scene in uncertain circumstances, many in the world have begun thinking that Chad might be talking to Cameroon.

The Chadian president had won a landslide victory in a predetermined presidential election like his Cameroonian counterpart, Paul Biya.

The beleaguered Chadian leader was dealing with an insurgency just like his Cameroonian counterpart and had vowed to crush it.

But can the Chadian situation be a lesson to Cameroonian authorities? This will be the subject of the next editorial as things play out in Chad.

Cameroon has been touted as an oasis of peace in a desert of chaos for many decades, but for some time now, the country has gradually been ranking itself among the most dangerous, corrupt and chaotic countries to live in as descent and frustration spread across the country like wildfire.

Four years ago, the country’s president, Paul Biya, erroneously declared war on the country’s English-speaking minority which was simply demonstrating to bring its sorry plight to the attention of the government and the international community and what Mr. Biya and his collaborators thought would be wrapped up in a week has now lasted four years with more than 7,000 young Cameroonians already sent to an early grave in a war that has no raison d’etre.

As the government and militia have transformed the country into an open air killing field, the country’s economy has taken a nosedive, with millions of Cameroonians seeking employment and thousands losing their jobs in the country’s two English-speaking regions where the killings are going on unabated.

The number of internally displaced person has continued to swell, while millions have fled to neighboring Nigeria where they are living rough and waiting for the fighting to end for them to return to their country, though their homes have been razed by government soldiers who are wont to inflicting collective punishment on the population each time an army soldier is killed.

But it is not only Southern Cameroons that is going through such an apocalypse. The northern part of the country has been the theater of violent confrontations between government troops and Boko Haram fighters who have bombed many civilians into an early grave.

While the government has been active in the North hoping that it could roll back Boko Haram fighters who are believed to come from Nigeria, government forces have succeeded to alienate Northerner due to massive and bloody killings and abuse of the civilian population which now sympathizes with Boko Haram fighters who are sometimes viewed as liberators.

Noted for its corruption, the government has never really sought to address those issues that are really threatening national unity and integration. The North, like many parts of the country, has been neglected, with very little development projects being implemented in that part of the country.

Tribalism and nepotism are really tearing the country apart as most senior government positions are only occupied by the president’s tribesmen and those loyal to him and his ruling crime syndicate known as the CPDM.

However, it is not the government’s nepotism that is the issue but the results it has posted over the last four decades. Cameroonians would not be bothered if those occupying those strategic positions were really delivering desired results.

While across the country the unemployment rate is high, it is a lot higher in the northern region of the country where there are no companies, no roads, no hospitals and no social services and financial assistance that can even cushion the impact of the economic hardship.

The frustrations in the North are legion and the pain is excruciating. The North has lost almost everything it had during the Amadou Ahidjo days and this is really painful.

Northerners have grudges and they want to get their pound of flesh sooner rather than later. The Biya regime had killed thousands of Northerners, especially senior northern military officials, following a coup d’état in 1984 that led to the country’s first president, Amadou Ahidjo, fleeing to Senegal where he died and is currently lying in an unmarked grave.

This bitterness and the corruption which have robbed the northern population of many services has pushed the frustrated northern population to set up a militia which is now armed and willing to fight the Yaounde government that has never incorporated dialogue into its national development and integration strategy.

The new militia is enjoying huge support from muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia, Quatar, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates which surely have a hidden agenda that may result in the long term destabilization of the country.

Cameroon is falling apart and the way things are shaping up, if care is not taken, it might end up like Zaire, currently the Democratic Republic of Congo, where since its brutal dictator, Mobutu Seseseko, fell in 1994, the country has been unstable and the number of militia has grown by leaps and bounds and the country has become the epitome of political chaos.

The international community must stop looking the other way as Cameroon continues its unfortunate but sure descent to the bottom of the abyss of chaos and corruption.

With new armed groups cropping up on a daily basis, it is obvious that the country which is now on life support may one day implode and the consequences could linger for a very long time.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

The central African nation of Cameroon is better known for football, but its bloody, under-reported conflict deserves our attention. The right of minorities to self-determination is at the heart of violence blighting the lives of millions of unarmed civilians.

The Vatican has been increasingly diplomatically engaged, encouraging the Cameroon government to participate in inclusive peace talks, mediated by a third party. A webinar, hosted by the Liberal Democrats, on 19 April 6.30 – 8pm explores these issues.

Cameroon has been ruled by President Paul Biya, age 88, since 1982. He continues to win elections that no international monitor considers free and fair, and his country is ranked among the world’s most corrupt and repressive by Transparency International and Freedom House, respectively.

In 2016, Biya’s Francophone-dominated regime tried to impose French-speaking judges and teachers on the English-speaking regions, representing 20% of the population. Peaceful Anglophone protests were crushed with what impartial human rights groups described as disproportionate force. The UN estimates 700,000 civilians (out of six million Anglophones) have fled to the bush and beyond. UNICEF says one million children are out of school. Local civil society groups believe 5,000 people have been killed. Meanwhile, hundreds of opposition figures are imprisoned without due process.

Armed militias have emerged, demanding a sovereign country called “The Federal Republic of Ambazonia,” and rights monitors believe all armed sides are behaving with impunity, with unarmed civilians caught in the middle. The former colonial powers, the UK and France, offer bland calls for the respect for international human rights law, but neither government will apply pressure on Cameroon to attend inclusive mediated peace talks offered by the Swiss and the Vatican. Cardinal Parolin, the Papal envoy, visited Cameroon in January, and rights monitors suggest that Pope Francis is the only world leader commanding the respect of President Biya.

The webinar will explore a cross section of views on the way forward. Speakers include Dr Chris Fomunyoh from the National Democratic Institute in Washington DC, and Juliette Paauwe of the Coalition for the Responsibility to Protect.

Source: Independent Catholic News

Professor Messanga Nyamding, the former faculty member of the International Relations Institute of Cameroon (IRIC), who was recently transferred to Ngaoundere by the country’s higher education minister, Fame Ndongo, who also doubles as an indefatigable professional dancer, has finally arrived his new duty station.

Messanga Nyamding’s transfer, which is a disciplinary measure for his incisive criticism of his own party, the ruling CPDM, also known as the crime syndicate, is gradually transforming him into a clown and rock star at the same time.

Upon reaching his new duty station, the notorious professor, headed to a local restaurant where he ate a one-kilometer long loaf of bread with an entire pot of meat before heading to the university where he will be imparting knowledge to young Cameroonians.

The minister of higher education, Fame Ndongo, had said on national television that the frustrated professor of international relations would be received in his new obscure university as a hero.

He made this declaration while seeking to prove that Professor Messanga Nyamding’s brutal and sudden transfer was not politically motivated.

Professor Messanga Nyamding had criticized the secretary general at the Presidency of the Republic, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, on national TV, pointing out that the all powerful secretary general was fostering corruption in the civil service by promoting nepotism and mediocrity.

Cameroon has long been known for its legendary corruption and it has, on two occasions, won the world cup for corruption under the watchful eyes of Peter Mafany Musonge who was the country’s prime Minister at the time.

Messanga Nyamding who is cash strapped has accepted his humiliation and has grudgingly moved to Ngaoundere, but he wants to make political out of his misfortune.

As predicted by Fame Ndongo, Professor Messanga Nyamding was received with pump and pageantry by motorcycle riders of Ngaoundere. But the Chancellor of the Univerisy, Professor Chinje, was not willing to see Messanga Nyamding enjoy his rock star status. She did her best to rain on Messanga Nyamding’s parade.

Instead of being a beautiful event, the CPDM drama ended up being a COVID-19 super spreader event, with the boisterous and flamboyant Nyamding spraying the deadly virus across the entire city. What was supposed to have been a simple event to escort Professor Nyamding ended up being a super spreader event, with onlookers and participants ignoring all COVID-19 safety protocols and with Messanga Nyamding coughing and blowing his nose irresponsibly.

Professor Messanga Nyamding might not have had the joy and privilege of being escorted to his new duty station because of Prof. Chinje, but he did at least draw attention to himself.

His objective has always been to draw the attention of the country’s president, Paul Biya. He has been looking forward to a good appointment but his dream seems to be turning into a nightmare as his political comrades have resorted to persecuting him as a means of shutting him up for good.

Yesterday’s event in Ngaoundere is by no means the last we will be seeing from the frustrated and flamboyant Nyamding. He needs a political appointment and recognition and he will stop at nothing when it comes to achieving his objective.

Nyamding is hungry. He is cash strapped and while he has taken the humiliation from Professor Fame Ndongo and Mr. Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh lying down, he has not taken his eye off the ball. Cameroonians will be hearing from him soon as he remains a key member of the CPDM comedy cast.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

In a bid to continue deceiving the people of Southern Cameroons that the Social Democratic Front party of Ni John Fru Ndi is still a force within the Biya Francophone political setting, Yaoundé has announced that the crisis in Southern Cameroons will be on the agenda of the next parliamentary session, four years after the conflict began.

The information was made public by the regime after secret service officers reported that ghost town operations put in place all over Southern Cameroons by the Ambazonia Interim Government is paralyzing the economies of many towns and cities including those in French Cameroun and hampering the flow of Ambazonia money into the French Cameroun treasury.

 A highly placed official inside the Etoudi palace was quoted by Le Jour –a French Cameroun newspaper as saying “The crisis that is shaking the North-West and South-West regions will finally be put on the National Assembly’s agenda next June”.

Fru Ndi’s man in Yaoundé, Hon. Joshua Osih has reportedly confirmed the CPDM French Cameroun decision and told Le Jour that “We have always fought for a debate on the crisis in the North West and South West regions. This has been agreed and could be put on the agenda for the June session. I think we will come back to this issue in June and to the budgetary orientation debate. This session was dense. We are going home with the feeling that we have played our role well. It is important to know that the sessions follow each other and are not alike.”

SDF boycotted the opening of the November 2017 session, to force the Biya Francophone government to include the Southern Cameroons Crisis on the agenda for discussions. Nothing was done. Former SDF Member of Parliament Hon. Joseph Wirba, one of the first parliamentarians to raise this issue when the conflict was still in its infancy, ended up resigning from the assembly out of sheer exhaustion and threats to his life.

By Oke Akombi Ayukepi Akap in Glasgow with files from Rita Akana

Members of the ruling CPDM crime syndicate from the South Region have now been told that the choice of Franck Biya to succeed his father President Biya is mission impossible in the Beti constituency as a planned rally by a prominent administrative officer was boycotted by the elites including traditional rulers.

No one was there to even welcome the governor and the senior divisional officer during the meeting that was supposed to make public the Franck Biya political discourse, according to senior security officials in the South Region.

What followed was a series of drama and uncertainty that included a massive boycott staged by the people of the South Region, a protest statement by the visiting administrative officers and threats of expulsion from the CPDM party.

A video posted online recorded by a senior political elite from the South Region sent cheering crowds into the streets in Ebolowa the chief town in the South Region where thousands are reportedly anticipating the end of the Biya era.

Biya feared, not loved

Cameroon has been touted as an oasis of peace in a desert of chaos for many decades, but for some time now, the country has gradually been ranking itself among the most dangerous, corrupt and chaotic countries to live in as descent and frustration spread across the country like wildfire.

Four years ago, the country’s president, Paul Biya, erroneously declared war on the country’s English-speaking minority which was simply demonstrating to bring its sorry plight to the attention of the government and the international community and what Mr. Biya and his collaborators thought would be wrapped up in a week has now lasted four years with more than 7,000 young Cameroonians already sent to an early grave in a war that has no raison d’etre.

As the government and militia have transformed the country into an open air killing field, the country’s economy has taken a nosedive, with millions of Cameroonians seeking employment and thousands losing their jobs in the country’s two English-speaking regions where the killings are going on unabated.

The number of internally displaced person has continued to swell, while millions have fled to neighboring Nigeria where they are living rough and waiting for the fighting to end for them to return to their country, though their homes have been razed by government soldiers who are wont to inflicting collective punishment on the population each time an army soldier is killed.

But it is not only Southern Cameroons that is going through such an apocalypse. The northern part of the country has been the theater of violent confrontations between government troops and Boko Haram fighters who have bombed many civilians into an early grave.

While the government has been active in the North hoping that it could roll back Boko Haram fighters who are believed to come from Nigeria, government forces have succeeded to alienate Northerner due to massive and bloody killings and abuse of the civilian population which now sympathizes with Boko Haram fighters who are sometimes viewed as liberators.

Noted for its corruption, the government has never really sought to address those issues that are really threatening national unity and integration. The North, like many parts of the country, has been neglected, with very little development projects being implemented in that part of the country.

Tribalism and nepotism are really tearing the country apart as most senior government positions are only occupied by the president’s tribesmen and those loyal to him and his ruling crime syndicate known as the CPDM.

However, it is not the government’s nepotism that is the issue but the results it has posted over the last four decades. Cameroonians would not be bothered if those occupying those strategic positions were really delivering desired results.

While across the country the unemployment rate is high, it is a lot higher in the northern region of the country where there are no companies, no roads, no hospitals and no social services and financial assistance that can even cushion the impact of the economic hardship.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Former general manager of the Cameroon Radio and Television (CRTV) died at his residence in Yaoundé on Friday, his family announced.

He is credited with setting the stage for state radio and television to be an important tool of blackmail, misinformation and President Paul Biya’s image laundering used by pro Biya comedians like Paul Atanga Nji.

As a French Cameroun political elite and blood relation to the head of state, Mendo Ze brought to his endeavors an enduring commitment to the Blessed Virgin Mary in a deep wellspring of warmth and good humor and successfully transformed CRTV into a conduit through which fraud is celebrated and the flames of the North West/ South West divide are fanned and Francophones in Mfoundi Division are incited to take up arms against their neighbours.

He made CRTV the voice of hate, sycophancy and intimidation and CRTV under him was used to perpetrate crimes against the people of Southern Cameroons in which alleged “enemies dans la maisons” “biafrais” “anglobami” “Opposants” and now are blackmailed and targeted on account of their ethnicity or valid claims for self determination.

The former General Manager of the Cameroon Radio and Television, CRTV, extremely weakened by stress and illness was told to go home from the notorious Yaoundé Central Prison in Kondengui.

A video of the former pot-belly supporter of the Yaoundé-based crime syndicate was trending on social media, portraying him as a bag of bones that was a victim of a vile system he served and propped whole-heartedly for many years.

Mendo Ze was brought down by the system in which he had unwavering faith and trust

The Biya regime was never bad to Mendo Ze when he enjoyed all the fame and perks that came with the high offices he occupied. This regime was like his oxygen and anybody who held contrary views automatically became Mendo Ze’s enemy.

Finally, the man who headed Cameroon Radio and Television for seventeen years was made to have a taste of the medication he helped the ruling crime syndicate to manufacture for Cameroonians.

The fat and bulky Mendo Ze was reduced to a bag of bones and was let off the hook just for him to go and die at home-confirming the Cameroon Concord News assertion that if a man appoints you, he can disappoint you!

The Francophone God of Evil passing for a head of state did not want him to soil the Yaoundé Maximum Security Prison if he dies there. Mendo Ze to President Biya did not even worth the prison’s jumpsuit in which he would have been wrapped if he had died in jail.

Mendo Ze was spared because of his illness, and as we rightly reported he had very limited time to live. He was sent home to die surrounded by his loved ones who saw him melt like snow under very high temperatures.

Mendo Ze was a huge and fat person but he left the Kondengui prison simply a shadow of his former self.

Gervais Mendo Ze: CRTV General Manager

Gervais Mendo Ze former general manager of the Cameroon Radio and Television (Crtv) from 1988 to 2005), was sentenced by the Special Criminal Court to 20 years in prison.

Arrested in November 2014 after he was sacked from the cabinet as Minister Delegate to the Minister of Communication), Gervais Mendo Ze  was prosecuted for several issues which inter alia included fraudulent transport allowances amounting to CFAF 39 million and television tax money.

The Beti Ewondo French Cameroun political elite was also accused of having received a monthly representation bonus of more than CFAF 15 million,  CFAF 116 million as home maintenance allowance, FCAF 205 million  as car allowance and 20 million from Cameroon’s audiovisual fee.

Justice also reproached him for misappropriation of 360 million FCFA, constituting part of the GM’s running cost of the state owned radio and television.

Gervais Mendo Ze was prosecuted with fourteen other people (some fleeing and others dead in custody), among them Crtv’s financial service staff and Cameroon’s treasury administration represented by the renowned former Minister of Finance Polycarpe Abah Abah, former mayor Akono Ze Jean Marie and Jean Paul Amang Bitegni all implicated in the 15 billion FCFA television tax scandal

The Mendo Ze acolytes were all sentenced to 18 years in prison and must also pay CFAF15 billion representing the damage caused to the state and pay a fine of CFAF 962 million.

The Special Criminal Court: President Biya’s Court

Depicting the Special Criminal Court established to prosecute alleged corrupt government officials and the several Alibabas responsible for pilfering from the public treasury as the President’s court is no misnomer.  Cameroon Concord News Group calls it President Biya’s court because it is one instrument of power through which the President is reining in on perceived opponents from within his CPDM power conduit.

An attribute of a genuine court is the fairness of the trial proceedings in cases which are brought before the court for trial. It is not the number of convictions entered against accused.  A court is legitimate and recognized as such because of its exercise of judicial, executive, legislative and administrative independence.  A court that is independent must be accessible to all citizens after all, is equality before the law, not a constitutionally protected value? The Special Criminal Court is lacking in these attributes of impartiality, judicial independence and accessibility.  It is perceived more as the President’s Court than a Court of Justice.

Establishing this court was President Biya’s way of saving himself the embarrassment of being humiliated during his perennial trips abroad as the President of the most corrupt countries in the world.  This ranking of the country as the most corrupt or one of the most corrupt countries had a potential to hamper President Biya’s personal pecuniary interests far from the borders of Cameroon.  There was therefore a personal interest need to establish the court.  Another personal interest need was to avail himself of a legal tool under his direct control to consolidate absolute power, blackmail potential rebels and competitors within the system and to stifle any form of institutional opposition. He perceived the court as a tool with which to whitewash his more than thirty years of corrupt governance and the rape of the economy.

With the war against Boko Haram, the fight against corruption using the Special Criminal Court has afforded Paul Biya justification contest in the next institutionally flawed elections in order to eternalize power purportedly to direct the war against terror and the war against corruption.  True to the name the President’s Court, the President has exclusive preserve in referring cases to the Special Court and the power to terminate them. He decides who will be arrested, who will be investigated and who will serve time and who will not.

In one instance, he ordered a detained late Minister Bapes Bapes released from remand custody at Kondengui when a warrant was issued for his arrest without the presidential fiat.  Prof Titus Edzoa a former Secretary-General at the Presidency of the Republic benefitted from a purported Presidential pardon whose primary purpose was the release of a French citizen Thiery Atangana from jail.

The fear of a presidential referral to the Special Criminal Court on additional charges of corruption under a practice devolved under the supervision of Paul Biya called “rouleur compresseur” pushed Titus Edzoa   to rejoin the CPDM Party without a public resignation or repudiation of his membership of the party on which he intended to contest presidential elections prior to his incarceration.  Edzoa was a victim of this system of presidential justice when new charges were brought against him when his first imprisonment was about to end in order to maintain him in prison.

By Soter Tarh Agbaw-Ebai

Fearful of attracting the ire of a Biden administration that is already rather ill-disposed towards Yaoundé, the Cameroonian foreign ministry is staying silent in the wake of the expulsion of one of its diplomats from the United States over allegations of ill-treatment.

The new U.S. Administration sent Minister Laurent Esso’s niece, Michelle Esso, who has been the chief spy out of the United States and she has been declared persona non grata.

The US has already indicated that Cameroon is a country which needs to be watched very carefully because of the gross human rights abuses taking place in the country, especially within the context of the Southern Cameroons crisis.

President Biden clearly holds that the Yaoundé government is persecuting Southern Cameroonians for purely linguistic purposes.

Michelle Esso is paying a huge price for working for the ruling CPDM crime syndicate in Yaoundé and some of the errors and sins of her uncle, Laurent Esso, who is the current Minister of State, Justice and Keeper of the Seal that has usurped power and has opted to make things terribly hard for Cameroonians.

By Chi Prudence Asong with files from Soter Agbaw-Ebai and Africa Intelligence

For the second consecutive time, heavily armed police dispersed an opposition leaders’ meeting held to propose reforms they say are needed to democratically change the more than four-decade-long rule of 88-year-old Cameroonian President Paul Biya. Opposition leaders, including three former presidential candidates, say the crackdown is the latest setback in their attempt to pave the way for peaceful transition of power from Africa’s second-longest-ruling president.

 Seven opposition leaders said they were forcefully evicted from a meeting held in Yaounde Wednesday as they were pressing for reforms to rescue elections from the strong grip of Cameroon’s long-serving president, Paul Biya. The leaders issued a formal statement on April 3. 

 Among the attendees was Prince Michael Ngwese Ekosso. He is the president of the opposition United Socialist Democratic Party and said he took part in the meeting with hopes of easing tensions after allegations of election rigging. Opposition leaders say post-election tensions have risen after claims of fraud, with results skewed toward Biya’s Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement party.

 “It was a need for us the political leaders to see that the electoral code resembles the aspirations of Cameroonians in general,” Ekosso said. “We are living a country where democracy is not implemented. They (the government) do not want political leaders to hold meetings and they (the police) always come to disrupt. And also, it was a need for us to be able to discuss those things that have hampered true democracy, and then talk about the need for opposition parties to be able to form a reasonable platform to address some of the key issues,” he added.

 Ekosso said the leaders avoided possible brutality and assault by peacefully leaving the hall when the police ordered an immediate stop to the meeting.

 The government said it ordered the meeting to be ended because the opposition leaders failed to obtain an authorization, as stipulated by Cameroonian law.

 Ekosso said the law requires an authorization only when there is a political rally. He said he and his peers were simply taking part in a meeting of seven opposition leaders. 

 Three candidates who lost the country’s October 7, 2018, presidential poll were in the meeting.

 Maurice Kamto, who claims he won the election and that Biya stole his victory, said the decision to stop an opposition meeting was another step in a crackdown on the democratic process. 

 Cabral Libii, a former presidential aspirant and lawmaker of the opposition Cameroonian Party for National Reconciliation, and Joshua Osih, former presidential candidate and vice president of the Social Democratic Front, said the decision to stop the meeting was an afront to democracy.

 Cameroon’s Higher Education Minister under Bia, Jacques Fame Ndongo, says there is no need for changes in the electoral code now. 

 He said Cameroonians gave Biya 71% of their votes in the 2018 presidential election, an indication that they agree with all of Biya’s policies and laws. He said people are expecting Biya to concentrate on developing Cameroon in fulfilment of the promises he made before the 2018 presidential poll.

 Ndongo said political parties can make suggestions as to the changes they want in the electoral code for Cameroon’s Parliament to examine when lawmakers deem it necessary.

 Mamoun Njoya of the Cameroon Civil Society group, which advocates for good governance in the country, says any opposition bill to change the electoral code will be thrown out of Parliament by majority lawmakers controlled by Biya.

 He said Biya and his Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement party have drifted from the policy and values they promised the Cameroon people when the party was founded in 1985. He said Biya and his party are not ready to enact laws that will stop election rigging and the siphoning state funds.

 Biya has been in power in Cameroon for 45 years, seven as prime minister and 38 as president. In 2008, he removed term limits from the constitution, allowing him to serve indefinitely. 

 He has won all of Cameroon’s elections, but the opposition has always contested his victory, saying Biya prepared the electoral code to favor him and his CPDM party.

 Biya is the second-oldest serving president in sub-Saharan Africa after his neighbor, Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea, who has been in power since 1979. When Biya’s latest term is finished, he would be 93 years old.

Source: VOA