15, July 2019
US: Poll gives Biden, Sanders and Warren lead over Trump 0
A new opinion survey shows that US President Donald Trump trails the Democratic Party’s most-talked-about presidential aspirants, ex-vice president Joe Biden, senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
The poll was conducted between July 7 and 9 among 800 registered voters. It was undertaken jointly by NBC News and The Wall Street Journal.
Clashing head to head, Biden would beat Trump 51 to 42 percent in the next election, while Sanders would overtake him 50 to 43, the poll showed.
Warren would also beat Trump outside the poll’s 3.5 percent margin of error by 48 percent against the president’s 43.
Sen. Kamala Harris will be successful too, but winning over Trump 45 to 44.
The hopefuls attend a heated televised debate on a monthly basis, which bears heavily on their respective popular image.
The competition is gaining momentum amid continued controversy surrounding Trump’s 2016 victory.
The furor concerns the country’s Electoral College system, and ongoing accusations of foreign meddling in the elections.
The system overrides the popular vote, which gives the victory to the candidate winning the most ballots. It instead makes 538 electors across different states, who are chosen based on each state’s representation in Congress, liable for electing the chief executive. Therefore, if a contestant secures at least 270 of the electoral votes, they have won the presidential race.
In 2016, the mechanism handed the presidential election’s victory to Trump over Hillary Clinton, although the voters had given the latter three million more votes.
The accusations of foreign intervention relates to claims that Russia conducted a campaign, including through various social media accounts, in order to positively influence the public opinion in Trump’s favor. Both Moscow and the president roundly rejects the claims.
16, July 2019
The Butcher of Yaounde postpones local elections again 0
Cameroon President Paul Biya said Monday he was delaying local elections to 2020, a declaration read on the radio said Monday, the second time in two years that the poll has been postponed.
“The mandate of municipal councillors elected on September 30, 2013 has been extended until February 29, 2020,” Biya declared, which essentially sets the poll back until that date. No reason was given for the extension.
On July 11, 2018, the elections were postponed a first time using the same method. Biya, who is 86, has been in power for 36 years.
Legislative elections could now be delayed as well because the government wants to hold them at the same time to cut costs, deputies told AFP.
Cameroon is in the midst of a security crisis that has pitted separatist English-speaking regions in the west against the French-speaking population elsewhere. In the north, the Nigerian jihadist group Boko Haram stages regular armed attacks meanwhile.
The country is also facing political ructions, with the head of the opposition Movement for the Rebirth of Cameroon, Maurice Kamto, and about 100 of the party’s supporters still in jail after their arrest in January.
(AFP)