2025 presidentials: Biya to run unchallenged?.

The tides, observers are already saying, could result in most of those who made their mark, albeit coming distant behind the incumbent President Paul Biya in 2018, missing out.

The seeming political cacophony is manifesting in the face of a political register at the level of the Ministry of Territorial Administration, MINAT, which shows not less than 365 political parties. 

This is excluding the ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement, CPDM party.

In the thinking of a majority of those abreast with political gymnastics of Cameroon’s democracy, a majority of the formations on MINAT's register are fair-weather suitcase formations hiding under the guise of visions to occupy the highest office of the land.

The few political parties with muscles that give many the gumption to believe that change is possible at the helm of State, when Cameroonians go to the poll in October 2025, are gasping for stability. 

This is the case with the Cameroon Renaissance Movement, MRC, party of Prof Maurice Kamto and the Cameroonian Party for National Reconciliation, PCRN, of Hon Cabral Libii.

The duo makes up for what has been raising the bar of hope for change across the nation’s political chessboard since 2018. 

Yet, six to seven years down the road, pundits say Kamto and Cabral are having a jerkier ride than they had in a faceoff with incumbent Paul Biya at the poll in 2018.

Deafening refrains for Biya to give presidency another shot 

With Cameroon veering towards the next presidential election, incumbent Paul Biya, 92, is the sole politician whose supporters have been unbending about the need for him to seek another seven-year mandate. 

While Biya has not accepted or rejected such increasing calls for him to seek re-election, analysts are already unanimous that it would be a miracle if he decides to go on political retirement, when his current mandate expires in October next year.

The calls from across the nation in favour of Biya, who has led Cameroon as President for 42 uninterrupted years, are becoming stronger each day. 

Thus, observers say the picture shows a ruling party well organised with its sight on returning the presidency, while the opposition continues with its history of groping in the dark and disunity. 

On a flip coin, there are those who are arguing that some of the President’s cronies in government are bent on ensuring he gets a smooth ride to renew his mandate. 

This, they claim, is through actions that would block viable opposition voices and retain other smokescreen political parties in line with the CPDM’s agenda.

Working for Biya to run unchallenged?

At a time when many are hoping for an opposition coalition that could give Biya a historic run for his money, if he decides to run for office again, the sways and swerves across the country are rather showing otherwise.

Rather, concurrent battles, be they man-made or political blunders, are haunting the PCRN and MRC. 

The challenges, which are different but point to the possibility of both parties not possibly being able to field candidates in next year’s presidentials, are said to be what is giving regime lackeys a peace of mind. This, at least momentarily.

There are some of them who are already popping champagne covertly that the situation means Biya would be up against nonstarters or some make-believe opposition figures when the time comes next year.

For one thing, Kamto is viewed as still licking his wounds after unilaterally pulling the MRC out of the February 9, 2020, twin polls. 

The election, many are today saying, would have given the MRC seats in councils and the National Assembly, to guarantee it the possibility of fielding Kamto in next year’s presidentials.

This is because the Electoral Code bars candidates which party don't have elected council and regional Councillors.

He is now left with the option provided in Article 121 (1) of the Electoral Code to seek for 300 signatures from first-class traditional rulers and elected officials. 

Getting these, many say, is already a near impossibility for Kamto, given that most of such officials and traditional rulers are diehard Biya and CPDM supporters.

Even fresh reports of Kamto being in advanced talks with a political party to endorse him for the presidential election, The Guardian Post gathered, are yet to go through. 

Even if the negotiations go through, there is still the possibility that Yaounde can sponsor rival candidates from the political outfit that would endorse Kamto.

In such a scenario, the said political party would have two or more candidates joining Kamto to run for presidency on the ticket of the same political party. 

That will make it easier for ELECAM to reject all the candidates.

This, many are saying, puts Kamto’s candidacy in next year’s election in serious doubt.

‘Dismembered’ PCRN leaves Cabral Libii’s ambition in doubt

Like Kamto, Hon Cabral Libii’s political platform, the PCRN, is yet to fully recover from a leadership crisis. 

Cabral and the PCRN had been building momentum for the 2025 presidentials, until one of the party’s co-founders, retired administrator, Robert Kona, emerged, challenging his leadership of the party.

The issue has resulted in a series of dismissals, counter dismissals and court cases. Though the Kaele Court of First Instance in the Mayo-Kani Division of the Far North Region rubbished Kona’s claim in a September 5 ruling, analysts say, the fight is far from over.

In what was easily interpreted as the MINAT boss, Paul Atanga Nji, meddling in the affairs of the PCRN, he recently wrote to ELECAM, informing the election organ that Kona is the party’s leader! 

This, he did, while the leadership legal battle between Cabral and Kona, was yet to have a final judgment

Along these lines, Cabral Libii challenging an almost certain Biya candidacy in next year’s election, some are arguing, is out of the picture.

CPDM tackling vibrant opposition, pampering faire-weather parties 

As natural as the challenges facing the PCRN and MRC may look, those versed with Cameroon's style of politicking say the CPDM is the drummer in the bush. 

They are accusing the ruling party of working to sap every energy the MRC and PCRN parties have, so as to stop them from fielding candidates in next year’s election.

Those projecting this narrative are putting in the equation, letters from the Minister of Territorial Administration, Paul Atanga Nji, stalling every opposition gathering to discuss moves towards coalitions. 

The action is said to have been taken to ensure the opposition worth the salt does not get any breathing space to put a strong candidate in next year’s battle for the highest office of the land.

A hindsight in all of the arrows, which some believed are being fired at the MRC and PCRN, some say, is the preparation of situational opposition candidates as a formality when presidential elections hold next year.

Election without Kamto, Cabral Libii disgrace to Cameroon’s democracy

Holding presidential election next year, without viable opposition candidates such as Prof Maurice Kamto and Hon Cabral Libii on the ballot, many are already saying, would read negative for Cameroon’s democracy.

There are those who are already arguing that if the incumbent Head of State goes into such an election and emerges victorious, such a mandate would be seen as something picked from the gutter.   

Analysts say it would be an insult to Cameroon’s democracy, national stakeholders involved in the process and the country’s ratification of international instrument to create a balance political field for citizens to vote their leaders.

This article was first published in The Guardian Post issue N0:3234 of Thursday September 19, 2024