Biya's paradox of celebrating 90th birthday after Youth Day.

On Monday, President Paul Biya celebrated his 90^th well-deserved birthday in a solemn tradition in person. But commercial motorbike riders, some youth groups and members of government added publicity blitz in his adoration.

The Minister of State, Secretary General at the Presidency, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, who officiated festivities at the Yaounde Multipurpose Sports Complex, invited Cameroonians "to accompany the Head of State in his great work of modernising our country”.

“Paul Biya is a real God-sent for Cameroon. You can count on him,” Ngoh Ngoh said. The Guardian Post congratulates Mr. President and wishes him many more candles to blow.

Like in previous fiestas, it happened two days after the Youth Day, one of the few occasions the Head of State makes an address.

The nexus of the Youth Day addresses has been on youth unemployment, which remains a time bomb. That is against a background that the young people, who are often flattered in the country as "leaders of the future", are ignored in top political and government appointments.

That raised the irritating question, if youth are not integrated in the governing and political system, how does the president expect them to gain experience for an effective transition when the old guards bow out as no one can cheat nature?

President Biya was appointed Secretary General at the presidency in 1967 at the youthful age of 34. How many people within that age group are ministers or even Secretaries General in any ministry? The vexing answer is in the negative.

At 90, President Paul Biya should be thinking hard of a well-deserved retirement and a smooth succession, which has remained a taboo within his party as there is visibly no one he has groomed.

When the question cropped up during a joint press conference with visiting French president, Emmanuel Macron, in Yaounde last year, the unpredictable Biya was as dribbling as always.

“As you know, Cameroon is governed in accordance with its Constitution. According to this Constitution, the mandate that I lead has a duration of seven years. So try subtracting: seven, four or three, and you will know how much time I have left to run the country. But otherwise, it will be known when this mandate expires. You will be informed about whether I am staying or going to the village,” Biya said. In 2025 when Biya’s current mandate will expire, he will be 92.

The Guardian Post, without pretending to be one of his advisers, though from the point of view of the vast silent majority, urges him to look back some 40 years ago when he was raised to the helm of state and ask himself what legacy he intends to leave when he finally retires to the "village" or called to God's glory as every human shall.

At 90, Biya is the oldest African president. He took office as "constitutional successor" of President Ahmadou Ahidjo, who had ruled ruthlessly with a one party iron fist. Against that authoritarian background, Biya was perceived as a breath of fresh and reinvigorating air.

He curried favour with the people of the North West and South West regions, whom his predecessor had, in a divide-and-rule tactic, pitted their politicians against each other.

In one of his few visits to Bamenda, Biya declared it as his “second home” and was enthroned "Fon of Fons".

It was in Bamenda that he transformed Ahidjo's Cameroon National Union, CNU, to Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement, CPDM, to cleanse the vestige of Ahidjo’s autocratic regime. He pledged a “new deal” to restore integrity and eliminate corruption.

In Communal Liberalism, which he authored, Biya emphasised the importance of creating a “more open, more tolerant and more democratic political society”.

But the lustre was short-lived. Transparency International ranked his regime as “the world most corrupt” for two years in a row, in 1998 and 1999.

As Africa’s largest producer of timber, the world’s fifth-largest producer of cocoa and a major oil producer and other natural resources, Cameroon should have emerged by now. But it is still looking up to 2035.

The conflict in the North West and South West Regions has remained the regime's Achilles’ heel for six years running, causing an estimated 6.2 million people to be in need of humanitarian assistance.

To Biya's credit, his regime has carried out a number of infrastructural projects in the areas of electricity, water, and roads, advertised as "grand achievements". But the feel good effects remain an apology of sort.

Where his greatest success has come, according to experts, is in diplomacy. He remains influential in the African Union, and maintains good relations with France, US, Russia, UK and China and many other countries, even if at the chagrin of France.

Cameroon has been part of the multinational joint task force conducting military operations to contain Boko Haram. Biya was key in convincing major powers that Boko Haram posed a global threat.

He settled Cameroon’s conflict with Nigeria over the Bakassi Peninsula and placed relations between the nations on a good footing.

Two days before President Biya celebrated his 90^th birthday, he told youth that there were daunting challenges and he needed them on board for a solution. It was the same message his Secretary General reiterated at the birthday celebration on Monday.

At age 90 and over 40 years in office, this daily newspaper holds that Biya has done his best, which might not be enough. At that old age, ovations certainly run out for any human still in active service.

What he should consider is a legacy he wants to leave for young people who are a dominant majority in the country, where only three percent of the population, according to government data, are above 60.