Paul Biya, 92, said to have won 53.66% of vote after volatile two weeks since election when opponent claimed victory
Paul Biya, the world’s oldest serving head of state, has been declared the winner of Cameroon’s election, granting him an eighth term that could keep him in office until he is nearly 100.
The country’s constitutional council said Biya had won 53.66% of the vote, while his former ally turned challenger, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, got 35.19%.
Continue reading...Issa Tchiroma Bakary calls on 92-year-old president to accept end of reign, although results have yet to be released
The Cameroonian opposition leader Issa Tchiroma Bakary has declared himself the winner of the 12 October presidential election and called on the incumbent, Paul Biya, to accept the end of his 43-year rule.
“Our victory is clear, it must be respected,” Tchiroma said in a video statement on Facebook with the national flag in the background, before directly addressing 92-year-old Biya: “We call on the regime in power to show greatness and to honour the truth of the ballot box with a long-awaited gesture: that phone call of congratulations, which will demonstrate the political maturity of our nation and the future strength of our democracy.”
Continue reading...Paul Biya, in power since 1982, has brushed off calls to retire but is rarely seen in public
Cameroon goes to the polls on Sunday for a presidential election with Paul Biya, already the world’s oldest head of state at the age of 92, the favourite to win an eighth term in power in the central African country.
A fractured opposition of 11 candidates is standing against Biya, who, despite his advanced age and declining health, has dismissed calls for him to retire.
Continue reading...Emmanuel Macron writes to Cameroonian president with findings of joint commission on country’s colonial past
France has acknowledged its role in decades of violent repression of independence movements in Cameroon, the latest stage in a slow process of reckoning with its brutal colonial past.
In a letter to the Cameroonian president, Paul Biya, dated 30 July, Emmanuel Macron said it was “up to me today to assume the role and responsibility of France in these events”.
Continue reading...Scientists say more-frequent hotter temperatures in west African region are part of reason for reduced harvests and price rises
The climate crisis drove weeks of high temperatures in the west African region responsible for about 70% of global cacao production, hitting harvests and probably causing further record chocolate prices, researchers have said.
Farmers in the region have struggled with heat, disease and unusual rainfall in recent years, which have contributed to falling production.
Continue reading...Health of Paul Biya, 91, declared matter of national security and any debate prohibited after denial that he has died
Cameroonian authorities have banned discussions about the health of the president, Paul Biya, after the latest round of speculation about his prolonged failure to appear in public.
In a 9 October letter to regional governors, the interior minister, Paul Atanga Nji, said discussing the 91-year-old president’s health was a matter of national security and “any debate in the media about the president’s condition is therefore strictly prohibited”.
Continue reading...Potential for flooding in 11 Nigerian states as west and central Africa struggles to deal with recent heavy rainfall
Authorities in Nigeria have warned of the potential for flooding in 11 states after neighbouring Cameroon said it would start regulated releases from its Lagdo dam following recent heavy rainfall in west and central Africa.
Umar Mohammed, the director-general of the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NHSA), indicated that the discharges would be gradual “to avoid … triggering substantial flooding downstream in Nigeria” and that there was “no need for alarm”. Still, 11 Nigerian states from north to south lie along the Benue River’s flow trajectory and are expected to be affected to some degree.
Continue reading...Where Chad, Cameroon and the Central African Republic meet, people are turning vigilante to fight back
Tired of waiting for the authorities to come to their aid, young men in the Mayo-Kebbi Ouest region of south-west Chad are banding into vigilante groups, using bows, arrows and spears to fight gunmen who have turned kidnapping into a professional pastime.
“We guide the gendarmes in the bush, but we are also the first to go after the criminals after a kidnapping,” said Amos Nangyo, head of one of the units in Pala, capital of the region, which borders Cameroon, told Agence France-Presse earlier this month.
Continue reading...‘Crucial’ UN resolution attempts to avoid repeat of injustices produced by Africa’s fossil fuel sector
In an attempt to avoid the “injustices and extractivism” of fossil fuel operations, African leaders are calling for better controls on the dash for the minerals and metals needed for a clean energy transition.
A resolution for structural change that will promote equitable benefit-sharing from extraction, supported by a group of mainly African countries including Senegal, Burkina Faso, Cameroon and Chad, was presented at the UN environmental assembly in Nairobi on Wednesday and called for the sustainable use of transitional minerals.
Continue reading...Country accused of violating torture convention in hope of finding justice decade after incident in which at least 15 people died
A 25-year-old from Cameroon has filed a complaint to the UN against Spain, accusing the country of multiple violations of the convention against torture in hope of seeking justice after an incident in 2014 during which at least 15 people died while trying to enter Spanish territory from Morocco.
“A decade has passed and still not a single person has been held accountable for the death and injury of so many,” said the man, who asked to be identified by the pseudonym Ludovic.
Continue reading...Another 19 African countries have plans to join the programme – bringing ‘more than just hope’ to a continent that suffers the vast majority of malaria deaths
The rollout of the world’s first malaria vaccine began in Cameroon on Monday, which is said to be a “transformative chapter in Africa’s public health history”.
The RTS,S vaccine – 662,000 doses of it – will be administered to children in the west African country, the first to be vaccinated after successful trials of the drug in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi between 2019 and 2021.
Continue reading...Samuel Fosso scoops £30,000 award for performative self-portraits of historical figures including Angela Davis and Mao Zedong
One of Africa’s most important living photographers and contemporary artists, who photographs himself in the style of leading historical figures including Martin Luther King and Angela Davis, has won the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation prize 2023.
The Cameroonian-born Nigerian photographer Samuel Fosso was awarded the £30,000 prize – one of the most prestigious in the industry – at the Photographers’ Gallery in London on Thursday.
Continue reading...Health charity in an ‘untenable position’ in anglophone parts of the country as it is accused of taking sides in internal strife
Medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has suspended its work in Cameroon’s south-west region and demanded the release of four staff members who have been detained for months, accused of helping secessionists.
Two MSF staff were detained at a checkpoint in December when they were transferring a patient with gunshot wounds. Another two were held by Cameroonian gendarmerie in January.
Continue reading...Officials often underestimate the dangers faced by failed asylum seekers who are forcibly sent home, writes Jackie Fearnley
The recent Human Rights Watch report on the harm done to Cameroonian asylum seekers, both while they were trying to make their claims in the US and when repatriated in a blaze of publicity, should be required reading for all asylum decision-makers (African migrants deported in Trump era suffered abuse on return, 10 February).
From my experience of helping Cameroonian torture survivors over the past 14 years, I have noted that Home Office decision-makers, and many judges, can fatally underestimate the degree of risk attached to the forcible return process, particularly as failed asylum seekers are viewed as having brought the country into disrepute and can be punished with imprisonment.
Continue reading...Dozens of fans have been injured and at least six are reported to be dead after a crush occurred outside Olembe Stadium in Yaoundé, the capital city of Cameroon, at the host nation’s Africa Cup of Nations match against Comoros.
Victims are understood to have been admitted to the city’s Messassi hospital after the incident, which occurred as supporters attempted to gain access to the ground’s south entrance for the round-of-16 match. The circumstances, including whether the injuries occurred before kick-off or during the game, are unclear but a local official has said the crush had tragic consequences.
Continue reading...Opposition figure shot and a soldier killed with an explosive device in a separate attacks in the region
A prominent opposition figure and a soldier have been killed in separate attacks in Cameroon’s restive anglophone regions, intensifying security concerns as the country hosts the Africa Cup of Nations football tournament.
Henry Kemende, a senator for the Social Democratic Front party, was shot dead in Bamenda city in the north-west region. His party, who blamed separatist fighters for the attack, said gunmen forced him from his car and shot him in the chest.
Continue reading...Human Rights Watch says armed separatists in anglophone regions have made schools a battleground, with hundreds of school pupils and teachers attacked, kidnapped or threatened
Armed separatists in Cameroon’s anglophone regions have attacked, kidnapped and threatened hundreds of school pupils in nearly five years of violence that has forced more than 230,000 children to flee their homes, a report has found.
In a detailed analysis of the conflict that has gripped the English-speaking regions since 2017, dozens of students and teachers speak of brutal attacks by armed groups who have made education a battleground in their fight to form their own state.
Continue reading...Médecins Sans Frontières and Norwegian Refugee Council, active in war-torn Tigray, in talks over ban
The Ethiopian government has suspended the work of two international aid organisations for three months, including in the conflict-hit Tigray region, accusing them of spreading misinformation.
Ethiopia Current Issues Fact Check, a government-run website focused on Tigray, accused Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) of violating several rules.
Continue reading...The Cameroonians, who had ‘no idea’ they had jumped into the demilitarised area, have been trapped for almost two months
A few months after Grace Ngo flew into Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus from her native Cameroon, she decided to head “for the west”. Smugglers pointed the student in the direction of the Venetian walls that cut through the heart of Nicosia, Europe’s last divided capital.
A little before midnight on 24 May, Ngo leapt from the breakaway Turkish Cypriot republic into what she hoped would be the war-divided island’s internationally recognised Greek south.
Continue reading...Social media celebrity Shakiro and friend given five-year sentences as rights groups fear crackdown on LGBT+ community
Two transgender women in Cameroon have been convicted of “attempting homosexuality” and sentenced to five years in prison, in a case feared to be part of a growing campaign against sexual minorities, according to rights groups.
Shakiro, a popular social media figure, and Patricia were convicted on Tuesday. The charges included public indecency and non-possession of a national ID card, an offence rarely prosecuted in Cameroon.
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