Eleven candidates face off against Cameroon’s incumbent president Paul Biya in elections on Sunday, with the divided opposition having failed to unite behind a joint contender.
The 92-year-old head of state, who has spent 43 years in power, made his first public appearance of the campaign on Tuesday just five days before the vote.
Four candidates among the crowded lineup of presidential hopefuls have drawn attention: two former ministers and two fierce government adversaries.
– Issa Tchiroma Bakary, 79 –
Bakary recently defected from the presidential camp and has gathered several thousand people at his meetings around the country.
The former employment minister and leader of the Front for the National Salvation of Cameroon (FSNC) resigned from government in June after more than 20 years in the ranks of the ruling majority.
A coalition of minority opposition parties and civil society actors called Union for Change 2025 nominated Bakary for election in mid-September, but he has not garnered further support since.
On the campaign trail in Cameroon’s English-speaking region, the presidential candidate apologised for “denying the existence of an Anglophone issue in this country” during his time in office.
– Bello Bouba Maigari, 78 –
Maigari was Biya’s first prime minister in 1982 and came third behind him in the 1992 presidential election.
As leader of the National Union for Democracy and Progress (UNDP), he was part of the presidential majority until he resigned as tourism minister in late June.
Two other presidential candidates, Ateki Seta Caxton of the Liberal Alliance Party (PAL) and lawyer Akere Tabeng Muna of the Universe party, have announced their support for Maigari and withdrawn from the race, but not in time to prevent their names from appearing on ballots alongside nine others.
– Cabral Libii, 45 –
A longstanding rival of Biya’s, Libii is the leader of the Cameroon Party for National Reconciliation (PCRN) and came third in the 2018 presidential election.
He decided not to boycott the 2020 legislative elections, and his party won five seats.
– Maurice Kamto, 71 –
Biya’s top opponent and runner-up in the 2018 election, Kamto’s candidacy for the upcoming presidential bid was rejected by the Constitutional Council.
He has denounced the “arbitrary” decision and accuses the authorities of orchestrating his exclusion.
Previously the leader of the Movement for the Renaissance of Cameroon (MRC), Kamto left the party in June to found another: the African Movement for New Independence and Democracy (MANIDEM).
Following the ban on him running, Kamto has met with most of the other candidates, and despite his supporters’ readiness for guidance on who to vote for, he has simply told them to do so “freely”.
AFP
The post Eleven candidates vie to unseat Cameroon’s Biya appeared first on Vanguard News.
