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Tag: Paul Biya

  • Cameroon govt bans media reporting on President’s health, whereabouts

    Cameroon govt bans media reporting on President’s health, whereabouts

    Cameroonian government has prohibited public discourse concerning the health of President Paul Biya, labelling it a matter of national security.

    This announcement follows ongoing efforts by authorities to counter rumours suggesting that the 91-year-old leader has passed away while abroad.

    In a statement released on Thursday, Minister of Territorial Administration Paul Atanga Nji emphasised that the president represents the country’s highest institution and that any discussions regarding his health fall under national security concerns.

    “All debate in the media about the health of the President of the Republic is consequently formally prohibited,” Atanga Nji said, warning that “offenders will have to face the rigour of the law.”

    The minister directed regional governors to create monitoring units to record programmes and debates in the private and social media and identify authors of “tendentious comments.”

    Social media has been flooded with discussions regarding the declining health of Cameroonian President Paul Biya, who has not been seen in public since his televised departure from Beijing on September 8, after attending the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (Focac).

    On Tuesday, the government reassured the public that the president is in excellent health and is expected to return to the country “in the next few days.”

    Rene Emmanuel Sadi, the Minister of Communication and government spokesperson, stated, “The government of the republic firmly declares that these rumours are entirely unfounded and are a product of the imagination of those spreading them.”

    He added that President Biya had taken a brief private trip to Europe following his participation in the Focac summit.

    “However, he remains, as usual, and wherever he may be, attentive to the development of national life,” the minister added.

    In another statement, Samuel Mvondo Ayolo, director of the President’s Cabinet, emphasised that “the Head of State is still fulfilling his duties in Geneva and has not left the city since returning from Beijing.”

    Cameroonians are accustomed to the President’s “brief private stays in Europe,” as frequently claimed by his Cabinet, although the actual length of these absences often contradicts the official announcements.

    However, the current absence, which has lasted nearly 40 days, has sparked heightened curiosity among the public.

  • Cameroon declines proposed visit of France’s LGBTQ ambassador

    Cameroon declines proposed visit of France’s LGBTQ ambassador

    Cameroon has officially declined the visit of France’s ambassador for LGBTQ rights, emphasizing that homosexuality remains illegal under the country’s current laws.

    Ambassador Jean-Marc Berthon was due to visit the Central African country from 27 June until 1 July to discuss gender rights, the BBC reports.

    But foreign minister Lejeune Mbella Mbella in a French language circular sighted by GhanaWeb noted that the government disapproves of the planned visit.

    Homosexuality the statement said “qualified as a crime of common law” in Cameroon.

    Recently Cameroon’s National Communication Council warned the media against promoting homosexual content, the BBC Africa LIVE report added.

  • President of Cameroon’s 90th birthday marked by a cocktail of troubles

    President of Cameroon’s 90th birthday marked by a cocktail of troubles

    Since taking office in 1982, President Biya has served Cameroon for seven terms. According to many, a change is necessary.

    When Paul Biya, the newly elected president of Cameroon, visited the United States in 1984, Edith Kah Walla was at the forefront of a group of students eagerly anticipating the stability, democracy, and end to corruption the young leader would bring.

    Biya turns 90 on Monday and is now the oldest leader in the world. Kah Walla, one of Biya’s opponents in the 2011 presidential election, will not be present when he cuts a large cake as he usually does on his birthday.

    Her support for Biya evaporated over the years as economic progress stalled, dissenting voices were silenced, and the oil-producing country of 27 million people became split by a separatist uprising that has killed thousands, amid growing Boko Haram attacks in the north.

    At 90, Biya should spend his days playing with his grandchildren, she said.

    “We live in a violent, brutal dictatorship. Over the past 40 years it has gotten more and more violent and brutal,” said Kah Walla, now a civil society activist. “These 40 years are a huge setback for Cameroon.”

    A government spokesperson did not respond to calls requesting comment.

    Four decades of Biya

    Biya has repeatedly defended his record in the past and says the government has made strides to return peace to the minority English-speaking regions where separatists are trying to form their own state.

    He touts his Vision 2035 plan as a blueprint to boost development over the next 12 years.

    Biya was born in Mvomeka’a, a village in the southern equatorial forest, in 1933, the year Adolf Hitler became chancellor in Germany.

    After studying in Paris, he returned to Cameroon in 1962 as a top civil servant and quickly rose to become the prime minister in 1975. He was hand-picked as successor after the country’s first post-independence President Ahmadou Ahidjdo decided to resign suddenly in November 1982.

    In Africa, only President Teodoro Obiang of Equatorial Guinea has ruled longer.

    Millions still support Biya, although international observers have raised doubts about the fairness of elections that he routinely wins with ease. He spends long stretches in comfortable European hotels with his wife Chantal, frustrating many at home who believe the country’s crises require closer attention.

    In 2020, he was not seen in public for weeks, prompting speculation that he had died of COVID-19.

    Biya has ruled with openness and tolerance, said former minister Elvis Ngolle Ngolle. Old age, he said, has its advantages.

    “The more you add up the age, the wiser you become – the more experienced, tolerant, logical you become,” Ngolle said.

    ‘I can’t celebrate’

    Popular journalist and whistleblower Paul Chouta disagrees. Chouta, an outspoken critic of Biya, has been repeatedly beaten and tortured in recent years. He lives in fear: just the sound of his floorboards creaking sends him into a panic.

    On March 9 last year, unknown assailants bundled him into the back of a car and drove him to an isolated spot near Yaounde airport. They beat him with stones and batons and left him for dead, he said.

    Chouta is one of several reporters who have been beaten or killed. Two journalists were killed in the last month, prompting condemnation from the United Nations.

    “If he [Biya] loves Cameroonians, let him fix things and go. The woes are deep,” Chouta told Reuters news agency.

    It is not only well-known reporters who are wary.

    Kouam Yves, a motorcycle taxi driver, last week stood at a newspaper stand discussing the news headlines with colleagues. He struggles to make a living and is critical of Biya and what he describes as rampant corruption. But he paused as he spoke, worried about who might be listening.

    “I can’t celebrate the head of state’s birthday. For more than 20 years, I have not seen anything which we have executed in this country that went well like in other countries,” he said.

  • Blakk Rasta throws jabs at Cameroonian president ‘Paul Biya’ in new song

    Ghanaian reggae star, Blakk Rasta, popularly known for his outspokenness, has composed a song for Cameroonian President, Paul Biya, for the atrocities he is causing individuals of Cameroon.

    As per the artiste, his song exposes the evil actions of the president who has been in power since 1982 while terrorising his citizens and keeping them in outright servitude.

    He added that while Paul Biya remains the only president in history to rule his country from Switzerland, using his thugs to do his dirty work, he still fights to remain in power.

    Before the ‘Barack Obama‘ artiste delivered his ‘Bwoy Biya’ melody on November 9, 2022, he had released ‘Daaro’ while delivering another single, ‘Fatima’.

    While these melodies vary in tunes and beats, he seizes the opportunity to excite admirers of different music with some fervor.

    Blakk Rasta, known officially as Abubakar Ahmed, is known for some of the controversial statements he makes when given the platform and is the host for ‘The Black Pot’.

  • Africa’s oldest president absent at party to celebrate his 40th year in office

    At 89 years, Paul Biya of Cameroon is Africa’s oldest president and second longest serving Head of State.

    Over the weekend, parties have been held across the Central African country to commemorate the 40 years he has been in power.

    Reports indicate that the celebrations were held with life-sized portraits of Biya but he was not present at any of the events.

    Thousands of people danced in front of the city hall in the capital Yaoundé. It was draped in an enormous portrait of Mr Biya emblazoned with the slogan “An exceptional president,” a BBC Africa LIVE report noted.

    The main opposition leader Maurice Kamto said Cameroon under Mr Biya was a highly corrupt country where people’s basic rights were trampled upon in a ruthless and arrogant manner.

    The administration has become even more repressive since 2017 when separatists launched a violent uprising in English-speaking parts of the country, the BBC report added.

     

    Source: Ghanaweb

  • The ‘Franckistes’ shaking up Cameroonian politics

    In just a few weeks, Paul Biya will celebrate 40 years as president of Cameroon.

    The 89-year-old has shown no sign of wanting to give up the role, though critics claim he spends much of his time abroad, even as conflict in the English-speaking part of the country rages.

    There is, however, a huge political debate in Cameroon about who should eventually replace Paul Biya.

    Among the apparent contenders in the presidential elections scheduled for 2025 is one Franck Biya, the president’s son.

    The man himself has not spoken much about his ambitions but several groups of ‘Franckistes’ – or supporters of Franck – have sprung up.

    The vice-president of one of the groups, Shimenyi Amidou, said the movement was not about retaining political power in one family.

    “Franck Biya is a Cameroonian and has all the right to be a president. We are not looking at the position of the father. It’s not an issue of family,” he told the BBC’s Newsday programme.

    He also rejected claims that the president’s son was sponsoring the movement.

    “If you are a Franckistes in Cameroon it means you are having that zeal for a new Cameroon, for making Cameroon better than before,” he said.

    Source: BBC