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Don’t allow Cameroon’s forever president to trample democracy again

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The writer is a Cameroonian journalist who has been imprisoned since December 2016. He dictated this column from Yaoundé Central Prison

On October 12, my fellow citizens will go to the polls to elect Cameroon’s next president. I, however, will not.

Since December 2016, I have been confined in a dirty, cramped corner of Yaoundé Central Prison. Having watched Cameroon’s last presidential election unfold from behind bars, I had hoped to be free in 2025 so that I could continue to highlight the regime’s failures and speak out for freedom and democracy. Instead, I remain trapped inside the crumbling walls of this overcrowded prison.

The world needs to realise that Cameroon is in crisis. With a poverty rate of 23 per cent, rampant corruption, abysmal protections for civil liberties and escalating attacks from militant Islamists, the country has many challenges. But perhaps its most serious is the near-decade long conflict between President Paul Biya’s government and separatists in the English-speaking areas of the country, both of which have committed atrocities.

The anglophone crisis, as it is known, has displaced nearly 1mn people and resulted in thousands of deaths. I have witnessed the devastation first-hand — soldiers shooting at peaceful protesters, the detention and torture of friends and neighbours, villages razed to the ground.

Biya’s 43-year reign, a de facto presidency for life, has been sustained by elections that were neither free nor fair and a 2008 constitutional amendment that abolished term limits. Rather than address the country’s challenges, he has regularly played down the conflict’s seriousness and avoided the steps needed to bring peace. His government has arbitrarily suspended media outlets and correspondents, prohibited reporting on important topics and harassed and imprisoned journalists.

Cameroon desperately needs new leaders, who sincerely try to bridge the chasm between the country’s English- and French-speaking populations and understand the hopes and fears of this country’s very young population. This is not something that Biya, at 92, can credibly claim to do — especially when he spends significant time outside the country he rules, costing taxpayers millions of dollars and fuelling speculation about his health.

Sadly, there is little chance that the upcoming election will provide this change. In the lead-up, the regime has increased media censorship, suspended and banned civil society organisations, and prohibited Maurice Kamto, the runner-up in the 2018 presidential election, from running again. Moreover, the government is not doing much to ensure that citizens in the anglophone regions will be able to cast their votes.

Separatists — believing that a fair election is impossible under a violent, militarised occupation — have already vowed to obstruct voting in these regions as they did in 2018, putting 15 per cent of Cameroonians at risk of disenfranchisement.

There simply cannot be a legitimate election in this country until all its citizens can vote free from pressure — whether from the regime or separatists. The fact that disputes about the vote’s outcome will be handled by agencies controlled by former government officials appointed by Biya himself, does not inspire confidence.

Cameroon has been described as the “world’s most neglected displacement crisis” and “a case study in global neglect.” There is a very real risk that the situation could devolve into violent chaos and threaten the entire continent’s stability.

World leaders must call out the regime’s efforts to rig this year’s election, before Biya wins an eighth term (as he is widely expected to do). The international community, including the African Union, should demand a comprehensive, internationally mediated peace process to resolve the anglophone crisis, beginning with a ceasefire, the release of those arrested in connection with the conflict, an amnesty for those involved in the fighting and inclusive negotiations that address the root causes of conflict (which date back to Cameroon’s flawed decolonisation process).

Finally, there needs to be accountability. Despite well documented atrocities, there has been little effort to hold those directing the violence responsible. In the past year, several separatist leaders have been arrested and charged with serious crimes; however, there has been no corresponding punishment — or international sanctions — targeting the military and government officials planning, directing and executing the worst violence.

The international community needs to demonstrate that such actions will not be tolerated.

 

Crédito: Link de origem

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