2004 Cameroon Presidential Election Briefing

The outcome of the October 11 presidential election in Cameroon is a foregone conclusion. President Paul Biya – incumbent since 1982 – will be elected to serve another seven-year term, probably by a substantial majority. Although the ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (RDPC/CPDM) is unlikely to resort to the levels of electoral fraud that have marred previous elections in Cameroon (it may not need to), the inevitability and likely scale of Biya’s victory is the latest indication of serious deficiencies at the heart of Cameroon’s democratic dispensation.

At the centre of these deficiencies is the ongoing and overwhelming political strength of the RDPC. In power for two decades, the ruling party has recovered from its brush with defeat in Cameroon’s first multiparty elections in 1992 and has reasserted itself as the only truly national party. Despite significant if still limited institutional reforms in the 1990s, the RDPC maintains exclusive control of the state apparatus, including – crucially – the electoral machinery, the principal avenues of economic accumulation, and a privileged presence at the level of local and regional administration. It has even succeeded in extending its electoral base into regions hitherto considered beyond its natural core in the Béti-dominated Centre Province, if only through a politically-convenient alliance with the northern-based National Union for Democracy and Progress (UNDP) and increasingly shrill interventions on behalf of autochthonous communities in disputes with ‘stranger’ groups.

The opposition, by contrast, appears increasingly divided and demoralised. Having nearly displaced the incumbent regime in 1992 on the back of broad-based popular support for democratic liberalisation and institutional reform, opposition parties have seen their electoral fortunes diminish and their electoral bases contract, to the point where they now represent little more than the ethnic or regional constituencies of their leaderships. Efforts to create a united front in opposition to the regime have consistently failed, most often because of the inability of party leaders to sacrifice personal or party ambitions for the sake of collective objectives.

The effective disintegration of this year’s opposition alliance, the Coalition for National Reconciliation and Reconstruction (CRRN), is a case in point. Having previously promised to abide by the Coalition’s selection for the ‘unity’ candidate it would present at the presidential poll, Cameroon’s largest opposition party – the Social Democratic Front (SDF) – announced that it would field its own candidate after the selection committee rejected SDF leader John Fru Ndi’s candidature. There is good reason to believe that had the victorious CRRN candidate – Adamou Ndam Njoya – suffered Fru Ndi’s fate, he too would have withdrawn his party, the Cameroon Democratic Union (UDC). Days after the SDF’s withdrawal, Antar Gassagay of the Union for the Republic (UPR) announced his party’s defection to the so-called ‘presidential majority’, bemoaning the ‘selfishness’ of opposition leaders.

The effects of internal party wranglings and disputes over the opposition leadership are massive and cumulative. Not only do they divide the opposition vote (thereby depriving the electorate a credible alternative to the incumbent), they undermine the credibility of opposition claims to desire more accountable governance and divert election campaigning away from key issues. Indeed, this year’s campaign (kept short by the regime to prevent early opposition mobilisation) has been characterised by a distinct absence of political debate. The ideological vitality that energised and united the opposition in the early 1990s has dissipated. Indeed, the only reform issue that made it into the CRRN’s election campaign – the computerisation of the electoral register – was effectively dropped in September after it failed to attract significant support at unevenly attended opposition rallies. The murder of a local SDF activist in South West Province, allegedly by the RDPC MP, offered better electoral mileage, but beyond well-attended demonstrations in the regional capital, Bamenda, the SDF has been unable to make the necessary connection between the killing and the perceived human rights abuses of the RDPC regime.

Meanwhile, the issues that consumed political discourse in the 1990s have been gratefully sidelined by the regime: the 1996 constitution is yet to be fully implemented; the decentralisation process has stalled; the National Election Observatory sits unreformed; and the electoral process remains the effective domain of a government department, the Ministry of Territorial Administration. In such a context, popular disillusionment with the electoral process (only 12 years after the restoration of a multiparty system) should come as no surprise. Levels of electoral registration have been low – partly because of government obstructions, but also because voting no longer seems to offer the possibility of improved living conditions and enhanced liberties. With access to public amenities heading a long list of public grievances, the active electorate appears to have adopted a ‘better the devil you know’ attitude, which – along with the expected low turnout at next Monday’s poll – will doubtless serve the regime well.

The ease with which President Biya will win next week’s supposedly competitive election should be a source of significant concern for those interested in the efflorescence of a genuine democratic culture in Cameroon and across the sub-region. Although immensely disheartening, the election will also serve notice that Cameroon is about to enter a critical juncture. Biya’s forthcoming term will almost certainly be his last, raising key questions about the unresolved succession and the parameters of the post-Biya dispensation. Of course, there is every prospect that the next regime will be very similar to its predecessor. However, there are a number of reasons to believe that an alternative is possible and achievable and the effort of the young radicals in TFF led by Dr Chris Fomunyoh has been noteworthy in this regard.

Yet, Biya’s long-predicted retirement will inevitably create a rupture at the heart of the RPDC: an increasingly vocal reformist wing has already stepped up its campaign to excise the old guard and to institute an internal democratisation of the party. Whilst there is no guarantee of success in this project, the vulnerability that such a challenge would entail could create new opportunities for opposition parties to reconnect with the electorate, especially if – as expected – the current generation of opposition leaders finally withdraw from the political scene. The entrenched nature of popular grievances in Cameroon – from disgust at obscene levels of corruption to fears of regional marginalisation – are such that they will always throw up individuals and groups who desire a renegotiation of their position within the prevailing system. The central question is how these endeavours and aspirations can be best identified, harnessed and articulated, if only to take advantage of Cameroon’s undoubted but long undermined potential for stability, political freedom and prosperity. This election will fall far short of responding to this central challenge.

1960	1 January	Proclamation of Independence
1960	5 May	Election of Ahmadou Ahidjo as President Ahidjo was subsequently re-elected unchallenged in 1965, 1970, 1975 and 1980
1961	11/12 February	Referendum finds in favour Southern Cameroon membership The year following independence in French Cameroon, a referendum was held in British Cameroon to determine whether the Anglophone territory should be incorporate into the newly-independent Republic of Cameroon or into Anglophone Nigeria. Whilst the northern province voted for membership of the Nigerian federation, the southern province voted for membership of Cameroon, becoming West Cameroon in the two-state federal system.
1961	14 August	Federal Constitution adopted Under the two-state federal constitution, President Ahidjo retained his position as head of state. West Cameroon Prime Minister John Ngu Foncha was appointed Vice-President.
1966	1 September	Creation of the Cameroon National Union (UNC) Deploying the substantial powers reserved for him under the federal constitution, President Ahidjo pursued an aggressive political strategy designed to undermine opposition to his tenure, particularly from western Anglophone parties. In 1966, this strategy culminated in the creation of the UNC, which under law incorporated all other political parties.
1972	20 May	Referendum finds in favour of unitary state In Ahidjo’s state-building strategy, the counterpoint to the creation of the UNC was the dismantling of the federal system. The co-optation or suppression of opposition to Ahidjo’s programme had been so effective that few were in a position to oppose the proposals and the referendum passed by a near unanimous majority.
1973	18 May	National Assembly elections Single-party (UNC) legislative elections were also held in 1978 and 1983.
1975	30 June	Appointment of Paul Biya as Prime Minister
1982	4 November	Resignation of President Ahidjo After a year of serious illness and apparent exhaustion, Ahidjo made the surprise announcement of his intention to resign as President in favour of his prime minister, Paul Biya. Ahidjo retained the UNC presidency, however, and was expected to remain a significant force in Cameroonian politics.
1982	6 November	Paul Biya succeeds as President Despite initial opposition to his succession from the northern barons that backed Ahidjo, Biya’s takeover was remarkably smooth, although his control of the party-state was limited by Ahidjo’s ongoing control of the UNC.
1983	22 August	Discovery of a coup plot implicating Ahmadou Ahidjo Following the emergence of serious tensions between the new president and predecessor, the Biya regime announced that it had uncovered a coup plot involving northern interests and implicating Ahidjo, who had apparently recovered both his health and his political ambition.
1983	27 August	Ahmadou Ahidjo resigns from presidency of the UNC Under pressure from the Biya regime, Ahidjo was forced to give up the presidency of the UNC and to enter into exile. In 1984, he was sentenced to death in absentia for plotting against the security of the state.
1983	14 September	Paul Biya elected president of the UNC
1984	14 January	Paul Biya elected as President
1985	21-24 March	Foundation of the Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (RDPC) To consolidate his political authority after the delayed trauma of the succession, Biya rejuvenated the structures of the party, promising reform and replacing the UNC with the RDPC, a party that would draw its greatest support from the southern Béti, a group long opposed to the domination of Ahidjo’s northern Fulani constituency.
1988	24 April	Re-election of President Biya
1991	5 December	Restoration of the multiparty system Although President Biya had based his authority on a commitment to reform, these promises proved largely hollow. Combined with changing international conditions and protracted economic decline, the lack of genuine political liberalisation prompted the emergence of new oppositionist tendencies, including organisations and proto-parties comprised of marginalized ethnic and regional communities. The foundation of the Anglophone-dominated Social Democratic Front (SDF) in 1990 and the large-scale defections of senior RDPC figures to opposition groups forced the regime to legalise opposition parties, if only to avoid a further breakdown of the social and political order presaged by often violent demonstrations in support of democratisation.
1992	1 March	National Assembly multiparty elections Although the regime successfully resisted calls for a sovereign national conference, it acceded to demands for fresh elections. Such a concession was not sufficient for the SDF, which boycotted the polls. Nevertheless, an opposition party – the northern-based National Union for Democracy and Progress (UNDP) – won 68 seats to the RDPC’s 88, raising hopes of the gradual evolution of a competitive system of electoral democracy.
1992	11 October	Re-election of President Biya in multiparty poll The presidential poll was always likely to be controversial, and indeed it was. The opposition alleged widespread fraud after Paul Biya was found to have won by a small margin with 39.9% to SDF leader John Fru Ndi’s 35.9%. Demonstrations in North-West Province were violently suppressed.
1996	18 January	New Constitution adopted by National Assembly Negotiations over a new constitution had begun in 1992 under the aegis of Tripartite Technical Committee. However, whilst the regime was prepared to accept the need for dialogue, in practice it sought to limit the input of the opposition and of Anglophone interests in particular. Anglophone appointees to the Committee were in a minority and were further sidelined by government representatives. As a result, the final document retained the unitary character of the state, protected the powers and prerogatives of the president and made it far easier for incumbent regimes to make subsequent constitutional revisions. It also provided for the creation of an upper house, the Senate, 30% of whose members would be appointed.
1996	21 January	Municipal elections The first multiparty local elections were won by the RDPC, which gained control of 65% of communes.
1997	17 May	National Assembly election, followed by by-elections on 3 August In the second legislative election of the multiparty era, the RDPC won 116 out of 180 seats.
1997	12 October	Re-election of President Biya Having come close to losing the first multiparty presidential election in 1992, Biya’s easy victory – aided by officially sanctioned fraud and a boycott by the SDF – came as a welcome relief.
1997	7 December	Formation of government including opposition parties Following the election victory of 1997, the regime announced the formation of a government including members of the opposition, most notably Bello Bouba Maigari, the leader of the National Union for Democracy and Progress (UNDP). The co-optation of opposition figures
2000	6/7 December	Enactment of laws on party financing and national election observatory
2002		National Assembly election In 2002, the RDPC won 149 of 180 seats in the National Assembly and a majority of seats in nine out of ten provinces. The SDF representation was reduced to 22 seats – all in North-West Province. Although there were some reports of electoral fraud, there is some doubt as to whether a more transparent poll would have resulted in a significantly different outcome.

This briefing was written for CDD by Chris Melville, a Research Analyst on Africa based at the World Markets Research Centre in London, email: chris.melville @ wmrc.com