Five appeals lodged against Cameroon presidential poll

Cameroon

Yaoundé – Five appeals have been lodged over Cameroon’s presidential election in which incumbent Paul Biya is seeking an eighth term, but none from top rival Issa Tchiroma Bakary who claims victory, state TV said.

Official results from Sunday’s poll are due within 10 days but most analysts expect 92-year-old Biya to extend his already 43 years in power.

Under electoral rules, appeals must be submitted in the three days following a vote.

“Five appeals in total filed with the Constitutional Council to date,” CRTV state television announced late on Wednesday, saying they included a call for the vote to be cancelled because of “electoral fraud”.

Tchiroma, 79, a former employment minister who generated unexpected enthusiasm among voters in the central African nation, has not filed an appeal.

His campaign manager, Chris Maneng, said that since the Constitutional Council relied on reports tainted with “irregularities”, Tchiroma did not want to engage in a “truncated” approach.

Reports proving “the truth of the ballot boxes” will be published online in the coming days, he insisted.

Videos on social media show tensions between Tchiroma supporters and law enforcement officers near the offices of the electoral commission in the western city of Bafoussam and the economic capital Douala.

Fourteen people were arrested in Douala, local official Sylac Marie Mvogo told CRTV on Thursday.

During the last presidential election in 2018, all appeals contesting the result were rejected.

“It’s clear that the institutions will recognise Paul Biya as the winner,” said Brice Molo, a historian and sociologist at the Catholic University of Paris.

In August, members of the Constitutional Council barred Biya critic Maurice Kemto from standing in the presidential election.

Kemto, who came second in the 2018 vote according to the official results, had declared victory the day after the poll.

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