Today, September 15th, 2016, the mandate of Paul Biya will end as CPDM Chairman. The media in the Cameroons reported a CPDM congress is billed for September 29th to re-elect Biya as the CPDM Chair though he is being looked upon by praise singers as a natural chairman and/or candidate. However, it seems the congress may not hold, after all, the politburo of the party will sit instead to extend his rule. Biya has succeeded to cage everyone in his party and most importantly the opposition without any credible challenge. Sadly, we hold the view that if things remain as they are now, 2018 Biya will win.

When we look into the political situation in the Cameroons in the last 2 years, with the hope that a change of leadership wasn’t just a wish, but a possibility, BaretaNews can come to the sad conclusion that Biya will win in 2018. It seems Cameroonians who wish to see Biya leaves will have to wait a little bit longer. It’s not a good news at all for those who are eager to see Biya go. The bad news is that, Biya will still be the President of Cameroon in 2018 and beyond as he wishes.

When we analyze the strategies on the ground to understand the political situation in the Cameroons, When we search for means on how the Cameroons people could fit in and how they could be part of the struggle for some lofty strategies especially on how the Diaspora could participate, some difficult conclusions could be made.

1. It’s extremely difficult to be part of the struggle because the approach employed back home by politicians is completely unproductive. There is total confusion, egoism, selfishness, distrust, lack of ideas and courage, plenty of fear and disunity with no convincing strategy. This is the situation back home. There seems to be nothing concretely one can do because Biya has the opposition today on the level he wants it to be- a divided opposition which is the greatest challenge we are facing.

2. We have found out that the greatest enemies to any change of government are the politicians themselves. This means from the CPDM and from the opposition camp. No Cameroonian politician is up to the task. “Tumbu tumbu burst calabash” is their strategy. Experimenting/ gambling hoping that something good comes from their attempts.

Most political pundits have argued that with the current situation in the Cameroons, the truth is that Biya doesn’t need to rig the 2018 elections in the Cameroons for him to be the President. He doesn’t. Biya will genuinely win the 2018 election. He has all the mechanism in place to win.

Two years into elections, no political parties have started preparing for the election. No one knows who will represent them or if they will be a united opposition party. The main opposition party is calling her convention for February 2017, a year before the elections itself.

The opposition in Cameroon behaves exactly like the Cameroon government. They present nothing new or different in their management of their own nucleus- their party structures. Even to respond to common letters and emails is a big problem- a situation similar to what the government does. How can you explain the fact that official letters written to opposition leaders are hardly replied to? Acknowledgement of receipt is a strange concept to them despite having proof that they have received your mail. Some would want you to write an application for them to consider if they could grant you audience. These are opposition party leaders oh! Those who are supposed to beg people to join them oh! They have started to feel as if they have already won the election…as President. What becomes when they are President?

Their communication strategies and how they engaged with the Cameroons people is a mess. Most of them lack foreign links to build up a corporation in a win-win situation. They are never in the news, they allow the government set the pace of how information flows. They are not aggressive in their approach.

Biya owns the courts, the police, all administrative officers, ELECAM etc. The opposition owns nothing but owns a powerful tool- the people. They need to strategize, come together earlier to energise the population. They need to get the people behind them- an awaken political active population with a strong united opposition will defeat Paul Biya- until these are done, 2018 election is in the hands of Biya.

If you lack strategies for any competition, then the game is over before the race starts. In the Cameroons case, the game has already been played. It’s done and dusted.

God is still saying something.

NB: This is a political analysis to spur minds and probably wake up the Cameroons people and opposition parties that Biya is already winning. It was originally written by Callistus Funjong, UK, edited with some additional lines and published by BaretaNews.

Photo Credit: Cameroon Intelligence Report (CIR)