Beti-Ewondo rejection of cabinet caused new govt delay

While all attention is now focused on the manhunt for the leaders of the Boko Haram Islamic group that has legitimately infiltrated and established itself in Cameroon and causing mayhem to the indigenes of Cameroon’s Extreme Nord Region, threatening national sovereignty, peace and stability including our economic activities, there are other litany of problems confronting the President Biya and undermining his presidency.

Cameroon Concord’s political desk has inter alia enlisted the “Boko Haram Camerounaise” insecurity that led to the kidnapped and released of a French family, a Roman Catholic Priest and Nuns, pirate and illicit maritime activity around the Bakassi Peninsular, internal rebellion within the ruling CPDM members of parliament, chronic corruption and pillaging from state coffers, Guerandigate, poverty and above all the recent Lekie(Obala) Motion that is almost tearing the country apart with the elites of the South and those from the Grand Nord fighting for succession.

The South is accusing the North of double standards and of playing the Boko Haram card to destabilize the Biya regime. In clear terms President Biya is really having a hype of task as his moves slowly but surely towards the end of his mandate as captain of the Cameroonian ship. If man lived forever, the late President Ahmadou Ahidjo should have been around to see this Biya dramatic end on national and international deadlock issues which if not strategically managed by his administration will add to the flood gates of existing criticisms.

However, there are many unanswered questions as to why the long awaited cabinet shake-up that has occupied both private and public discourse for a while in the Nation`s capital Yaounde is gradually becoming an illusion.

When President Paul Biya summoned his new Head of Government and Ministers at the Etoudi Palace after his re-election in 2011, the president had as agenda to impose and increase the voltage of pressure with specific instructions and deadlines in the handling of state issues. The president hammered on the point of inertia in the affairs of conducting state business. He emphasized that there is too much laxity and corruption that is hampering and delaying projects to be completed in time.

The 45 minutes cabinet meeting was a call to duty for quick results. Yet, nothing has even since been realized after the ministerial conclave. The expected cabinet reshuffle is pending and to be sure, is now taking a non existence level which might be his only and last time Mr. Biya might be exercising his major executive orders through decrees.

2018 is a year of elections in Cameroon, that is Presidential, Upper and Lower House of the Parliament and Municipal. Biya is tired of extending parliamentary and municipal mandates. Cameroon Concord understands that he now wants to abolish National Mandate for parliamentarians and Mayors to be replaced by Imperative Mandate.

When the Beti-Ewondo dominated Secret Service began secret consultations and quiet findings with directives from the Civil Cabinet at the presidency concerning the possible replacements as to “Who is Out and Who is In”, the instructions they got was to make sure that the choices if it will ever be reality should reflect the image of a Biya`s legacy. The Secret Police findings from the predominant ruling and governing CPDM big wigs of the Centre, South and East made stunning revelations.

According to Cameroon Concord’s intelligence officers, most of those political elites consulted for subsequent presidential appointments have refused to accept Ministerial and Secretary of State Positions. Some of the reasons advanced are hanging on the air. Popular among them is the point that most of the elites from that area fear of a situation been targeted after Biya leaves power.

Some raise the issue of a subsequent chaos in Cameroon making reference to the present South and Nord rife in Cameroon that has created too much tension. Some categorically stated that they prefer to remain in peace and live their lives than to be appointed and became targets of a new regime. Added to the existing dangers is a series of blackmailing, treasonous mutterings including serial private killings among the governing CPDM elites.

Therefore even among his own people and at 81 years of age, President Biya cannot count anymore on their loyalty. What even makes the situation more complex is an inside information that filtered to us at the time of writing this report that the Director of Civil Cabinet at the Presidency was heard murmuring privately to himself about the fate that awaits him when Biya is no longer in power. Where will he be and what will become of him when a new president steps in. Many of the Grand South Beti-Ewondo political elites had put their faith in the Beti-Ewondo Cameroon army.

However, the emergence of Boko Haram and its weaponry and sophistication has washed away that myth leaving President Biya and his corrupt acolytes with just one escape route----that of an Anglophone Head of State to move the nation forward and in peace. Cameroon with an Anglophone President or Cameroon at war after Biya is a tough call even for the French.