On October 12, 2025 Cameroonians will go to the polls to elect the President of the Republic. According to the electoral calendar, the country was due to host a total of four elections – Presidential, Parliamentary, Legislative and Regional elections. However, in a series of decrees, the President extended the term of office of municipal Councillors from 25 February 2025 to 31 May 2026, and that of members of the National Assembly from 10 March 2025 to 30 March 2026. According to the government, these measures were designed to ‘lighten the electoral calendar’.
Critics argue that the President’s decision to move the elections by at least one year in both cases violates Article 15(4) of the Constitution which provided for such an action to take place only:
“in the event of a serious crisis or when circumstances so require,”
and in such an event:
“the election of a new assembly takes place at least forty (40) days and at most one hundred and twenty (120) days”
following the postponement. Sensing that the government’s move was a calculated ploy to weaken and disqualify its leader, Maurice Kamto, from the 2025 Presidential election, the opposition Cameroon Renaissance Movement (CRM) party called on the government to respect the electoral calendar.
Prior to publication of the election date, and unlike previous occasions, speculation was rife about the candidacy of incumbent President Paul Biya, who has been in power since 1982. This time around there was greater acrimony about the 92-year old’s fitness to rule. On the one hand, were the fervent calls from the ruling party, ‘paid-opposition’ and affiliate groups for the president to run for another 7-year mandate. On the other, there were frantic cries from opposition political parties, civil society, concerned individuals and groups for him to step aside and pave way for a smooth transition. This debate was finally closed on July 14 2025 when a message from the Head of State was posted on the presidential website captioned: “I am a candidate.”. The president justified his decision to run for another term of office by citing, among others, the desire to continuously ensuring the ‘security and wellbeing’ of Cameroonians, heeding to the massive and persistent calls from all the 10 regions of the country and from abroad. The president further mentioned the wellbeing of youths and women as a top priority; the message ended with a promise:
“the best is still to come…”.
Upon the announcement of the election date, all potential candidates had the opportunity to make public their intentions to run in the presidential race. By the close of the 10-day deadline for the submission of candidacy files(21 July 2025), the elections management body Elections Cameroon (ELECAM) had received a total of number of eighty-four applications and rejected all but thirteen.
This included the main opposition leader, Maurice Kamto, who was largely seen as the principal challenger to incumbent president Paul Biya. It is important to note that since the change of leadership in 1982, during which former president Ahmadou Ahidjo resigned and handed over power to his constitutional successor Paul Biya, there had not been any fundamental alteration in the system of governance in Cameroon since independence in the 1960s. In fact, the current head of state and a significant portion of the ruling elite have been shuttling around the state apparatus since independence.
The disqualification of opposition leader Kamto’s presidential bid was quite contentious and highly acrimonious. In the months leading up to the announcement of the election date, there was a lot of debate and discussions among politicians, as well as ordinary citizens, through social and mainstream media and related circles throughout the country about Kamto’s eligibility to contest the election. The reason often cited by government officials and affiliates was that the Cameroon Renaissance Movement (CRM) political party had no national representation, given that it boycotted the municipal and legislative elections that took place in February 2020, and without holding any elective post (local or national) the party could not present a candidate for the presidential election.
Yet, Kamto sprang up a last-minute surprise by presenting his candidacy under the banner of the Mouvement Africain pour la Nouvelle Indépendance et la Démocratie (MANIDEM) party. This move that caught the government off-guard, but spearheaded by the Ministry of Territorial Administration, they quickly bounced back and manoeuvred into place a dissident faction of the MANIDEM to present a candidate Dieudonne Yebga for the election, effectively putting Kamto’s candidacy in peril. A a letter addressed to Mr Kamto by ELECAM cited ‘double nomination by the MANIDEM’ as justification for rejecting his application, thereby nullifying his second bid for the presidency. In his first presidential bid in 2018, Kamto lost to Biya but claimed victory, only to be arrested and briefly jailed, before being released and placed under house arrest.
Following ELECAM’s decision, a total of 35 presidential aspirants whose files were rejected filed petitions to the Constitutional Council in a last-ditch attempt to get their nominations reinstated. However, most of these petitions were rejected including that of Kamto, leaving the current head of state without any veritable challenger. Without any further recourse at his disposal, observers of the Cameroonian political landscape are now wondering what Kamto and indeed the remnants of the real opposition’s next move will be, amid growing calls for the opposition to put up a united front. Will Mr Kamto join calls for the opposition to unite and present a single candidate? Will he call for a boycott as was the case in 2020? Ultimately, what impact the political manoeuvrings designed to secure victory for the incumbent head of state during the 12, October 2025 Presidential election have on peace and prosperity in Cameroon is to be seen.
Numvi Wallace is currently serving as Lecturer in the Department of Political Science at The University of Bamenda in the North-West Region of Cameroon. You can reach the author via email: numviv@gmail.com
