Cameroon court rejects opposition claims against Biya

Cameroon’s Constitutional court has rejected 18 petitions calling for a repeat of the 7 October presidential election which opposition parties said was marred by fraud.

The move will likely clear the way for President Paul Biya to be confirmed the winner before Sunday, correspondents say.

The 85-year-old has ruled the central African nation for 36 years.

The election was held amid a tense atmosphere in the North-West and South-West regions where Anglophone separatists had vowed to disrupt the election.

The crisis can be traced to October 2016 when teachers and lawyers in the English-speaking regions took to the streets to protest against the imposition of French in schools and courts.

But those protests soon took on a political dimension, with thousands of residents taking to the streets on 1 October last year to declare the independence of a new country they called “Ambazonia”.

The government cracked down in response.

Hundreds of people have been killed – at least 420 civilians, 175 military and police officers, and an unknown number of separatist fighters.

More than 300,000 people have also been forced to flee their homes, according to the International Crisis Group.

Source: BBC