Cameroon: One Party, Many Parties and the State

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Periodical article

Title:	Cameroon: One Party, Many Parties and the State
Author:	Derrick, Jonathan
Year:	1992
Periodical:	Africa Insight
Volume:	22
Issue:	3
Pages:	165-177
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Cameroon
Subjects:	elections 1992 multiparty systems Politics and Government
Abstract:	This article considers recent developments in Cameroon against the background of the move towards multipartyism in Africa. One of Africa's most durable one-party States, headed by Ahmadou Ahidjo and then by Paul Biya over thirty years, accepted multiparty democracy in 1990 and held multiparty elections on 1 March 1992. Having agreed to the elections, President Biya's regime sought to guide the change along its own lines, remaining in full charge in the interim; but the new opposition parties, unwilling to accept this, defied the regime with a call for a national conference. Government and opposition confronted each other in a serious crisis from May to November 1991, in which the division followed regional lines; but the confrontation ended with victory for Biya's government. Elections were therefore held very much on the government's terms, and the previous single party, the Rassemblement démocratique du peuple camerounais (RDPC) or Cameroon People's Democratic Movement (CPDM) dominates the government formed after the elections. Biya is still firmly in power. But now the biggest test of all lies ahead: coping with the economic problems that are the most important in Cameroon and all over Africa. Notes, ref.