God the Politician

5. Electors and Cheaters

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Electors and Cheaters 992. It will take Cameroonians several decades to forget this year, if at all. Here I mean Cameroonians who could distinguish between right and wrong in that year. It was the year of SDF glory as well as shame. It was the year of glory because the Fru Ndi, from available statistics, won the presidential elections in October, but a year of shame because the party failed to participate in the 1 March legislative polls. Concerning the parliamentary polls, the party erroneously thought government would postpone elections after the SDF declared the existing electoral laws too bad to allow for free and fair elections. ‘No good laws, no elections’ was the SDF’s position. This decision was opposed by well-meaning political observers who did not regard boycotting as a sound political weapon. But Fru Ndi had the overwhelming support of the militants. The Church also bought the idea, with eminent evangelists like revivalist Micheal Bame Bame, a teacher at the Protestant University of Theology in Yaoundé, echoing it. Bame Bame argued that change could not be effected from within, citing the cases of Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ who succeeded by operating outside the system. Consequently, the SDF decreed ‘Ghost Towns’ on election day, which were respected by the majority of its militants and sympathizers. The UNDP, the UPC and some minor parties decided to go in. Fru Ndi’s party had a good chance of sweeping the polls because the CPDM rigging machine was then not yet perfected to the level it is at today. Biya himself was yet to recover from the embarrassment caused him by the Messi Messi Affair, in which Robert Messi Messi, the previous manager of the formerly well-stocked SCB Bank had blamed the collapse of this famous financial institution on the loans taken out by Biya’s wife, Jeanne Irene Biya and her sisters, and which had not been paid back. Proof of how weak the CPDM was can be seen in the fact that the opposition parties that took part obtained 92 of the 180 seats, while the ruling CPDM got only 88 seats. The SDF was plunged into deep regret and mourning, especially as the CPDM won all 20 seats in the Northwest, its fief. The UNDP won 68 seats, the UPC got 18 and the 1 41 MDR, a relatively obscure party, had 6. Biya acted promptly by not only persuading the MDR to join the CPDM. He demonstrated political pragmatism and magnanimity by appointing Achidi Achu, one of the justelected Northwest MPs, as prime minister. The SDF was thus condemned to succumb to the painful reality that those who boycott an election end up being ruled by people they did not choose. Fru Ndi and his supporters have since employed all the wit and sophisms they are masters of to justify the boycott decision. One of the arguments put forward by their spin doctors was that government relaxed its fraud mechanism only because of the SDF boycott. But whatever excuse they proffered, few sympathized with them. For instance, they argued that the Biya regime relaxed its fraud mechanism only because the SDF had boycotted the elections. The 1992 legislative election was important in that it helped to bring into the limelight an individual who was to play a significant part in Cameroon politics for 15 years. Doh Gah Gwanyin III, Fon of Balikumbat, embraced the SDF from its inception and was optimistic that he could get into Parliament on the SDF platform. He was certainly not one of those to whom the SDF’s boycott decision made sense and he registered protest by joining the very ruling party which he had embraced the opposition to oust from power. He certainly believed, like Nkwame Nkrumah, that the political kingdom should be sought first and everything else would follow. He was not a candidate in the 1992 parliamentary election but reasoned impressively that if he did something dramatic to embarrass the opposition, the ruling party would take serious note of him. His calculations proved correct. Fon Doh, who had vowed that the CPDM must win in Balikumbat by any means, tried to force stuffed ballot papers on the counting commission. This led to a clash with militants of the UNDP, the only other party contesting the elections in Balikumbat, although UNDP militants were determined that this should not happen. In the confrontation that followed, Fon Doh opened fire on the crowd seriously wounding one Henry...