Cameroon President Paul Biya, is reportedly set to run for an eighth term in the 2025 presidential election.
This was confirmed by the founder of the Foreign Press Association Africa, Kennedy Wandera, on Thursday, who cited a report from News media, The EastAfrican.
The report read, “Cameroon is due to hold its next presidential election in 2025, longtime President Paul Biya will be 93. He has confirmed that he will contest.”
At 91 years old, Biya is one of the world’s oldest and longest-serving leaders, having held the presidency since 1982.
Before ascending to the highest office, Biya served as the country’s Prime Minister for seven years, from 1975 to 1982, under then-President Ahmadou Ahidjo.
In a controversial move, Biya recently postponed the country’s Parliamentary and Municipal elections until 2026, citing security concerns in the Anglophone regions, where a separatist conflict has been raging since 2016.
The conflict, which began as protests against perceived marginalization by the Francophone-dominated government, has since escalated into a full-blown insurgency, with armed groups calling for the independence of the English-speaking North West and South West regions.
Biya’s time in power has been marked by a combination of political stability and growing discontent, with his administration often criticized for authoritarian practices, including the suppression of opposition parties, restrictions on press freedom, and the use of security forces to maintain control. Despite these challenges, Biya has managed to maintain a tight grip on power, winning a series of elections that critics argue were marred by fraud and irregularities.
A native of Cameroon’s south, Biya rose rapidly as a bureaucrat under President Ahmadou Ahidjo in the 1960s, as secretary-general of the presidency from 1968 to 1975 and then as prime minister. He succeeded Ahidjo after the former president’s surprise resignation in 1982, and consolidated power in a 1983–1984 staged attempted coup, in which he eliminated all of his major rivals.
Biya introduced political reforms within the context of a one-party system in the 1980s, later accepting the introduction of multiparty politics in the early 1990s under serious pressure.
He won the contentious 1992 presidential election with 40% of the plural, single-ballot vote and was reelected by large margins in 1997, 2004, 2011, and 2018. Opposition politicians and Western governments have alleged voting irregularities and fraud on each of these occasions.
Multiple sources have provided evidence that he did not win the elections in 1992, and the political opposition along with others have alleged subsequent elections suffered from rampant fraud.