An Expression of Political Pluralism…

To supreme political office passes necessarily through Presidential elections.

Statutorily, the next Presidential elections are expected to hold in 2018.

In fact, to give flesh to that understanding the President of the Republic made a very clear reference to that date when a French journalist cornered him at State House on July, 3, 2015 during the visit of the French President, Francois Hollande to Cameroon.

Quizzed about the next Presidential election and about whether he was going to be a candidate or not for that election, the President of the Republic gave this witty answer: “the elections are certain, but far off”.

To go by the French language rendition, there was some onomatopoeia - with the words certaine et lointaine - which gave some more meaning and interest to the issue.

But what was taken home from this formulation was that the Presidential election could not have been an issue so soon; not when the Constitution of the Republic prescribes an election every seven years and that the next in line could only come in 2018!

But in the past few weeks, there has been a veritable hubbub across the political divide as to the necessity for the President of the Republic to stand as candidate for his party, the Cameroon Peoples Democratic Movement.

Virtually all the sections of the party and even civic associations claiming to support the President have lined up in some kind of orchestrated movement without anyone coming up to the fore to take responsibility for the situation.

Every day we see a new phenomenon in newspapers in which pages and useful advertisement space is taken up by signatures by those ostensibly seeking the President’s attention.

Why such an outburst over two years to the event? Opposition parties have read meaning to this initiative.

The meanings are as wide as the country’s political spectrum can accommodate. What is quite curious about reactions to what some CPDM members call militant fervor is the fact that the party hierarchy claims not being aware of the initiative.

But even without a clear-cut opinion by the CPDM, several political parties of the opposition have attacked the move, even taking to the streets to make their point of disapproval made to the wider public.

This has led to an escalation of sorts between diehard members of the CPDM and, in some cases the problem has been taken to the streets, requiring the forces of law and order to intervene to bring back order to prevail.

Trigger-hungry members of the security forces, ever so eager to execute the orders of the administrative authorities, may not be aware of the gains our country has obtained by way of freedom of expression following the December 1990 freedom laws.

We cannot come back on those gains, as some overzealous law-enforcement officials will want; but by the same token, non-State actors as well as those in the opposition also have to know how far to go because the law on freedom of expression and association is not exclusively for those who oppose government action, but also for those who promote same.

So pluralism must be seen from a more embracing context in which all actors are seen to enjoy the same rights: those caring for the common interest whose majority is in government and those who believe that things could be done in another manner.

Those criticizing the CPDM action, just as those promoting the action within the CPDM are all in their rightful posture.

It is all about enjoying the era of political pluralism in which we find ourselves today.