Missing president notice: where the hell is Paul Biya?

On July 17, Cameroon's president Paul Biya, left the country for three-day state visit to China. While there, China promised more money, Biya promised more resources and contracts were signed. Then Biya disappeared.

Missing President.  Photo. Finbarr O'Reilly/Reuters

It should be said that this is not Biya's first or last fugue. Among African or one could dare say world leaders, Biya is easily the one who spends the least time actually running his country. In a year, it is reported that he spends about 150 to 200 days outside the country, mostly in Geneva, Switzerland, where is young children school and where he seems to have a permanent residence at the Geneva Intercontinental.  It reached a point early this year when a group of Cameroonian activists in the video below, staged a protest at the hotel.

After every trip abroad, Biya rarely goes home directly. There's always a Geneva stopover for a couple of weeks, but never over 40 days. After a 40-day absence, there is a risk of the presidency being declared vacant and fresh elections called. The state-controlled media describes the trips as "brief short visit" or "brief private visit". However, it is not like him being in Cameroon will make a difference. A resources and manpower-rich nation, which was suppose to be the economic motor of the Central African region has slumped into a miasma of corruption, fainéantisme, state-sponsored sycophancy and economic decay with millions of youths reduced to paupers. In a recent book an AFP colleague, Fanny Pigeaud writes of Cameroon's government under Biya as an authoritative but lax regime that has plunged Cameroon to the bottom of every economic and social indicator since Biya came to power in 1982.

"While maintaining and deepening former president Ahidjo's dictatorial style of governance, Biya has introduced other trends and features such as neglect, inertia, and criminality within state structures. Together, all these has resulted to an unproductive and paradoxical system. For nearly 30 years, Cameroonians are subjected to power wielded by their leaders who are doing everything to stay in power without governing the country," she writes.

"Cameroon is a country where two years could go by without the president presiding a cabinet meeting, where the head of the police can imprison an innocent person for murder to cover a guilty one; or where a citizen could call police emergency to report that they have just witnessed a woman being assaulted and want to make a statement, only to told: "But let the woman come and complain herself! What is your business in it?" before getting hung up on; where the president pays with suitcases stuffed with cash when he buys jet fuel for his plane; ...where it takes two days to find the remains of a Boeing 737-800 that crashed, with 114 passengers, thirty seconds after take-off," Pigeaud added.

Cameroon is expected to hold presidential elections in October, yes in about two months. Though 78-year-old Biya has not said whether he would be seeking another mandate, his sycophantic crowd have been on overdrive in the past months, printing books, pamphlets and holding rallies, urging him to run. Biya had somewhat shown his intentions in 2008 when he orchestrated a constitutional reform which removed presidential term limits, effectively, according to their calculations, clearing the way for him to run again if he wanted. So, two months to elections, there are no campaigning, no primaries. Cameroonians are in suspense, waiting for Biya to decide whether elections will be held and if he would run. Even his own political party is stuck in the limbo. Potential successors cannot openly challenge him or even been seen to be vying for the throne because they'll find themselves in jail so fast on corruption charges, like others before them.

Meanwhile Biya is holed up somewhere in Geneva, no explanations, nothing, nada, while a nation awaits, as it has always done. But for how long? Egypt? Tunisia? Libya? Syria?