Emmanuel Kendemeh
11 April 2008
Cameroonians welcomed the return to multi-party democracy in 1991 with euphoria because they understood that political parties were the surest way of getting to decision-making and governing positions.
Each political party leader and militant look forward to one day participate in managing the society through institutions such as the presidency, National Assembly, Senate, Regions and local councils. This probably explains the sustained euphoria in Cameroonians to keep on creating political parties. Sources from the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralisation (MINATD) reveal that the country now counts over 207 legalised political parties.
A critical reading of Cameroon's political map reveals that a majority of the legalised political parties in the country, are concentrated in the Littoral, Centre and West Provinces. However, one mostly learns of the existence of many of the parties when he does research at the Political Affairs Department of MINATD. Keen political observers in Cameroon would ready name political parties like the ruling Cameroon People's Democratic Movement (CPDM), Social Democratic Front (SDF), National Union for Democracy and Progress (NUDP), Cameroon Democratic Union (CDU), and Progressive Movement (MP) represented in the National Assembly for the 2007 to 2012 legislative period. It is also difficult to forget the Union des populations du Cameroun (UPC) that had three seats in the 2002 to 2007 legislative period of the National Assembly. But for the Progressive Movement of Jean Jacques Ekindi, the five parties mentioned above also won local councils in the 22 July 2007 municipal elections. Only the ruling CPDM is implanted nationwide having parliamentary seats and local councils in all the provinces. The SDF with 16 seats in Parliament is reduced to the North West, West, Littoral and South West Provinces, the NUDP in the three northern provinces, the CDU is reduced to the Noun Division in the West Province.
Many political parties make sporadic appearances during elections. For instance, the ruling CPDM candidate incumbent Paul Biya competed with candidates of seven opposition parties in the October 1997 presidential election. The main opposition parties such as the SDF, NUDP and CDU boycotted the election. In the 2004 presidential election, 16 candidates competed for the presidency. 44 political parties competed for the 180 seats in Parliament in the 2007 legislative election and 33 political parties were in the race for the 360 local councils in the 2007 election. All these show the interest of party authorities in getting to decision-making and management position. Some of the political parties have preferred to get to governing positions through creating alliances and coalitions, like the presidential majority with major parties.
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