Fully Authoritarian
World’s Population
Population
HRF classifies Cameron as ruled by a fully authoritarian regime.
Cameroon is a republic with a presidential system of government. The Head of State, Paul Biya, took power in 1982, after the resignation of Cameroon’s first leader, Ahmadou Ahidjo. In 2025, he secured a contentious eighth consecutive term in highly disputed elections tainted by fraud. After gaining independence in 1960, Cameroon experienced 32 years of one-party rule, and despite the democratization process initiated in 1990, Biya’s ruling Democratic Rally of the Cameroon People (RDPC) has monopolized power and consolidated control over all branches of government. With no meaningful check to executive power, and an endemic culture of abuse, corruption, and clientelism, Cameroon has suffered a number of political, humanitarian, and security crises, including civil unrest stemming from protests and insecurity as a result of a terrorism from Boko Haram in the Far North region, and armed conflict in response to a secessionalist insurgency in the minority English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions.
Elections are a sham, to the point where the real, mainstream political opposition does not have a realistic chance to meaningfully compete and possibly win. Although national elections are consistently organized, the regime prevents the most serious opposition challengers from participating, obstructs their campaigning efforts, engages in large-scale electoral fraud, and fills the independent electoral management body with loyalists.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and regular people face overt and systematic retaliation if they openly criticize or challenge the regime. The regime systematically responds to protests with extreme violence, shuts down independent organizations, and employs various measures, including arbitrary arrests, bans, and false charges, to intimidate and silence dissenting voices. Additionally, it engages in widespread censorship of content critical of the regime or that addresses sensitive topics, such as the anglophone separatist movement.
Institutions largely fail to serve as independent checks on the governing authority. Due to the regime’s takeover of state institutions, there is a complete lack of institutional accountability in the country. Courts have frequently and unfairly supported the regime’s efforts to undermine electoral competition and retaliate against individuals who openly oppose its most prominent and widely publicized policies. Moreover, state institutions do not hold regime officials accountable, and legislative bodies are particularly aligned with the regime’s agenda, merely rubber-stamping its policies without oversight.
Elections are a sham, to the point where the real, mainstream political opposition does not have a realistic chance to meaningfully compete and possibly win. The regime implements measures to hinder the participation of political rivals it views as the greatest threat, restricts opposition campaigning, engages in voting irregularities, and undermines independent electoral oversight.
The regime has systematically and unfairly barred a real, mainstream opposition party or candidate from competing in elections, including indirectly through politically-motivated lawfare that leads to disqualification. Ahead of the October 2025 presidential election, Elections Cameroon (ELECAM)—the official electoral oversight institution barred main opposition leader Maurice Kamto from the ballot. ELECAM justified its decision by falsely claiming that Kamto’s party, the African Movement for New Independence and Democracy (MANIDEM), had already endorsed the expelled former party chair, Dieudonné Yebga. This exclusion had been confirmed by both Yebga himself and the Ministry of Territorial Administration, which is responsible for monitoring political parties’ activities.
The regime has systematically, unfairly, and significantly hindered a real, mainstream opposition candidate’s electoral campaign. Ahead of the 2025 presidential elections, regime authorities continued a longstanding pattern of invoking vague security and administrative concerns to deny main opposition candidates access to public facilities. For example, in September 2025, the authorities denied the main opposition’s request to host a convention to designate a consensus presidential candidate at the Multipurpose Sports Stadium in the capital, Yaoundé. The same month, authorities in the commercial capital Douala barred opposition candidate Cabral Libii of the Cameroon Party for National Reconciliation (PCRN) the use of the Camtel and Cicam stadiums to launch his campaign. In October 2025, local authorities in the southern city of Ebolowa, a stronghold of the ruling party, prevented opposition candidate Bello Bouba Maigari of the National Union for Democracy and Progress (UNDP) from entering the city where he hoped to campaign. The same month, authorities in the northern city of Maroua banned a rally of leading opposition candidate Issa Tchiroma. In the backdrop of clashes between the army and Anglophone separatist fighters who opposed the elections, security forces falsely accused Tchiroma of colluding with separatists and promoting terrorism and secession.
The regime has engaged in systematic and significant voting irregularities. The ruling party has consistently been involved in electoral fraud, particularly in the last three presidential elections. International observers deemed the official results of the 2025 presidential elections, awarding Biya a 53% share of the vote, not to be credible based on widespread reports of fraud, manipulation, and the lack of transparency in the tabulation of announced results. Evidence of systematic manipulation and tampering documented included ballot box stuffing, falsified tallies and signatures, vote buying, ballots lacking the names of some candidates, and registered voters missing on the electoral rolls despite having their registration cards. These electoral malpractices have consistently tainted Cameroonian elections, such as in 2018 and 2011. Furthermore, ruling party-appointed administrative, electoral, and judicial officials enjoy opaque and unchecked control over the transmission of polling station results to the centralized compilation and announcement of votes, offering ample opportunities for manipulation.
The regime has systematically and seriously undermined independent electoral oversight. It established ELECAM in 2006 to fulfill independent electoral management in place of the Ministry of Territorial Administration, but the law gives the President full powers to directly appoint all ELECAM commissioners. With this system, ELECAM commissioners serve at the pleasure of and loyalty to the President. Biya has stacked ELECAM with loyalists, many of whom are affiliated with the ruling RDPC party. For example, in December 2024, Biya issued a decree appointing Jean Bernard Mboutou Ze, a former Secretary General of the Higher State Audit Office, and Charles Nanga, the Inspector General at the Ministry of National Education, to ELECAM. Opposition leaders criticized these appointments, pointing out that both individuals are members of the ruling RDPC and have held high-level government positions.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and regular people face overt and systematic retaliation if they openly criticize or challenge the regime. The regime systematically represses pro-democracy protests, shuts down independent organizations, hinders dissenting voices, and engages in censorship.
The regime has systematically, seriously, and unfairly repressed protests. The regime violently suppresses pro-democracy demonstrations and detains protesters for prolonged periods without trial. In 2025, regime security forces responded to nationwide post-election protests against the official results of the October presidential elections with brutal and lethal violence that killed at least 48 people and mass arrests of as many as 2,000 people, including several minors, many of whom, as of December 2025, have not yet been brought before a judge. Lawyers monitoring the cases have indicated that the charges against the detainees include “hostility toward the homeland,” “revolution,” “rebellion,” and “insurrection,” some of which do not relate to the actual acts of protest and, in some instances, could carry the possibility of the death penalty. Similarly, in 2020, the regime arbitrarily arrested more than 500 people who participated in demonstrations against electoral fraud following the disputed 2018 elections. As of September 2025, 36 of those arrested remain in detention at Kondengui Prison in Yaoundé, having been sentenced by a military court to prison terms ranging from five to seven years.
The regime has unfairly shut down independent organizations. It selectively enforces local fiscal regulations and invokes the country’s security situation to ban independent organizations. In December 2024, the Ministry of Territorial Administration suspended the Central African Human Rights Defenders Network (Redhac) for three months on vague and unsubstantiated accusations such as “illicit and exorbitant funding that does not align with the organization’s activities” and “activities likely to undermine the integrity of the national financial system.” Since 2020, the regime has harassed Redhac, with the Ministry of Territorial Administration accusing the organization of receiving funding from clandestine networks and attempting to destabilize the state. The regime has also targeted political groupings. In March 2024, the regime issued a ban on two opposition coalitions: the Alliance for Political Transition in Cameroon (ATPC) and the Alliance for Change (APC). The authorities declared the coalitions illegal, falsely accusing them of attempts to connect with Anglophone separatist leaders.
The regime has systematically, seriously, and unfairly obstructed the work of independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, and individuals. This includes arbitrary arrests, temporary suspension, imprisonment, physical violence, and false charges. In December 2025, Anicet Ekane, the president of the MANIDEM opposition party, died in prison after a month of detention without trial. He had been initially arrested on politically motivated charges that included hostility toward the homeland, incitement to revolt, and calls for insurrection. In November 2025, Tchiroma, the main opposition leader, fled the country following threats from the regime, which announced that he would be brought to justice for declaring himself the winner of the 2025 presidential elections and for organizing “illegal” protests. In July 2025, the Higher Council for Communication (CNC), the media regulatory body, imposed a six-month ban on the satirical newspaper Le Popoli on baseless accusations of “professional misconduct” over a cartoon that depicted the Minister of Territorial Administration handing an envelope to the Pope. Additionally, in July 2025, the Council suspended the editor-in-chief of L’Opinion Publique, Patrice Polla, and journalist Anne Azewa from practicing for two months after they made critical statements that were considered “damaging to the reputation” of the acting Minister of Mines and Industry, Fuh Calistus Gentry. In February 2024, the regime imprisoned Abdoulaye Math, the president of the Movement for the Defence of Human Rights, at Maroua prison for organizing a demonstration.
The regime has systematically, seriously, and unfairly censored dissenting speech. The ruling RDPC systematically suppresses critical discourse regarding the regime and sensitive issues, such as the Anglophone crisis. Following the 2025 elections, the regime imposed an Internet shutdown to curtail online criticism of the election and reports of rigging and repression. In October 2024, when rumors about the president’s health began to circulate, the regime issued a ministerial communiqué to regional governors formally prohibiting any media discussion of the topic. In 2018, the government shut down internet access for 280 days in the English-speaking regions where an armed conflict opposed the army to separatist groups. This action was taken to stop the flow of information in these areas, as many citizen journalists were producing and sharing news about the “Anglophone crisis” on various social media platforms.
Institutions largely fail to serve as independent checks on the governing authority. The ruling RDPC has, over the decades, consolidated control of state institutions, effectively removing meaningful checks to executive power. In the electoral process and in response to the regime’s policies, the courts generally align with the regime. Legislative institutions are predominantly dominated by members of the ruling party, rendering them an extension of the executive branch in practice.
Courts systematically and unfairly enable the regime’s attempts to significantly undermine electoral competition or make the electoral process significantly skewed in its favor. The Constitutional Court, the supreme arbiter of electoral matters, has consistently ruled in favor of the regime, validating the disqualification of opposition candidates from the ballot, and dismissing legal petitions challenging irregularities and manipulation undermining the integrity of the electoral process. The court has consistently dismissed legal challenges on grounds of admissibility or form, without reviewing their merits and substance.
In the 2025 election, the Council—whose judges are appointed by the President, and include active members of the ruling RDPC party— validated ELECAM’s controversial disqualification of main opposition leader Kamto. In September 2025, the Council dismissed a subsequent, independent petition filed by a private citizen, Michel Noutchetchassi, which urged a review of the substantive merits of the case. Conversely, the Council ruled that an opposition petition to invalidate the candidacy of the 92-year-old Biya on the grounds of physical fitness requirements under Article 118 of the electoral law was unfounded. The Council’s ruling ignored legitimate concerns over Biya’s deteriorating health and lack of physical fitness. Furthermore, despite widespread reports of significant fraud during the elections, the Council rejected all petitions to cancel the election results and confirmed President Biya’s victory for an eighth consecutive term.
Courts frequently and unfairly failed to check the governing authority’s attempts to repress criticism or to retaliate against those who express open opposition to its most prominent, widely publicized policies. The judiciary often aligns with the authorities, imposing harsh sentences on individuals despite a lack of due process. It frequently dismisses well-founded complaints against the regime, declares its incompetence to take on certain cases, or delays proceedings related to human rights violations. Since 2022, two years after the regime illegally detained hundreds of individuals for participating in pro-democracy protests led by the opposition, at least thirty-six appeals have been filed with the Supreme Court of Cameroon. However, the court has not ruled on any of these cases to date, leading to unreasonable delays that allow the detainees’ sentences to be carried out without due process.
The regime has systematically directed cases to separate, regime-controlled courts. The regime has used military prosecution under the country’s draconian 2014 anti-terror law to criminalize dissenting protests in the context of opposition political contestation and the anglophone crisis with rebellion and insurrection. In September 2020, authorities brutally suppressed protests against electoral fraud organized by the main opposition MRC party, arbitrarily detaining more than 500. The regime brought 47 MRC members, including party leader Kamto, before a Yaounde military tribunal, which convicted them on trumped-up charges of rebellion and insurrection. In December 2021, they were handed jail sentences lasting between one and seven years. Around the same time, a Douala military court sentenced several members of the Stand Up for Cameroon civic movement to between 16 and 18 months in jail on similar charges in connection with their peaceful pro-democracy activism.
Judicial, legislative, or executive institutions systematically, frequently, and unfairly failed to hold regime officials accountable. Cameroon is a patrimonial state with transactional patronage and clientelism governed by loyalty and favor to Biya, and the regime systematically shields loyal officials from accountability. One notable example of impunity is the February 2020 massacre of 21 civilians, including 13 children, and the burning of their homes by the military and a local ethnic armed group in the North-West region. The regime carried out this violence as a reprisal against residents it accused of collaborating with separatist Anglophone fighters. After initially establishing a commission of inquiry, recognizing its involvement in the massacre, and arresting two soldiers and a gendarme, the regime has since repeatedly delayed the trial and postponed hearings for various reasons, such as the absence of judges and other court members. Additionally, they have involved victims’ families minimally in the proceedings, refused to admit key evidence, including death certificates, and, as a result, senior officials have not faced charges or arrests.
The regime has subjected legislative institutions to reforms that abolish or severely weaken their independence and operational effectiveness. Since 2002, the ruling RDPC party has enjoyed an overwhelming supermajority in the National Assembly, and it has exploited its control to weaken the legislature into a rubber stamp for its policies. In 2008, the regime pushed through the National Assembly a contentious constitutional amendment removing presidential term limits, paving the way for Biya to extend his rule. Another constitutional amendment established a senate and granted the president the authority to directly appoint 30 percent of senators, while the remaining 70 percent are elected by municipal and regional councils, which are predominantly composed of representatives from the ruling party. Additionally, in 2024, the regime pushed through a bill extending parliamentarians’ terms by one year, allowing the ruling party to keep its supermajority intact ahead of the October 2025 presidential election. Finally, in 2025, the regime pushed through the legislature, naming the new National Assembly building “Paul Biya Glass Palace.”
HRF classifies Cameron as ruled by a fully authoritarian regime.
Cameroon is a republic with a presidential system of government. The Head of State, Paul Biya, took power in 1982, after the resignation of Cameroon’s first leader, Ahmadou Ahidjo. In 2025, he secured a contentious eighth consecutive term in highly disputed elections tainted by fraud. After gaining independence in 1960, Cameroon experienced 32 years of one-party rule, and despite the democratization process initiated in 1990, Biya’s ruling Democratic Rally of the Cameroon People (RDPC) has monopolized power and consolidated control over all branches of government. With no meaningful check to executive power, and an endemic culture of abuse, corruption, and clientelism, Cameroon has suffered a number of political, humanitarian, and security crises, including civil unrest stemming from protests and insecurity as a result of a terrorism from Boko Haram in the Far North region, and armed conflict in response to a secessionalist insurgency in the minority English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions.
Elections are a sham, to the point where the real, mainstream political opposition does not have a realistic chance to meaningfully compete and possibly win. Although national elections are consistently organized, the regime prevents the most serious opposition challengers from participating, obstructs their campaigning efforts, engages in large-scale electoral fraud, and fills the independent electoral management body with loyalists.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and regular people face overt and systematic retaliation if they openly criticize or challenge the regime. The regime systematically responds to protests with extreme violence, shuts down independent organizations, and employs various measures, including arbitrary arrests, bans, and false charges, to intimidate and silence dissenting voices. Additionally, it engages in widespread censorship of content critical of the regime or that addresses sensitive topics, such as the anglophone separatist movement.
Institutions largely fail to serve as independent checks on the governing authority. Due to the regime’s takeover of state institutions, there is a complete lack of institutional accountability in the country. Courts have frequently and unfairly supported the regime’s efforts to undermine electoral competition and retaliate against individuals who openly oppose its most prominent and widely publicized policies. Moreover, state institutions do not hold regime officials accountable, and legislative bodies are particularly aligned with the regime’s agenda, merely rubber-stamping its policies without oversight.
Elections are a sham, to the point where the real, mainstream political opposition does not have a realistic chance to meaningfully compete and possibly win. The regime implements measures to hinder the participation of political rivals it views as the greatest threat, restricts opposition campaigning, engages in voting irregularities, and undermines independent electoral oversight.
The regime has systematically and unfairly barred a real, mainstream opposition party or candidate from competing in elections, including indirectly through politically-motivated lawfare that leads to disqualification. Ahead of the October 2025 presidential election, Elections Cameroon (ELECAM)—the official electoral oversight institution barred main opposition leader Maurice Kamto from the ballot. ELECAM justified its decision by falsely claiming that Kamto’s party, the African Movement for New Independence and Democracy (MANIDEM), had already endorsed the expelled former party chair, Dieudonné Yebga. This exclusion had been confirmed by both Yebga himself and the Ministry of Territorial Administration, which is responsible for monitoring political parties’ activities.
The regime has systematically, unfairly, and significantly hindered a real, mainstream opposition candidate’s electoral campaign. Ahead of the 2025 presidential elections, regime authorities continued a longstanding pattern of invoking vague security and administrative concerns to deny main opposition candidates access to public facilities. For example, in September 2025, the authorities denied the main opposition’s request to host a convention to designate a consensus presidential candidate at the Multipurpose Sports Stadium in the capital, Yaoundé. The same month, authorities in the commercial capital Douala barred opposition candidate Cabral Libii of the Cameroon Party for National Reconciliation (PCRN) the use of the Camtel and Cicam stadiums to launch his campaign. In October 2025, local authorities in the southern city of Ebolowa, a stronghold of the ruling party, prevented opposition candidate Bello Bouba Maigari of the National Union for Democracy and Progress (UNDP) from entering the city where he hoped to campaign. The same month, authorities in the northern city of Maroua banned a rally of leading opposition candidate Issa Tchiroma. In the backdrop of clashes between the army and Anglophone separatist fighters who opposed the elections, security forces falsely accused Tchiroma of colluding with separatists and promoting terrorism and secession.
The regime has engaged in systematic and significant voting irregularities. The ruling party has consistently been involved in electoral fraud, particularly in the last three presidential elections. International observers deemed the official results of the 2025 presidential elections, awarding Biya a 53% share of the vote, not to be credible based on widespread reports of fraud, manipulation, and the lack of transparency in the tabulation of announced results. Evidence of systematic manipulation and tampering documented included ballot box stuffing, falsified tallies and signatures, vote buying, ballots lacking the names of some candidates, and registered voters missing on the electoral rolls despite having their registration cards. These electoral malpractices have consistently tainted Cameroonian elections, such as in 2018 and 2011. Furthermore, ruling party-appointed administrative, electoral, and judicial officials enjoy opaque and unchecked control over the transmission of polling station results to the centralized compilation and announcement of votes, offering ample opportunities for manipulation.
The regime has systematically and seriously undermined independent electoral oversight. It established ELECAM in 2006 to fulfill independent electoral management in place of the Ministry of Territorial Administration, but the law gives the President full powers to directly appoint all ELECAM commissioners. With this system, ELECAM commissioners serve at the pleasure of and loyalty to the President. Biya has stacked ELECAM with loyalists, many of whom are affiliated with the ruling RDPC party. For example, in December 2024, Biya issued a decree appointing Jean Bernard Mboutou Ze, a former Secretary General of the Higher State Audit Office, and Charles Nanga, the Inspector General at the Ministry of National Education, to ELECAM. Opposition leaders criticized these appointments, pointing out that both individuals are members of the ruling RDPC and have held high-level government positions.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and regular people face overt and systematic retaliation if they openly criticize or challenge the regime. The regime systematically represses pro-democracy protests, shuts down independent organizations, hinders dissenting voices, and engages in censorship.
The regime has systematically, seriously, and unfairly repressed protests. The regime violently suppresses pro-democracy demonstrations and detains protesters for prolonged periods without trial. In 2025, regime security forces responded to nationwide post-election protests against the official results of the October presidential elections with brutal and lethal violence that killed at least 48 people and mass arrests of as many as 2,000 people, including several minors, many of whom, as of December 2025, have not yet been brought before a judge. Lawyers monitoring the cases have indicated that the charges against the detainees include “hostility toward the homeland,” “revolution,” “rebellion,” and “insurrection,” some of which do not relate to the actual acts of protest and, in some instances, could carry the possibility of the death penalty. Similarly, in 2020, the regime arbitrarily arrested more than 500 people who participated in demonstrations against electoral fraud following the disputed 2018 elections. As of September 2025, 36 of those arrested remain in detention at Kondengui Prison in Yaoundé, having been sentenced by a military court to prison terms ranging from five to seven years.
The regime has unfairly shut down independent organizations. It selectively enforces local fiscal regulations and invokes the country’s security situation to ban independent organizations. In December 2024, the Ministry of Territorial Administration suspended the Central African Human Rights Defenders Network (Redhac) for three months on vague and unsubstantiated accusations such as “illicit and exorbitant funding that does not align with the organization’s activities” and “activities likely to undermine the integrity of the national financial system.” Since 2020, the regime has harassed Redhac, with the Ministry of Territorial Administration accusing the organization of receiving funding from clandestine networks and attempting to destabilize the state. The regime has also targeted political groupings. In March 2024, the regime issued a ban on two opposition coalitions: the Alliance for Political Transition in Cameroon (ATPC) and the Alliance for Change (APC). The authorities declared the coalitions illegal, falsely accusing them of attempts to connect with Anglophone separatist leaders.
The regime has systematically, seriously, and unfairly obstructed the work of independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, and individuals. This includes arbitrary arrests, temporary suspension, imprisonment, physical violence, and false charges. In December 2025, Anicet Ekane, the president of the MANIDEM opposition party, died in prison after a month of detention without trial. He had been initially arrested on politically motivated charges that included hostility toward the homeland, incitement to revolt, and calls for insurrection. In November 2025, Tchiroma, the main opposition leader, fled the country following threats from the regime, which announced that he would be brought to justice for declaring himself the winner of the 2025 presidential elections and for organizing “illegal” protests. In July 2025, the Higher Council for Communication (CNC), the media regulatory body, imposed a six-month ban on the satirical newspaper Le Popoli on baseless accusations of “professional misconduct” over a cartoon that depicted the Minister of Territorial Administration handing an envelope to the Pope. Additionally, in July 2025, the Council suspended the editor-in-chief of L’Opinion Publique, Patrice Polla, and journalist Anne Azewa from practicing for two months after they made critical statements that were considered “damaging to the reputation” of the acting Minister of Mines and Industry, Fuh Calistus Gentry. In February 2024, the regime imprisoned Abdoulaye Math, the president of the Movement for the Defence of Human Rights, at Maroua prison for organizing a demonstration.
The regime has systematically, seriously, and unfairly censored dissenting speech. The ruling RDPC systematically suppresses critical discourse regarding the regime and sensitive issues, such as the Anglophone crisis. Following the 2025 elections, the regime imposed an Internet shutdown to curtail online criticism of the election and reports of rigging and repression. In October 2024, when rumors about the president’s health began to circulate, the regime issued a ministerial communiqué to regional governors formally prohibiting any media discussion of the topic. In 2018, the government shut down internet access for 280 days in the English-speaking regions where an armed conflict opposed the army to separatist groups. This action was taken to stop the flow of information in these areas, as many citizen journalists were producing and sharing news about the “Anglophone crisis” on various social media platforms.
Institutions largely fail to serve as independent checks on the governing authority. The ruling RDPC has, over the decades, consolidated control of state institutions, effectively removing meaningful checks to executive power. In the electoral process and in response to the regime’s policies, the courts generally align with the regime. Legislative institutions are predominantly dominated by members of the ruling party, rendering them an extension of the executive branch in practice.
Courts systematically and unfairly enable the regime’s attempts to significantly undermine electoral competition or make the electoral process significantly skewed in its favor. The Constitutional Court, the supreme arbiter of electoral matters, has consistently ruled in favor of the regime, validating the disqualification of opposition candidates from the ballot, and dismissing legal petitions challenging irregularities and manipulation undermining the integrity of the electoral process. The court has consistently dismissed legal challenges on grounds of admissibility or form, without reviewing their merits and substance.
In the 2025 election, the Council—whose judges are appointed by the President, and include active members of the ruling RDPC party— validated ELECAM’s controversial disqualification of main opposition leader Kamto. In September 2025, the Council dismissed a subsequent, independent petition filed by a private citizen, Michel Noutchetchassi, which urged a review of the substantive merits of the case. Conversely, the Council ruled that an opposition petition to invalidate the candidacy of the 92-year-old Biya on the grounds of physical fitness requirements under Article 118 of the electoral law was unfounded. The Council’s ruling ignored legitimate concerns over Biya’s deteriorating health and lack of physical fitness. Furthermore, despite widespread reports of significant fraud during the elections, the Council rejected all petitions to cancel the election results and confirmed President Biya’s victory for an eighth consecutive term.
Courts frequently and unfairly failed to check the governing authority’s attempts to repress criticism or to retaliate against those who express open opposition to its most prominent, widely publicized policies. The judiciary often aligns with the authorities, imposing harsh sentences on individuals despite a lack of due process. It frequently dismisses well-founded complaints against the regime, declares its incompetence to take on certain cases, or delays proceedings related to human rights violations. Since 2022, two years after the regime illegally detained hundreds of individuals for participating in pro-democracy protests led by the opposition, at least thirty-six appeals have been filed with the Supreme Court of Cameroon. However, the court has not ruled on any of these cases to date, leading to unreasonable delays that allow the detainees’ sentences to be carried out without due process.
The regime has systematically directed cases to separate, regime-controlled courts. The regime has used military prosecution under the country’s draconian 2014 anti-terror law to criminalize dissenting protests in the context of opposition political contestation and the anglophone crisis with rebellion and insurrection. In September 2020, authorities brutally suppressed protests against electoral fraud organized by the main opposition MRC party, arbitrarily detaining more than 500. The regime brought 47 MRC members, including party leader Kamto, before a Yaounde military tribunal, which convicted them on trumped-up charges of rebellion and insurrection. In December 2021, they were handed jail sentences lasting between one and seven years. Around the same time, a Douala military court sentenced several members of the Stand Up for Cameroon civic movement to between 16 and 18 months in jail on similar charges in connection with their peaceful pro-democracy activism.
Judicial, legislative, or executive institutions systematically, frequently, and unfairly failed to hold regime officials accountable. Cameroon is a patrimonial state with transactional patronage and clientelism governed by loyalty and favor to Biya, and the regime systematically shields loyal officials from accountability. One notable example of impunity is the February 2020 massacre of 21 civilians, including 13 children, and the burning of their homes by the military and a local ethnic armed group in the North-West region. The regime carried out this violence as a reprisal against residents it accused of collaborating with separatist Anglophone fighters. After initially establishing a commission of inquiry, recognizing its involvement in the massacre, and arresting two soldiers and a gendarme, the regime has since repeatedly delayed the trial and postponed hearings for various reasons, such as the absence of judges and other court members. Additionally, they have involved victims’ families minimally in the proceedings, refused to admit key evidence, including death certificates, and, as a result, senior officials have not faced charges or arrests.
The regime has subjected legislative institutions to reforms that abolish or severely weaken their independence and operational effectiveness. Since 2002, the ruling RDPC party has enjoyed an overwhelming supermajority in the National Assembly, and it has exploited its control to weaken the legislature into a rubber stamp for its policies. In 2008, the regime pushed through the National Assembly a contentious constitutional amendment removing presidential term limits, paving the way for Biya to extend his rule. Another constitutional amendment established a senate and granted the president the authority to directly appoint 30 percent of senators, while the remaining 70 percent are elected by municipal and regional councils, which are predominantly composed of representatives from the ruling party. Additionally, in 2024, the regime pushed through a bill extending parliamentarians’ terms by one year, allowing the ruling party to keep its supermajority intact ahead of the October 2025 presidential election. Finally, in 2025, the regime pushed through the legislature, naming the new National Assembly building “Paul Biya Glass Palace.”
