In July 2025, President Paul Biya made a simple post on X. “I am a candidate for the … presidential election,” he wrote, adding, “Rest assured that my determination to serve you is commensurate with the serious challenges facing us… The best is still to come.” If his acolytes are to be believed, the impetus behind the 92-year-young Biya’s choice was merely a response to the people’s call—at least, from his loyal supporters. But what stood out most was the emphasis on the medium of the announcement itself: social media. The head of state’s camp painted Biya’s use of X as proof of his connection to young Cameroonians, who are the most active users of the platforms and make up about 60 percent of Cameroon’s  population. It is an allegation steeped in irony, as for more than four decades of Biya’s rule, the country’s youth have been consistently sidelined, excluded from meaningful political participation and decision-making.

After more than four decades of Biya’s rule, Cameroon appears to be sliding backwards. Public infrastructure is crumbling, insecurity and corruption are on the rise, youth unemployment remains stubbornly high, the government is deep in debt, and the threat of secession in English-speaking Cameroon continues to hang over the nation. Given the fragile state of affairs, Cameroonians have taken to calling the impending vote “Cameroon’s last election,” for many reasons—notable among them being that if the incumbent leader wins, Biya will be nearly 100 years old by the end of his eighth term.

Earlier this year, we had predicted that Biya’s victory was a foregone conclusion if he decided to run again for Cameroon’s top job, but a lot has changed on the ground. Two of Biya’s long-standing allies, former Minister of Employment and Vocational Training Issa Tchiroma Bakary and erstwhile Tourism and Leisure Minister Bello Bouba Maigari, shocked the country by resigning from his government. Resignations are not new under Biya, but the departure of these particular figures is significant—the timing, geography, and political bases they command allow for an otherwise unprecedented dialogue over the elderly head of state’s mandate. Coming from the predominantly Muslim northern regions of Cameroon—Adamawa, North, and Far North—with a large voter base making up about 32 percent of Cameroon’s registered voters, Issa Tchiroma and Maigari could significantly disrupt Biya’s usual landslide victories or even push him out of power.

The secretary general at the presidency of Cameroon, Ferdinand Ngoh Ngoh, often seen as the de facto leader cum “shadow president,” earlier on turned the presidency into what looked like a campaign hub of his own. He received delegations from all walks of life: religious leaders, youth representatives, and political elites, who, in return, pledged their support for the incumbent. Biya, who remains largely absent from the scene of daily politicking, had ceded his signature authority to Ngoh Ngoh, a move that has stirred growing resentment among sections of the political elite, who accuse him of usurping power from the “democratically elected president.”

“A country cannot exist in the service of one man,” declared Issa Tchiroma, now a candidate in the upcoming elections. He now refers to the Biya government as “broken.” According to Biya’s one-time spin doctor, centralization has failed. In an unexpected twist of events, Tchiroma—who once linked federalism to secession when Anglophone Cameroonians asked for it—is now proposing the same system of government as the magic wand that will take Cameroon out of the woods. Addressing a crowd in his hometown, Tchiroma is heard urging his people to take their destinies into their own hands. “We haven’t solved your old problems. But if we unite now, we can solve them for good,” he said. “It’s time to act. When the time comes, put in your envelope what will end our misery.”

Before joining the Biya government, both Tchiroma and Maigari were once its victims. Maigari served as Biya’s first prime minister from 1982 to 1983, shortly after Biya came to power. In 1984, however, he was forced into exile following accusations of involvement in a failed coup led by allies of former president Ahmadou Ahidjo, mostly from the north. He later returned and founded the National Union for Democracy and Progress (UNDP) in 1992. The party remained in alliance with Biya until 2025, when Maigari began showing interest in the presidency.

Tchiroma, unlike Maigari, did not manage to escape after the coup attempt. He was arrested and spent six years in prison. During his detention, he learned English—a skill that would later shape his political career. After his release, he joined Maigari’s UNDP but left in 2007 to form his own party, the Front for the Cameroon National Salvation(FNSC). Like the UNDP, his party maintained a marriage of convenience with the Biya regime until he, too, announced his intention to run for the country’s top job.

What makes Tchiroma and Maigari different from most of Biya’s former allies is that they have strong political foundations of their own. They are not members of the ruling party; instead, each leads a separate political party with genuine grassroots support, particularly in the north. For years now, they have been clamoring for power to “come back home,” having produced Cameroon’s first president—and the patience of these two northern powerbrokers appears to have worn thin.

But Tchiroma and Maigari are not the only ones seeking to end Biya’s 43-year rule over Cameroon. Ten other candidates have also been cleared by the elections body to take part. In total, a record 83 people submitted their candidacies for the presidency; only 13, including Biya, were approved. Missing from that list: Biya’s main challenger, Prof. Maurice Kamto, who finished second in the last election with over 14 percent of the vote. His dream of running again was cut short after the election body ELECAM rejected his candidacy through the African Movement for New Independence and Democracy (MANIDEM), a move that was widely considered by Cameroonians as a political maneuver by the ruling class designed to sideline Biya’s most formidable challenger.

Kamto is often called the “Pope of Law” in Cameroon. To his critics, the title mocks the “all-knowing law professor” who was outmaneuvered by the Biya regime. But his supporters highlight his key role in the landmark 2002 International Court of Justice ruling that granted Cameroon sovereignty over the oil-rich Bakassi Peninsula, a territory also claimed by Nigeria. His international reputation as a lawyer and his courage to challenge the Biya regime, especially after the 2018 presidential election boosted his political profile; his earlier service in the Biya government also gave him insider knowledge of the system he now opposes. Kamto mobilized supporters to protest what he called a rigged election—a move that led to his arrest and nine months in detention on charges of insurrection and seemingly strengthened his credibility among many Cameroonians as a symbol of resistance. The candidate he endorses would gain a major advantage, leveraging both Kamto’s clout and the tribe’s significant financial support to become a frontrunner. Kamto has set strict conditions: He will only give his endorsement to a coalition that includes Tchiroma and Maigari. Otherwise, he has urged voters to “follow their conscience.”

With the Pope of Law out of the race, the only real chance of defeating the incumbent now lies in a coalition—but the question of who would lead it hangs unresolved, and Cameroon’s long history of a fragmented opposition makes the dream of a united front seem unlikely. While opposition parties have been discussing this idea—two of the three candidates who originate from Anglophone Cameroon have already withdrawn to endorse Maigari—key opposition figures such as Maigari, Joshua Osih of the Social Democratic Front (SDF), and Cabral Libii, the young politician who came third in the last presidential elections, have vowed to never be part of any coalition. Despite Tchiroma and Maigari presenting themselves as insiders who are capable of sending Biya packing, Cameroonians remain skeptical, accusing them of enjoying the perks of Biya’s government for years and turning against him only now that it suits their ambitions.  Célestin Djamen, another opposition leader, described the two politicians as “situationists, profiteers, and mercenaries of politics.”

The campaign promises have been swift and all-encompassing. Osih has pledged to resolve the Anglophone crisis within his first 100 days in office. Maigari promises to convene an inclusive national dialogue within six months of his presidency and to grant amnesty to all prisoners of conscience as part of national reconciliation. Cabral Libii also supports dialogue with Anglophone leaders, regardless of their stance, and has even suggested relocating the presidency to one of the English-speaking regions as a gesture of unity. Tchiroma, who once labeled protesting Anglophones as “terrorists” while serving as minister of communication, now attributes the crisis to Biya’s over-centralized system and believes federalism is the only lasting solution.

While opposition parties in Cameroon struggle to agree on a single candidate to face the ruling party, many of them share similar ideas on major national issues. All the candidates vow to fight corruption, the hallmark of Biya’s Cameroon, and to reform key institutions—Tchiroma plans to conduct a full state audit at the start of his term, while Maigari proposes reducing the presidential term from seven to five years, renewable once, lowering the voting age from 20 to 18, and guaranteeing judicial independence. Tchiroma, Osih, and Cabral Libii all propose a federal system of government to address the long-debated “form of the state.” Cabral Libii, however, suggests a model he calls community federalism—inspired partly by Ethiopia’s system, though he compares it to Belgium and South Africa. Maigari, on the other hand, says he would let Cameroonians themselves decide through a national consultation. Given the country’s growing dissatisfaction with decades of centralized rule, public sentiment currently leans toward federalism.

Looming over the highly sectarian voter base is the lingering question of the fraught Anglophone crisis. The Anglophone regions of Cameroon in the Northwest and Southwest, home to about 20 percent of the population, have been locked in a secessionist war with the central government for nearly nine years. Fighters seeking to create an independent state they call Ambazonia have vowed to disrupt the upcoming presidential elections. Ironically, this unrest works in favor of the ruling party, which can use its control of security forces to protect loyal voters and manage the few polling stations that will open in the conflict  zones, which has been a failsafe modus operandi in past elections. Before the crisis, Anglophone Cameroon was the stronghold of the Social Democratic Front (SDF), but insecurity has since helped Biya’s Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement (CPDM) dominate politics in the area. For the opposition to win what is now Biya’s stronghold, the crisis must end; they simply don’t have the funds to motivate and protect supporters willing to risk voting.

Unfortunately for the opposition movement, coalitions alone will not suffice in restoring a long-entrenched lack of trust in Cameroon’s electing bodies. With members appointed directly by the president, it is hard for Cameroonians to lay their confidence on their impartiality, driving low voter turnout and increasingly daunting levels of  voter apathy. While Cameroonians are genuinely hungry for change, turnout at the polls has always been disappointingly low compared to the number of people eligible to vote. In the 2018 presidential election, for example, about 6.6 million registered, but only around 3.5 million actually voted—out of a national population of nearly 27 million. The 2011 elections were no different: 7 million registered, but only 5 million showed up to vote. Part of the problem is trust—or the lack of it. The elections body inspires little confidence, engendering a self-fulfilling prophecy of minimal change in the country’s executive administration.

As October 12 draws nearer, the question lingers: Is this finally the twilight of Biya’s rule, or just another chapter in his endless reign? While Cameroon appears to be sliding backwards, a spectrum of challengers have arisen in the hopes of taking the country to its next era: Some promising X, and others promising Y. For Cameroon to have a chance of progressing past decades of business-as-usual melancholia, a coalition will need to come from this discord—one that seeks to address regional sectarianism, neocolonial neglect, and youthful discontent.