Accusations of Fraud in Cameroon Elections

Opposition candidates have accused Cameroon’s election officials of fraud and incompetence following Sunday’s presidential election, according to reports.

President Paul Biya, 78, who has spent 29 years in power, is poised to win a sixth term in office, a move only possible because he amended the country’s constitution seven years to allow the president to serve longer. Biya faced 22 challengers in Sunday’s election.

An opposition official told BBC that people were caught voting more than once while some said they could not cast their ballots at polling stations.

Opposition candidate Momo Jean de Dieu told The Associated Press that he got reports that ballot boxes were not sealed properly, saying that they could easily have been stuffed.

Another candidate, Albert Dzongang, said when he went to vote, he did not see his name on the voter lists and couldn’t even vote for himself. “I don’t know why my name, and that of my wife, were erased from the list,” he told the news agency.

However, Biya said that the criticism was unfounded. “The world is not a perfect place, but let’s be positive, for there has been no intention of fraud,” he said, according to the BBC. “We’re for transparency and free elections.”