Cameroon to re-run vote in 11 Anglophone regions

Cameroon’s Constitutional Court has ordered a re-run of local and parliamentary elections in parts of the country’s English-speaking regions, following complaints of irregularities in the vote earlier this month. 

The ruling was announced on state broadcaster CRTV on Tuesday evening, with polls to take place in 11 constituencies, though a date has yet to be decided. 

It follows complaints lodged by numerous political parties about the conduct of the previous election. Among other grievances was the distance voters were expected to travel to cast their ballots.

“They took the polling centres far away from the people… How do you expect people to move 20km?," the opposition SDF's lawyer Valentine Njenje is quoted as saying.

The vote on 9th February was boycotted altogether by the MRC party, whose leader Maurice Kamto cited the ongoing Anglophone crisis as a “major reason” for refusing to participate.

The intensifying violence has forced at least 8,000 Cameroonians to flee into neighbouring Nigeria in the last few weeks alone, the UN has said. 

On polling day, witnesses reported clashes between separatists and government forces in the town of Muyaka and the sounds of gunfire in the city of Buea and Kuma town. 

Photo: AFP