The death of three incumbent African Presidents in
the last three months - Malawi’s Bingu wa Mutharika, Ghana’s John Atta Mills,
and Ethiopia’s Meles Zenawi has reignited the debate over Paul Biya’s health.
As the number of ailing African Presidents increases, concealing the health
status of the octogenarian can no longer be said to be in the public interest.
The secrecy around the President’s health, which for long, have been the
currency in official circles in this country has had its day and should give way
to transparency. Cameroonians need know whether or not their President is
healthy enough to live up to the exalting responsibilities of his high office.
Malawi’s Mutharika, Ghana’s Atta Mills and
Ethiopia’s Zenawi all died in office but their entourages elaborately concealed
the seriousness of their ailments. In Mutharika’s case, ministers insisted he
was alive. Both Zenawi and Mills had to seek medical treatment overseas because
of deficiencies in their local healthcare services. Earlier in 2012, Guinea-Bissau’s
President Malam Bacai Sanhá died in office after a protracted illness.
Zenawi’s death added Ethiopia to the growing list
of African countries that have lost a sitting President. So far, the list
comprises 20 countries: Algeria, Angola, Botswana, Burkina Faso, the Central
African Republic, Comoros, Cote d’Ivoire, Egypt, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea,
Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria and Zambia.
Gabon, (Leon Mba & Omar Bongo) Guinea (Sekou Toure & Lasana
Conte) and Nigeria (Sani Abacha & Yar’Adua) have each lost two sitting
presidents, bringing the total number of leaders who have died in office to 23.
The average age of these leaders at their death was
63. Côte d'Ivoire’s Félix Houphouet-Boigny (88), Kenya’s Jomo Kenyatta (84) and
Malawi’s Mutharika (78) were among the oldest, while Algeria’s Boumedienne (45)
was one of the youngest. Of the presidents who died in office, 13 were rumored
ill and undergoing treatment while in power. Presently, there are eight African
presidents (Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Malawi, Nigeria,
Togo and Zambia) who are in power directly or indirectly as a result of a
sitting president’s passing.
Since 2008, 13 Presidents worldwide have died in
office but 10 of those have been in Africa. Indeed, four African Presidents
have died in office in 2012 alone. For 54 states, this amounts to a
presidential mortality rate of 18%. Contrast with other continents, where in
the same period, there was just one presidential fatality from Asia (Kim Jong
Il from North Korea), Europe (Poland’s Lech Kaczyński, from a plane
crash), and North America (David Thomson of Barbados, from cancer). South
American leaders have all managed to stay alive. Same for Australasia.
President Ahmadou Ahidjo is the only African
president to have resigned from power due to ill health, in 1982, after ruling
for 22 years. Several ailing African leaders watching news of Zenawi’s death
are wondering who among them is next. They include Algeria’s Abdelaziz
Bouteflika (75); Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe (88); Eritrea’s Isaias Afewerki (66)
and Biya.
Born February 13, 1933, Biya is 79 years old and
counting. His health has been the subject of much speculation, ever since
reports emerged prematurely announcing his death at the Clinique
Generale-Beaulieu in East Geneva in November 2008. The pandemonium that
followed is evidence, if any was needed, that Biya’s health is a question of
public interest. Returning home after the rumors of his death, Biya touted his
detractors that they would have to wait 20 years to celebrate his death. The
President’s remarks gave him away either as playing to the gallery on a serious
issue of State, or that he did not thoroughly consider the implications of his
statements – implications necessarily arising from the ambiguity and
uncertainty surrounding presidential succession in the country.
The 1996 constitution (as amended) states that in
case of vacancy or incapacitation, the President of the Senate takes over. But
over 16 years after the constitution was passed, the Senate and other
institutions like the Constitutional Court as provided in the constitution are
yet to be created. Curiously, the government, out of political expediency has
improvised by allowing the Administrative Bench of the Supreme Court to sit-in
for the Constitutional Council. This, in point of fact and law is
unconstitutional and sets a dangerous precedence! The inability of the
government to remediate national institutions according to the supreme law of
the land simply boggles the mind. Within this context, were Biya to die
abruptly, there are plenty of incentives for someone, probably a soldier to
seize power, provoking conflict, instability and even civil war.
Biya’s 79 years is far on the left side of the
average age of African Presidents which is 63; that’s pension time, or nearing
it, in most countries. Put in context, the European equivalent is just 55;
which is also the average age of American presidents at the time of their
inauguration. Barack Obama is 50. Britain’s David Cameron is 45. The demand for
health disclosure is serious enough that in the USA, presidential candidates
are obliged to disclose their health reports before they can run for office.
Regrettably, the quest for credible information
about Biya’s health is taboo. Veteran Le Messager journalist, Pius Njawe (RIP)
was jailed simply for insinuating that Biya might have suffered a malaise
during the 1997 Cameroon cup finals. These speculations intensified after Biya;
for the first time in 26 years as president skipped the 2008 challenge cup
finals which was presided at by then Prime Minister Ephraim Inoni.
Amid repeated media reports that Biya is suffering
from prostrate cancer, keen observers could determine the president is showing
more wear and tear mostly in the form of wrinkles; the declining swagger of his
gait; the alleged uncontrollable flatulence and protracted anal blasts and the
deterioration in his husky voice as exhibited in his last two official
functions – laying of foundation stones at Mballam and Lom Pangar. The
subterfuge amongst the President’s men is to insist all is fine even when Biya
can barely walk.
No one has confirmed what’s ailing the President
and, in the absence of credible information, speculation has dominated the
headlines. Presently, the nation is awash with rumors that the President’s
wife, Chantal has deserted him. It hardly matters if the rumors are true or
not; official silence implies she has. No smoke without fire. Biya now cuts the
picture of an isolated president, frail, distraught, distracted, completely out
of touch; indeed, a character to be pitied.
Opinion is however unanimous that Biya is tired and
has dropped the ball; the regime is fragile in ways it has not been before,
plagued by a lack of vision, unprecedented levels of corruption and rumblings
within the military rank and file. With no clearly defined constitutional
transition process, the lack of transparency on Biya’s health creates a dangerous
uncertainty. Better communication over what Biya is suffering from, what the
prognosis is and perhaps some comment from the President himself would go a
long way to ending all these speculations.
*Ekinneh
Agbaw-Ebai is a public intellectual and graduate of Harvard University John F.
Kennedy School of Government where he was Managing Editor of the Harvard
Journal of African-American Public Policy. A former Research Analyst for
Central Africa with Freedom House, he is a consultant and lives in Boston, USA.
Talk back at ekinneh@yahoo.com.
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