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Allowing Cameroonian Citizens Abroad to Vote is Not Enough to Guarantee Free, Fair, and Transparent Elections

CCDHR welcomes the recent effort by the Government of Cameroon to grant voting rights to Cameroonian citizens abroad but condemns the narrow and fraudulent context within which such voting rights will be exercised. The effort to grant Cameroonians abroad the ability to chose who becomes the President of their motherland may at face value appear to be a good move by the Government of Cameroon, but this effort falls far short of satisfying the demands and needs of the Cameroonian Diaspora. The absence of concurrent measures to reform the electoral system, the electoral management body, and the continued denial of dual nationality to Cameroonians makes the current move nothing more than a calculated attempt to extend election fraud beyond the boards of Cameroon.

But who is a Cameroonian abroad and what does the term Cameroonian Diaspora actually mean? CCDHR maintains that every Cameroonian by birth, marriage, and naturalization should have and retain at anytime all the rights and privileges associated with being a Cameroonian national, irrespective of any other nationality that such individual may eventually acquire. However, Cameroon’s nationality laws provides otherwise. According to Cameroonian law, any Cameroonian who willingly acquires the citizenship of another nation shall automatically lose their Cameroonian nationality. This dictates that any Cameroonian immigrant who becomes a naturalized citizen of a foreign country automatically loses their Cameroonian nationality. CCDHR therefore notes that beyond giving them the right to vote, Cameroonians in the Diaspora are more interested in Dual Nationality and the establishment of an Independent Electoral Commission, not a calculated Machiavellian maneuver to stuff ballot boxes in Cameroonian Embassies abroad to swell up the margin of victory for Paul Biya.

An investigation concluded by the CCDHR in May 2011 revealed that many militants of the ruling Cameroon Peoples Democratic Movement (CPDM) in the United States, including the Presidents and executives of the various CPDM sections, subsections, and branches have acquired US citizenship. However, these people maintain strong militancy within Cameroon’s ruling party and continue to enjoy all the privileges of being Cameroonian despite taking up foreign nationality. They get Cameroonian passports for themselves and family, and receive other services and scholarships only available to Cameroonian citizens with relative ease. How the Government of Cameroon allows such interference in the domestic affairs of Cameroon by people who would otherwise be considered foreigners (if they were of the opposition or civil society) is questionable, but not surprising.

CPDM militants abroad who have acquired foreign nationalities are allowed to function as Cameroonians because they promote the ideology of the CPDM party, they support the continued oppression of the People of Cameroon by their government, and assist in the looting of the nation's resources. On the other hand, members of opposition political parties and the civil society abroad who criticize the tyranny of the Government of Cameroon are placed under secret surveillance, systematically castigated, refused services by Cameroon Embassies, and classified as foreigners for acquiring the nationalities of their host countries. This double standard in the treatment of Cameroonians abroad based on party affiliation has been a cornerstone policy of Cameroon’s diplomatic missions for the past decade based on specific instructions from the Presidency of the Republic on the advise of a joint recommendation of CPDM party militants abroad, the Ministry of External Relations, and the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralization.

Given that votes from Cameroonians at home have meant nothing to the eventual outcome of elections in Cameroon for the past 50 years, it is doubtful that votes from Cameroonians abroad would have any impact without a complete overhaul of the Cameroon electoral system itself. According to the new law granting Cameroonian citizens abroad the right to vote in general elections, the same government that will manage the conduct of elections at home will be managing the conduct of elections abroad. Meanwhile, Cameroonians abroad are called upon to trust their votes with government representatives that continued to deny them passports and other services, report them to immigration authorities, and work assiduously to inhibit their survival in their host countries just because they criticize the autocracy of the Government of Cameroon.

It appears more plausible to conclude that with all its known undemocratic tendencies, the Government of Cameroon would not have succumbed to the decades long call for Cameroonians abroad to be able to vote during elections, if it were not certain about its strategies to circumvent such votes to its advantage as it has consistently and successfully done to the votes cast by Cameroonians at home. CCDHR therefore holds that until Cameroonians are granted the ability to maintain dual, if not multiple citizenship; until the Government of Cameroon stops experimenting and creates a truly independent electoral Commission; until the role of the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralization in the conduct and supervision of elections is completely eliminated; and until the proclamation of election results becomes the prerogative of an independent electoral commission, the granting of voting rights to Cameroonians abroad will be inconsequential.

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