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Addressing a crowd of supporters at a stadium in the Far North town of Maroua, Biya promised to step up security in the region plagued by extremist attacks, curb youth unemployment and improve road infrastructure and social amenities if he is reelected in Sunday’s vote.
Cameroon’s 92-year-old President Paul Biya appeared at his first campaign rally last Tuesday for the upcoming election in which the world’s oldest head of state is seeking his eighth term.
Addressing a crowd of supporters at a stadium in the Far North town of Maroua, Biya promised to step up security in the region plagued by extremist attacks, curb youth unemployment and improve road infrastructure and social amenities if he is reelected in Sunday’s vote.
The Far North Region is majority Muslim and one of Cameroon’s poorest areas. It has been plagued by attacks and kidnappings for ransom by the extremist group Boko Haram.
It also accounts for nearly 20 percent of the country’s 8.2 million eligible voters, and two of the nine opposition candidates in the election — Biya’s former allies Bello Bouba Maigari and Issa Tchiroma Bakary — command a strong following in the Far North.
During his decades in power, the Central African nation of nearly 30 million people has struggled with challenges from a deadly secessionist movement in the west of the country to chronic corruption that has stifled development despite rich natural resources like oil and minerals.
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At least 43 percent of the country’s citizens live in poverty as measured by core living standards such as income, education and health, according to U.N. estimates.
