After a record length stay in Switzerland, President Paul Biya returned on the evening of Thursday August 20 to Yaoundé, Cameroon, AFP journalists noted. His absence, which lasted 73 days, fueled speculation about his state of health and reignited the debate on inertia at the top of the Cameroonian state.
The oldest head of state in the world, aged 93 and in power since 1982, landed around 4 p.m. GMT, from Geneva where he had been staying since June 7 for a “short private stay in Europe”, according to an official press release. He left Yaoundé airport, waving to the crowd from his car through the slightly ajar window.
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Several dozen activists from the presidential party, some of whom wore a loincloth bearing the president’s image, gathered at Yaoundé airport to welcome him, in a festive atmosphere.
The Cameroonian opposition denounces a country on “automatic pilot”
The state of health of Paul Biya, who stays very regularly in Geneva, is the subject of many rumors, sometimes denied by the government. On June 18, the Minister of Communication, René Emmanuel Sadi, denied the hospitalization of the Cameroonian leader in a Geneva clinic, in reaction to press articles.
This absence of unprecedented length has relaunched the debate on the inertia of Cameroonian power and sparked strong criticism from the opposition, which denounced an “institutional vacuum” and a country on “automatic pilot”, while the appointment of a new government and a vice-president have been awaited for several months.
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These repeated absences for more than twenty years continue to fuel the frustration of many Cameroonians, while the re-election of Paul Biya to an eighth term, in October 2025, gave rise to bloodily suppressed demonstrations – the government having recognized “several dozen” of deaths, without providing an exact toll.
With AFP
