By Doh James Sonkey
The Constitutional Council has rejected all the 13 petitions filed in by political parties for the Senate election of March 12, 2023. By so doing, it confirmed the lists published last February 7, 2023 by the Electoral Board of ELECAM.
After examining the files last February 15, 2023, members of the Council headed by its President, Clement Atangana rejected the petitions for not complying with the laws governing elections in the country.
For instance, the petition against the Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement, CPDM party’s list in the North West region was rejected. The complainant was the Social Democratic Front, SDF Party candidate in the region, Senator Vanigansen Mochiggle. According to him, the CPDM list did not respect the sociological representation as stipulated in article 218 of the electoral code which states that “where several lists have the same average for the award of the last seat, the seat shall be awarded to the list having obtained the highest number of votes. Where there is a tie in the number of votes obtained, the seat shall be awarded to the eldest candidate”
However, the Council rejected the petition because it was submitted after the deadline. The law says that after the publication of the list by ELELCAM, parties have 48 hours to table the complaints to the Council. In this case, the deadline was February 9 after the publication of the list last February 7, 2023. SDF according to the Council did not respect that.
Also, some petitions tabled by the CPDM party against some political parties were rejected for lack of evidence.
The ruling Cameroon People’s Democratic Movement, CPDM Party alone has 10 out of the 22 lists and is the only political party running in all the ten regions. It is running alone in the South West and South regions.
The NUDP party of Bello Bouba Maigari is running in 4 regions, the SDF of Ni John Fru Ndi is running in only 2 regions; the North West and Adamawa regions.
New comers include the Cameroon Democratic Union, CDU and the Cameroon Party for National Reconciliation, CPNR etc.