Bello Bouba Maigari is counting on being offered the presidency as a compromise to wedge off Issa Tchiroma Bakary, if the latter wins. “Bello is hoping to be Tshisekedied and Tchiroma Fayulued”, said an authoritative source associated to Bello’s campaign, in a good position to be believed.

The source was referring to the outcome of the presidential election of December 2018 in the Democratic Republic of Congo where it emerged that Martin Fayulu, the opposition consensual candidate backed by disqualified credible candidates including Jean Pierre Bemba and Moise Katumbi, was the actual winner of the polls but Felix Tshisekedi, who came second by verified election results, was declared the winner because outgoing president, Joseph Kabila was uncomfortable about handing power to a radical and authentic opposition leader.

According to a TV5Monde (Information.TV5Monde.Com) report on 15 January 2019, titled “Elections en RDC : Martin Fayulu est-il le vrai vainqueur ?”, three authoritative international news outlets, The Financial Times, RFI and TV5Monde in collaboration with a DRC study group, obtained documents that attested to the fact that both the Congolese electoral commission and the Congolese Episcopal Conference (Bishops) have documented proof that Fayulu won the election.

Speaking to Cameroon Intelligence Report senior correspondent and a couple of other journalists in Yaoundé on 7 October, our source Bello was not going to agree to a coalition with Tchiroma because of the Tshisekedi/Fayulu calculation which he believes the regime in Yaoundé would resort to if it became evident they would lose the 12 October presidential election.

Our source, who is familiar with Cameroon’s early multiparty politics and connected at very high level in Cameroon and across Africa and the world, said he has been having conversations with well-placed personalities in Yaoundé and drew anecdotes from Cameroon’s 1992 post-election deadlock when certain credible national and international organizations said opposition SDF candidate, John Fru Ndi, defeated incumbent Paul Biya though the Supreme Court declared Biya as the winner.

“I’m aware of a conversation between then Minister of Territorial Administration, Gilbert Andze Tsoungui and Barrister Ben Muna where Tsoungui told Muna, ‘Do you think we can hand this country to a book seller who speaks neither French nor English? If it were you, we’d be sure the country would be in safer hands and we would tell President Biya that he has lost and there is nothing we can do’,” said our source.

Fru Ndi was famously referred to at the time as an illiterate book seller because he campaigned around the country in Pidgin English, widely understood around the country as a lingua franca, in a calculated quest to be understood by all and sundry.

Ben Muna was a former Cameroon Bar Council chairman (Batonnier), bilingual and son of former National Assembly speaker, Solomon Tandeng Muna. Though a fiery critic of the regime from his Bar position, breaking the government’s initial resistance to multiparty politics and later a topnotch member of the opposition SDF, he was considered within certain circles as someone the regime could accommodate, at the worst.

“The people in Yaoundé are more comfortable with Bello as a prince of the system from Ahidjo’s time,” said our source. “They are not comfortable with Tchiroma. They may tamper with the results and place Tchiroma third. But what I see in the crowds turning out for Tchiroma is an uprising or possibly worse if certain institutions decide to step in as has been seen in other places.”

From an early semblance of parity perceived from turnouts at rallies by Bello and Tchiroma ahead of the launch of official campaigns, Tchiroma clearly emerged as the frontrunner throughout the 15-day campaign, pulling unprecedented huge and energized crowds of supporters all over the country.

Even in Garoua, turnout at Bello’s rallies regressed to near nothing. “Bello’s rallies looked like the installation of subsection excos,” said a journalist covering both Bello and Tchiroma campaigns.

By Franklin Sone Bayen on special assignment in Garoua