Background and career
Paul Barthélemy Biya (né Biya'a bi Mvondo, born 13 February 1933) is a Cameroonian politician who has been serving as the second president of Cameroon since 1982. He was previously the fifth prime minister under President Ahmadou Ahidjo from 1975 to 1982. Widely considered to be a dictator, Biya is the second-longest-ruling president in Africa (after Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo in Equatorial Guinea) and the longest consecutively serving current non-royal national leader in the world; at the age of 93, he is also the oldest current head of state in the world. A native of Cameroon’s south, Biya rose rapidly as a bureaucrat under President Ahmadou Ahidjo in the 1960s, as Secretary-General of the Presidency from 1968 to 1975 and then as prime minister. He succeeded Ahidjo as president upon the latter's surprise resignation in 1982 and consolidated power after an attempted coup in 1984, eliminating his major rivals. Biya introduced the political reforms within the context of a one-party system in the 1980s, later accepting the introduction of multiparty politics in the early 1990s under serious pressure. He nevertheless leads an authoritarian regime in Cameroon, where his Cameroon People's Democratic Movement continues to rule the country as a de facto one-party state with little to no opposition. He won the contentious 1992 presidential election with 40% of the plurality, single-ballot vote and was re-elected by large margins in 1997, 2004, 2011, 2018, and 2025. Opposition politicians and Western governments have alleged voting irregularities and fraud on each of these occasions. It is widely believed that the 1992 election was manipulated in his favor, and domestic and international observers have documented evidence of systemic electoral fraud in parliamentary and presidential elections under his administration.
Ethnically Beti, Paul Biya was born in the village of Mvomeka'a in what is now the South Region of Cameroon. He studied at the Lycée General Leclerc, Yaoundé, and in France at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, Paris, going on to the Institut des hautes études d'Outre-Mer, where he graduated in 1961 with a higher education diploma in public law.
As a Chargé de Mission in post-independence 1960s Cameroon, Biya rose to prominence under President Ahmadou Ahidjo. After becoming director of the Cabinet of the minister of national education in January 1964 and secretary-general of the ministry of national education in July 1965, he was named director of the civil cabinet of the president in December 1967 and secretary-general of the presidency (while remaining director of the civil cabinet) in January 1968. He gained the rank of minister in August 1968 and the rank of minister of state in June 1970, while remaining secretary-general of the presidency.
Following the creation of a unitary state in 1972, Biya was appointed prime minister by President Ahidjo on 30 June 1975. Because Biya is a Catholic from the southern region of Cameroon, it was considered surprising that he was chosen by Ahidjo, a Muslim from the north, as his successor. Biya's father, who was a catechist, wanted him to join the clergy, but at the age of 16 he was expelled from Catholic school. In June 1979, a new law designated the prime minister as the president's constitutional successor, which entailed Biya as the legal successor to Ahidjo should the presidency become vacant intra-term. Ahidjo announced his resignation on 4 November 1982 and Biya became president two days later on 6 November.
After Biya became president, Ahidjo initially remained head of the ruling Cameroon National Union (CNU/ UNC). Biya was brought into the CNU Central Committee and Political Bureau and was elected as the vice-president of the CNU. On 11 December 1982, he was placed in charge of managing party affairs in Ahidjo's absence. During the first months after Biya's succession, he continued to show loyalty to Ahidjo, and Ahidjo continued to show support for Biya, but in 1983, a deep rift developed between the two. Ahidjo went into exile in France, and from there, he publicly accused Biya of abuse of power and paranoia about plots against him. After Ahidjo resigned as CNU leader, Biya took the helm of the party at an "extraordinary session" of the CNU party held on 14 September 1983.
In November 1983, Biya announced that the next presidential election would be held on 14 January 1984; it had been previously scheduled for 1985. He was the sole candidate in this election and won 99.98% of the vote. In February 1984, Ahidjo was put on trial in absentia for alleged involvement in a 1983 coup plot, along with two others; they were sentenced to death, although Biya commuted their sentences to life in prison. Biya survived a military coup attempt on 6 April 1984, following his decision on the previous day to disband the Republican Guard and disperse its members across the military. Estimates of the death toll ranged from 71 (according to the government) to about 1,000. Northern Muslims were the primary participants in this coup attempt, which was seen by many as an attempt to restore that group's supremacy. Biya, however, chose to emphasize national unity and did not focus blame on northern Muslims. Ahidjo was widely believed to have orchestrated the coup attempt, and Biya is thought to have learned of the plot in advance and to have disbanded the Republican Guard in response, forcing the coup plotters to act earlier than they had planned, which may have been a crucial factor in the coup's failure.Under his rule, the country adopted a structural adjustment plan submitted to it by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, which involved privatization, opening up to competition, and reducing social spending. Civil servants' salaries were reduced by 60%, and the informal sector increased very significantly. In 1985, the CNU was transformed into the Cameroon People's Democratic Movement, in Bamenda and Biya was unlawfully elected as its president. He was also re-elected as President of Cameroon on 24 April 1988.
