30 Facts About Paul Biya

Paul Biya was born on Paul Barthelemy Biya'a bi Mvondo; 13 February 1933 and is the president of Cameroon since 6 November 1982.

Paul Biya is the second-longest-ruling president in Africa, the longest consecutively serving current non-royal national leader in the world and the oldest head of state in the world.

Paul Biya introduced 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.

Paul Biya's regime is supported by France, one of the former colonial powers in Cameroon, which supplies it with weapons and trains its military forces.

Paul Biya was born in the village of Mvomeka'a in what is the South Region of Cameroon.

Paul Biya studied at the Lycee General Leclerc, Yaounde, and in France at the Lycee Louis-le-Grand, Paris, going on to the Institut des hautes etudes d'Outre-Mer, where he graduated in 1961 with a higher education diploma in public law.

Paul Biya 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.

Ahidjo unexpectedly announced his resignation on 4 November 1982, and Paul Biya accordingly succeeded him as president of Cameroon on 6 November.

Paul Biya's father, who was a catechist, wanted him to join the clergy, but at the age of 16 while in Catholic school, he was expelled.

Paul Biya was brought into the CNU Central Committee and Political Bureau and was elected as the Vice-President of the CNU.

In November 1983, Paul Biya announced that the next presidential election would be held on 14 January 1984; it had been previously scheduled for 1985.

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 Paul Biya commuted their sentences to life in prison.

Paul 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.

Northern Muslims were the primary participants in this coup attempt, which was seen by many as an attempt to restore that group's supremacy; Paul Biya chose to emphasize national unity and did not focus blame on northern Muslims.

In 1985, the CNU was transformed into the Cameroon People's Democratic Movement, in Bamenda and Paul Biya was unlawfully elected as its president.

Paul Biya was re-elected as President of Cameroon on 24 April 1988.

Paul Biya initially took some steps to open up the regime, culminating in the decision to legalize opposition parties in 1990.

Paul Biya has been consistently re-elected as the National President of the RDPC; he was re-elected at the party's second extraordinary congress on 7 July 2001 and its third extraordinary congress on 21 July 2006.

Paul Biya won another seven-year term in the 11 October 2004 presidential election, officially taking 70.92 percent of the vote, although the opposition again alleged widespread fraud.

Paul Biya's opponents alleged wide-scale fraud in the election and procedural irregularities were noted by the French and US governments.

Paul Biya makes relatively few public appearances, and is sometimes characterized as aloof.

Under the constitution, Paul Biya has sweeping executive and legislative powers.

Paul Biya even has considerable authority over the judiciary; the courts can only review a law's constitutionality at his request.

Paul Biya is credited with a creative innovation in the world of phony elections.

Paul Biya regularly spends extended periods of time in Switzerland at the Hotel InterContinental Geneva where the former director Herbert Schott reportedly said he comes to work without being disturbed.

In 2009, Paul Biya was ranked 19th in Parade Magazine's Top 20 list of "The World's Worst Dictators".

Paul Biya was given a two-year prison term on charges of "insult to character" and organizing an "illegal demonstration" for attempting to hold a public reading.

Paul Biya was freed on 2 May 2011 when the London chapter of International PEN agreed to pay his fine in order that he might seek treatment for his worsening health condition.

On 14 November 2019, Cameroon's president, Paul Biya admitted in a Paris forum of trying to assimilate former British Southern Cameroons into the majority Francophone system, formerly East Cameroon State but failed, due to identity differences, thus triggering the Ambazonia War of independence in 2017.

Paul Biya became a naturalized citizen of France when he studied there, but he later relinquished his French citizenship when he returned to Cameroon to serve in government positions.