PAL’s President Blames Doctors’ Incompetence for Anicet Ekane’s Death

By MMI

The president of the Liberal Alliance Party, Celestine Bidzigui, in a eulogy to Anicet Ekane, who died in detention, has blamed doctors for incompetence and cowardice, as the late politician’s family accuses authorities of depriving him of healthcare.

To Bidzigui, doctors are to be blamed because they did not stand their ground that Anicet Ekane’s health situation required urgent treatment in a different hospital. 

The Cameroon government said the president of the MANIDEM party died at the Gendarmerie hospital while being detained in Yaoundé.

The PAL president expressed regret at Ekane’s death, although he never issued any statement condemning his arbitrary and unexplained detention of Anicet Ekane.

“This valiant defender of democracy, whose legacy some wrenched individuals seek to appropriate, fell without betraying his principles, facing death and welcoming it as an invitation to share the fate of the heroes and martyrs whose lives served as his model,” said Celestine Bidzigui.

“Anicet Ekane succumbed to personal incompetence and cowardice…. Incompetence and cowardice of doctors who should have firmly stated that his state of health was incompatible with hospitalization in a facility with secondary technical capabilities,” he added.

Attending Biya’s Inauguration While Ekane is Unjustly Detained

Celestine Bidzigui praised Anicet Ekane for never compromising his values while alive, recalling how they started in 1991 fighting for democracy and political freedom in Cameroon as opposition leaders.

However, while Ekane remained part of the opposition until his death, Celestine Bidzigui had dangled. 

Prior to the declaration of the winner of the October 12 presidential election, Ekane was arrested in Douala and transferred to Yaounde.

While he was there battling for his life at the State Secretariat of Defense, Bidzigui was among the first politicians to congratulate Paul Biya for being reelected, after the Constitutional Council pronounced the ageing leader winner on October 27.

On November 6, cameras captured Bidzigui with a broad smile as he entered the National Assembly to attend Paul Biya’s swearing-in.

These activities PAL’s president participated in were contradicted what Anicet Ekane died defending. 

Where Was Bidzigui?

Bidzigui’s party presented a candidate, Ateki Seta Caxton, for the October 12 election. But Ateki congratulated Issa Tchiroma Bakary for winning the election, as his party’s leader supported Biya.

Celestine Bidzigui used the party’s name to insult Ateki as an “opportunist.” 

When Anicet Ekane and some members of the Union for Change said Tchiroma had won the vote, Celestine Bidzigui remained silent, waiting for an opportunity to congratulate Biya, who is widely accused by the opposition of rigging the election.

Aside from just congratulating Biya, Bidzigui described him as the right man for the job.

Just a few months earlier, during PAL’s convention that endorsed Ateki, Mr. Celestine Bidzigui openly condemned the ruling CPDM party, describing Biya as old and unable to lead. He said the country had been ruined by the 43-year-old regime of Mr. Biya. 

Despite these utterances, many observers were surprised at how quickly he turned from his previous position and began applauding the Biya regime.