Prayers for President Biya Postponed After Alleged Backlash from Presidency

An interreligious service that was scheduled for October 17 to pray for President Paul Biya has been postponed after it was reportedly opposed by the Presidency of the Republic.

The event’s organiser, Henry Ayebe Ayissi, who is President of the Collective of Former Students of Catholic Seminaries of Cameroon (CASEMCA), said the prayers would be re-organized after President Biya returns to the country.

The President has been abroad for over 40 days now, one of the longest times he has stayed out of the country since he took power 41 years ago.

The government says he is in Geneva, Switzerland, on a private stay.

Henry Ayebe Ayissi, who is also Cameroon’s Minister of State Property and Land Tenure, took the initiative to organise prayers for Biya after widespread speculations that he was very sick or may have died.

The interreligious ecumenical service, meant to pray for President Biya and for peace in Cameroon, was supposed to hold Thursday, October 17, 2024, at the Palais Polyvalent des Sports in Yaoundé.

But another release from the organiser says the event “is postponed to a later date”, which will be “determined after the return to the national territory” of President Paul Biya.

President Biya Still Absent

At the moment, President Biya has remained publicly invisible for more than 35 days now, and despite the government’s dismissal of rumors about his health, Cameroonians have remained concerned.

But Minister Ayebe Ayissi’s ecumenical service for the President appears not to have resonated with fellow members of government.

Popular Cameronian whistle blower and blogger, Paul Chouta, claimed that the Presidency rejected the prayer service and ordered that it should be called off.

The reason might have been that a government Minister organizing prayers for President Biya at this time could just reinforce rumors that something is wrong with the President.

This would discredit previous statements by the Director of Civil Cabinet and the Minister of Communication in which they stated that Biya was doing very well.

This is, however, not the first time general prayers are being organized for the Paul Biya, a former seminarian of the Minor Seminary in Akono.

In his release postponing the prayer service, Henry Ayebe Ayissi was conscious to indicate that it wasn’t the first time they were organising prayers for Biya.

A similar ecumenical service for the president last held in 2022.