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Parliament: Has Cavaye’s “illness’ stalled election of Permanent Bureau?
Parliament: Has Cavaye’s “illness’ stalled election of Permanent Bureau?
Going by the standing orders of the two houses of parliament, the National Assembly and the Senate, a Permanent Bureau of each of the legislative houses is supposed to be put in place at the beginning of a legislative period and the first ordinary session of each legislative year which usually begins in March.
Article 15 of the standing orders of the National Assembly states that at the beginning of a legislative period and first ordinary session of the legislative year, a permanent bureau is elected before any deliberations could take place.
After the statutory session of the National Assembly which closed on the 17th of February, 2020, following the February 9 legislative elections, both Cavaye Yeguie Djibril and Marcel Niat Njifenji, President of the National Assembly and the Senate respectively, convened the first ordinary session of parliament for the year on Friday 20, February, 2020.
But since the opening of the session last Friday, Cameroonians have continued to wait in anxiety over the constitution of the new bureau of both houses of parliament.
Beside his advanced age, the President of the Senate, Marcel Niat Njifenji is devastated by illness and Cameroonians anticipate his replacement at the helm of the upper house of parliament.
In the lower house, the octogenarian and longest serving member of parliament in Africa, Cavaye Yeguie Djibil, is poised to retain the top job of Speaker of the National Assembly despite his ill health. Cavaye is also in his 80s and has been in parliament since 1970, serving for 28 years as speaker of the house.
Cavaye who recently spent over a month in France due to ill health and staggered home on the 14th of February against medics’ advice to attend the ceremony at the National Assembly where attributes were accorded newly elected members of parliament on Monday the 16th of February is still frail and unable to properly carry on with his functions as Speaker of the National Assembly. Besides his age and illhealth, the rumour mill has it that Cavaye contracted the deadly coronavirus in France while in hospital in Paris.
The House Speaker returned to the country on Saturday February 14 and defied the instructions of the minister of public health, Manaouda Malachie, and that of external relations minister, Mbella Mbella, to be quarantined for 14 days.
After the statutory session and the election of the bureau, nothing has been said or heard about Cavaye or his health status. Apart from photographs that emerged on social media, where Cavaye shared pleasantries with labour and social security minister, Gregoire Owona who doubles as CPDM scribe, nothing is known about him.
Yaounde is awash with rumour that Cavaye contracted the deadly COVID-19 in France reason why he has been put in self-isolation to prevent him from contaminating other MPs. The rumour is further given credence considering that both his cabinet and the general secretariat of the National Assembly have remained mute over his health situation.
It should be recalled that during the attributes award ceremony, several personalities avoided and sidelined Cavaye when he approached them to greet.
A young female MP (names withheld) embarrassed Cavaye in front of TV cameras when the House Speaker stretched his hand to greet and the MP turned down the offer.
Pundits hold that the proceedings of parliament cannot continue because it feared that Cavaye will contaminate the MPs and other personalities with the deadly coronavirus.
When The Horizon visited Hotel de Deputes where a majority of the MPs are lodged, your correspondent noticed that the lobby, the bar and the restaurants were all deserted. When questioned, a newly elected MP from the Littoral who elected not to be named said they were all in their rooms because they were scared of the deadly virus.