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Colombian President Gustavo Petro said Tuesday he had escaped an assassination attempt hours earlier, after months of warnings about an alleged plot by drug traffickers to target him.
On Monday night, Petro’s helicopter was unable to land at his destination on the Caribbean coast because of fears that unspecified people “were going to shoot” at it, he said.
“We headed out to open sea for four hours and I arrived somewhere we weren’t supposed to go, escaping from being killed,” Petro said in a cabinet meeting that was broadcast live.
Petro’s claim came amid a surge in violence months ahead of presidential elections, in a country marred by decades of conflict between guerrilla and other armed groups.
Petro, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a second term, has claimed that a drug-trafficking cabal has had its sights set on ending his life ever since assuming office in August 2022.
The alleged plot involves narco bosses and war lords such as Ivan Mordisco, who commands the largest group of dissidents who broke with the FARC guerrilla army after it agreed to disarm under a 2016 peace agreement.
Colombia has a long list of leftist leaders, including presidential candidates, assassinated over the years.
Petro, the South American country’s first-ever leftist president, had reported another alleged attempt on his life in 2024.
Read Also: Senate Reverses Course, Permits E-transmission Of Votes
Cameroon’s President Paul Biya announced on Tuesday evening a “slight readjustment” of the timing of legislative and municipal elections that were expected at the start of February.
Originally scheduled for 2025, the elections had already been postponed once until early 2026. No new date was set.
In his televised address on the occasion of the 60th Youth Day, a rare public appearance by the nearly 93-year-old head of state, Biya justified the postponement by citing “certain compelling constraints”, while assuring that “the relevant provisions of the laws, and particularly the Constitution, would be respected”.
He also promised to form a new government, having announced its dissolution in his annual speech on New Year’s Eve.
In his speech, he acknowledged the difficulty many young Cameroonians have in finding work, but also called on them to avoid “delinquency, alcohol abuse drug use, and excessive use of social media”.
Cameroon’s Youth Day is traditionally one of the few times the president addresses the nation directly.
Biya, the world’s oldest head of state, has been in power since 1982 and was re-elected in October to an eighth term, leading to protests that were violently suppressed.
There were deadly protests in several parts of Cameroon days after the October 19 vote, followed by a three-day lockdown this week after former minister and key contender Issa Tchiroma claimed victory and alleged vote tampering.
The government has confirmed that at least five people were killed during the protests, although the opposition and civil society groups claim the figures are much higher.
The incumbent, Africa’s second-longest serving leader, took the oath of office during a session of Parliament in what residents describe as the heavily militarised and partially deserted capital, Yaounde.
Priscilla Ayimboh, a 40-year-old seamstress in Yaounde, does not see a new term for Biya as likely to change anything.
“I’m tired of Biya’s rule and I no longer care whatever he does. It’s a pity. I wonder what will become of Cameroon in the next seven years: there are no roads, water, and jobs,” she said.
Munjah Vitalis Fagha, a senior politics lecturer at Cameroon’s University of Buea, told The Associated Press news agency that Biya’s inauguration was “taking place in a tense yet controlled political atmosphere, marked by deep divisions between the ruling elite and a growingly disillusioned populace”.
Cameroon’s top court on October 27 declared Biya the winner of the election, with 53.66 percent of the vote, ahead of his ally-turned-challenger, Tchiroma, who secured 35.19 percent.
Tchiroma insists Biya was awarded a “fraudulent” victory in the election.
“The will of the Cameroonian people was trampled that day, our sovereignty stolen in broad daylight,” Tchiroma wrote on Wednesday night. “This is not democracy, it is electoral theft, a constitutional coup as blatant as it is shameful.”
Biya came to power in 1982 following the resignation of Cameroon’s first president and has ruled since, following a 2008 constitutional amendment that abolished term limits. His health has been a topic of speculation as he spends most of his time in Europe, leaving governance to key party officials and family members.
He has led Cameroon longer than most of its citizens have been alive – more than 70 percent of the country’s almost 30 million population is below the age of 35. If he serves his entire term, Biya will leave office nearly 100 years old.
The results of his nearly half-century in power have been mixed; armed rebellions in the north and the west of the country, along with a stagnant economy, have left many young people disillusioned with the leader.
In other news, Nigeria’s Senate reversed itself Tuesday on a controversial decision that had sparked nationwide protests, voting to permit electronic transmission of election results after initially rejecting the provision last week, though the revised amendment stops short of making the technology mandatory and includes fallback provisions that critics say preserve loopholes for manipulation.
