KAMPALA, UGANDA – October 31, 2025 – The African Union Commission (AUC) has faced fierce condemnation from a prominent civil society group following its decision to congratulate Cameroonian President Paul Biya on his recent election victory. The Pan-African Pyramid (PAP), a continental movement based in Kampala, issued a blistering press statement today, accusing the AUC of “hypocrisy and complicity in endorsing dictatorship.”
The PAP’s statement comes days after Cameroon’s Constitutional Council declared the 92-year-old Biya, the world’s oldest serving head of state, the winner of the October 12 presidential poll, extending his 43-year rule.
According to the official results announced earlier this week, President Biya secured 53.66 per cent of the vote. However, this count has been vehemently rejected by the main opposition challenger, former minister Issa Tchiroma Bakary, who claims he won the election outright. The announcement has triggered waves of violent protests across major cities, including the economic capital Douala, leading to multiple reported deaths and arrests.
‘A Rubber Stamp for Dictators’
The Pan-African Pyramid denounced the electoral process itself, stating it was “marred by intimidation, violence, arrests of opposition members, and blatant irregularities,” rendering it neither free, fair, nor credible.
The group reserved its harshest criticism for the AUC, calling its congratulatory message “shameful and insulting to the collective conscience of the African people.”
”Yet, as has become customary, the AU Commission rushed to rubber-stamp the results, effectively legitimizing oppression and silencing the voices of millions who yearn for change,” the statement read. “The AU Commission, under H.E. Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, has lost the moral authority to speak on behalf of the African people… Its endorsement of tyranny makes it complicit in the destruction of the very ideals of Pan-Africanism.”
Demand for Dissolution
The organization, led by Founding Speaker Andrew Irumba Katusabe, challenged the very existence of the continental body if it cannot protect democratic principles.
”If the African Union cannot stand up to defend the sovereignty and dignity of African citizens, if it cannot speak truth to power when leaders go astray, then it has no moral justification to continue collecting taxpayers’ money from African governments,” the PAP declared.
The group concluded with a sharp ultimatum, calling upon the AUC to “either reclaim its founding vision and stand up to the challenge of African liberation, or respectfully dissolve itself,” arguing that Africa deserves “a union of conscience, not of convenience; a leadership of integrity, not of hypocrisy.”
