Police fired teargas to disperse hundreds of people in Cameroon who on Sunday defied protest bans to support opposition candidate Issa Tchiroma Bakary, who claims he won the recent presidential elections and who called on his supporters to march peacefully.

The Constitutional Council is due to announce results of the October 12 vote on Monday, and authorities have banned gatherings until then.

Most analysts expect Paul Biya, 92, to win an eighth term, in a system his critics say has been increasingly rigged during his 43 years in power.

Tchiroma says he won 54.8 percent of the vote. In his northern stronghold of Garoua activists carried Cameroonian flags and banners reading “Tchiroma 2025” and chanted “Goodbye Paul Biya, Tchiroma is coming”.

After about two hours, police fired tear gas to disperse the crowd.

For several days, dozens of supporters have gathered around the home of Tchiroma, who claimed in a video Sunday that military personnel had tried to take him away.

In the capital Yaounde, AFP reporters said the call to protest did not seem to have been followed amid a heavy police presence.

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In the southwestern coastal city of Douala, several dozen people gathered near the airport, defying the ban on demonstrations ordered by the department’s prefect, an AFP journalist observed.

Djeukam Tchameni, president of the Movement for Democracy and Interdependence in Cameroon (MDI), and Anicet Ekane, president of the African Movement for the New Independence of Cameroon (Manidem), were arrested at their homes in Douala on Friday, according to a coalition of parties that had nominated Tchiroma as the consensus opposition candidate.

Minister of Territorial Administration Paul Atanga Nji on Saturday said the protests “create the conditions for a security crisis” and contribute to “the implementation of an insurrectionist project”.

AFP