Cameroonian President Paul Biya announced a government change late Friday, creating a new ministry and appointing two officials from the nation’s Anglophone regions to top positions in an apparent bid to address a secessionist crisis in the central African nation.
Biya, 85, established a Ministry of Decentralization and Local Development and named Paul Atanga Nji, who hails from the restive Northwest region, as minister of territorial administration, according to a government statement read on state radio late Friday. Another Anglophone official, Pauline Nalova Lyonga Egbe, will lead the Ministry of Secondary Education, the statement said. Biya is Africa’s second-longest serving head of state.