National Assembly (Cameroon)
Lower house of the Parliament of Cameroon
The National Assembly (French: Assemblée Nationale) is the lower house of the Parliament of Cameroon. It has 180 members, elected for five-year terms in 49 single and multi-seat constituencies. Together with the Senate, it constitutes the legislative arm of government.
Although multiparty elections have been held since 1992, the Cameroon People's Democratic Movement (RDPC), the ruling party since independence, has always retained control of the National Assembly. The Cameroonian political system invests overwhelming power in the hands of the President of the Republic, Paul Biya, and the RDPC exists essentially to support Biya and his policies. As a result, for most of Cameroon's history since independence, the National Assembly has done little more than approve the President's policies.
From 1992 to 1997, the RDPC relied on alliances with two smaller parties to secure a parliamentary majority. This has been the only period since independence that saw any meaningful opposition to presidential decisions. Beginning in 1997, the RDPC has won an outright majority in each election; its majorities have consistently improved as the opposition has weakened. Prior to 2013 and the creation of the Senate, the National Assembly was a unicameral chamber.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “National Assembly (Cameroon)” as lower house of the Parliament of Cameroon. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the history & society register because the source frames it as lower house of the Parliament of Cameroon. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1634099. VIAF identifies the subject as 135686614. The Library of Congress control number is n77013456. Authority coordinates are 3.857, 11.509. 2 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1992, 1997 and 2013.
Later summaries often reconcile disputed chronology or motive more neatly than the contemporary record permits. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “National Assembly (Cameroon)”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow National Assembly (Cameroon) primary sources, National Assembly (Cameroon) archive and National research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “National Assembly (Cameroon)”?
- What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
- Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “National Assembly (Cameroon)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.