Tension has risen further in Senegal. On the night of Monday February 5 to Tuesday February 6, the Assembly voted, in an electric atmosphere, a bill aimed at postponing the presidential election until December 15, 2024. A decision which plunges this country, considered an island of stability in West Africa, in the unknown and raises fears of a boiling point.
In a speech to the nation, Senegalese President Macky Sall announced a few days earlier that he was repealing the decree which convened the electoral body on February 25. Then the Senegalese learned on Monday that their head of state would remain in office until the installation of his successor, as decided by another provision of the law ratified by the Senegalese elected officials present during the vote.
Some of them, opposition parliamentarians, were in fact evacuated from the democratic enclosure by the gendarmes. Massed around the platform, these elected officials physically obstructed the vote. The text was adopted without them and met with only one vote against. Despite hours of quibbling, there was no debate on the merits.
For the presidential camp, the decision to postpone the presidential election is the only way to protect the credibility of the election. Believing that Senegal cannot "afford a new crisis" after the episodes of violence in March 2021 and June 2023, President Macky Sall announced on Saturday the establishment of a "national dialogue" for "a free, transparent election and inclusive", reaffirming his commitment not to run for office.
The postponement of the vote aims to "avoid institutional instability and serious political unrest", and to lead to "a complete resumption of the electoral process", deputies in the preparatory committee indicated in a report on Monday. This postponement of more than six months makes it possible to take into account the "realities of the country", in particular the difficulty of holding an electoral campaign in the middle of the rainy season, between July and November, or even the collision with major religious festivals, underlines the report.
The opposition, for its part, criticizes a political maneuver allowing the president to retain power.
The law passed on Monday by Parliament must now be validated by the Senegalese Constitutional Council before being promulgated.
For its part, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) said on Tuesday it “encouraged” Senegal, a member country, to urgently restore the presidential calendar.
To better understand the consequences of these political reversals, France 24 interviewed Alioune Tine, independent United Nations expert on human rights, head of the Afrikajom Center think tank in Dakar.
France 24
: Is this political crisis unprecedented in Senegal
?
Alioune Tine
:
Since independence [1960], all successive presidents have respected the date for holding the presidential election. We have never had a postponement [apart from the two-month postponement decided in 1967 by Léopold Sédar Senghor to introduce the power of dissolution of the National Assembly by the President of the Republic, Editor's note]. The presidential election is something sacred. There is a real desire on the part of Macky Sall, at all costs, and by means which are totally unconstitutional, to extend his presidential mandate.
By voting on the bill which postpones the election to December 15, 2024, the National Assembly overturned a decision of the Constitutional Council [which had validated a list of twenty candidates]. This is extremely shocking, we didn't expect it. It was done with forceps. The law was adopted without debate. Opposition elected officials were quite simply kicked out of the National Assembly by the gendarmerie. And so, it is with the help of the gendarmerie and law enforcement that we are, little by little, establishing a form of authoritarianism that is completely new in Senegal. It is a shocking image that is not entirely different from military coups [like some countries in the region in recent years].
What will happen now
? What can the opposition do
? Is she able to mobilize
?
What the Senegalese experienced yesterday is mourning. We have witnessed the death of our democracy. We have opened an era of uncertainty and possible chaos. People here are sad and angry. There has been consternation since the National Assembly approved the postponement of the election. No Senegalese can bear what happened.
People are extremely shocked and are trying to organize, they are trying to mobilize. They have already started demonstrating since Sunday. As for the twenty candidates who had been accepted by the Constitutional Council, some decided to campaign as if the elections were going to take place. And they appealed to the Constitutional Council against this law, which is totally unconstitutional.
In your opinion, have we reached the point of no return
? Can Senegalese President Macky Sall turn back the clock
?
We don't know what will happen because people are organizing and resisting right now. I fear that there will be violence and that political tensions will lead to unforeseen effects. In any case, Macky Sall seems determined to follow through with his logic of postponement.
With AFP
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