2023-07-03 09:34:46
Opposition Ousmane Sonko in Dakar, March 14, 2023. JOHN WESSELS / AFP
The opponent Ousmane Sonko, sentenced a month ago to two years in prison, called on the Senegalese to “going out massively” the next few days, on the eve of a speech by President Macky Sall who must say whether he will be a candidate for a third presidential term in February 2024. “We must come out to confront the regime of Macky Sall and say that it will not be up to him to choose the candidates who will have to compete for the next presidential election”he said on Sunday evening July 2 during an intervention on social networks.
The conviction of the opponent in a sex scandal, which makes him ineligible as it stands, caused the most serious unrest in Senegal in early June, killing 16 people according to the authorities, 24 according to Amnesty International and 30 according to the opposition. Mr. Sonko has constantly shouted at the plot of power to exclude him from the presidential election of February 2024, which the power refutes. He is blocked by the security forces at his home in Dakar, ” held captive “ according to him, since May 28.
Read also: In Senegal, President Macky Sall or the art of suspense around the third term
President Macky Sall’s announcement, scheduled for 8 p.m. (local and GMT) on Monday July 3, is eagerly awaited in Senegal. The vagueness he maintained about his intentions in relation to the presidential election contributed to creating an explosive climate. Mr. Sall was elected in 2012, re-elected in 2019. He had the Constitution revised in 2016. It stipulates that “No one may serve more than two consecutive terms”. His supporters present him as their candidate in 2024, arguing that the revision has reset the counters to zero.
According to the opponent, if the president does not appear, it will be to better eliminate him politically and relaunch the judicial machine and ” it’s not acceptable “. If arrested and not released within two hours, “I call on all the Senegalese people to stand up as one man and come out massively and this time to put an end to this criminal regime”he says.
A “free and sovereign” choice
If the president shows up, “I believe that it is up to all the Senegalese people to stand up, to face him”did he declare. “If we have to fight a fight, it has to be final. I call for a national leap forward. The days and weeks ahead will be crucial.” et “difficult”, he added. He also called on the Senegalese to mobilize to demand the release of political detainees and to put an end as soon as possible to his “administrative detention”.
For the opponent, the consultation on the initiative of President Sall, which ended ten days ago, is nothing but a « deal » between the different political forces that competed to eliminate him from the presidential race.
Ce « dialogue national » put two opponents, Karim Wade and Khalifa Sall, on the track, whose political trajectory had been brutally interrupted by legal troubles and who had been deprived of the 2019 presidential election. The case of Mr. Sonko, sentenced on June 1 to two years in prison, was not addressed by the consultation.
Read also: In Senegal, President Macky Sall remains silent despite the violence
At the end of the work, President Macky Sall had promised to speak about his possible candidacy for the presidency of 2024 after the Muslim festival of Tabaski, which took place on Thursday, and which emptied the capital of a part of its inhabitants. He had previously argued that only political, not constitutional, factors would prevent him from running, and claimed that his choice would be “free and sovereign”.
On Saturday, in front of local elected officials who had made a petition to support him, he called on his political family for unity and to place “general interest” et “coalition interest” before any other consideration. “My fight and my greatest pride are really to lead you to victory and to pursue our economic policy for the benefit of our populations”he said, noting that the roadmap to make Senegal an emerging country in 2035 was already “marked”.
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