The critics of democracy should face the facts, through the fine example given by Senegal on February 24, that if the democratic rules of the game are truly respected, there is no better system than democracy.
This country is not at its first attempt.
The Senegalese did nothing special than go to the polls to express their choice through their ballot papers. And since the “system” works well, the voting results clearly reflect the will of the voters
There was no room for dissent. Just a few hours after the polling stations closed, the trends were almost known to everyone, including the candidates themselves. Thanks to the remarkable contribution of the media.
This is what democracy is all about. Even if once again, democracy is not just about elections.
Speeches such as “we want a democracy that takes into account our societal values, our cultural realities and not an imported democracy” are very often populist. They sometimes hide the desire to deceive the people. Moreover, each time we make this speech, at the end we are produced with a constitution which uses the same rules and renews almost the same institutions.
In 2020, one of the key arguments brandished by the promoters of the very controversial constitutional change project was the alleged discrepancy of the 2010 constitution in relation to our “realities”. Some even dared to describe this text as a “rag”, a “rag”.
But the text which was subsequently proposed to us and which had been “adopted” was almost a carbon copy of that of 2010.
The truth is that there are universal rules in terms of democracy. Either we believe in them and we undertake to respect them even against ourselves, or we do not believe in them, and in this case we trample them under foot.
Mr. Mohamed Traoré
2024-03-26 14:24:54