In Senegal, opposition candidate Bassirou Diomaye Faye was elected president with a surprisingly clear majority. Government candidate and former Prime Minister Amadou Ba (62) congratulated Faye on her victory on Monday, even before the official preliminary election results were published on Sunday.
For the first time in the history of the West African country, a new president was elected in the first round of voting. Just a few hours after the polls closed on Sunday evening, the count showed a clear lead for 44-year-old Faye.
Trendsetting ballot paper
The election to succeed Macky Sall, who has been in power since 2012, was seen as a milestone for the country of about 18 million people. Senegal is one of Africa’s most stable democracies and, unlike other countries in the region, has not experienced a coup or military coup since its independence from France in 1960. Sall has been praised for his successes in the country’s economic development, where oil and gas production is expected to begin this year. However, human rights activists criticize the restrictions on political freedoms during his time in office.
Faye ran to the camp of opposition leader Ousmane Sonko and his dissolved African Patriots of Senegal for Work, Ethics and Fraternity (Pastef) party. Sonko, who was particularly revered among young Senegalese as a critic of the elites and as a fighter against corruption, was not allowed to run for office because he had been convicted in a defamation trial.
Unknown candidate as plan B
Faye, Sonko’s closest confidant and ex-secretary general of the party, who was completely unknown until a few months ago, was nominated as Plan B. The tax official was only released from prison along with Sonko ten days before the elections on charges of an amnesty law, where he has been held since April last year on charges of defamation and insulting a judge, because he criticized the judiciary in the trial against Sonko in a Facebook post. During the election campaign, Faye campaigned with a broom to cleanse Senegal of corruption and bad governance.
A week-long political crisis
There was a week-long political crisis before the elections. Although Sall had decided not to run for a controversial third term under political pressure, he surprisingly canceled the February 3 presidential election, scheduled for February 25, due to disagreements over the endorsement of the candidates. After protests that left four dead and weeks of interinstitutional tug-of-war, the elections ultimately took place about a month late. More than 7.3 million voters were registered. The official results are expected later this week.
Source: Krone
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