The electricity was cut in the court in Ziguinchor, the main city of Casamance, when the news broke on the evening of Thursday, October 12. By lighting himself with the lamp of his mobile phone, the judge announced that he was canceling the deletion from the electoral lists of the opponent Ousmane Sonko, also mayor of this town in southern Senegal, and ordered the competent services of the State to restore it there.
The leader of the African Patriots of Senegal for Work, Ethics and Fraternity (Pastef), a party dissolved on July 31, was removed from the electoral register after being sentenced to two years in prison for “corruption of youth” in a case where he was accused of rape. A decision that his camp has always contested.
On September 29, Pastef MP Ayib Daffé was unable to collect from the General Directorate of Elections (DGE) the sponsorship forms, essential to garner the necessary support for Ousmane Sonko’s candidacy in the presidential election. of February 2024 is validated. A few days later, on October 6, the Supreme Court also rejected the request of the opponent’s lawyers, who requested that he be recognized as having the right to recover these sponsorship forms.
” Relief “
“This time, it’s a fine judgment which shows that there are free and independent judges on whom we can count to breathe new life into democracy,” comments one of Ousmane Sonko’s lawyers, Bamba Cissé, convinced that he will be able to participate in the next presidential election. “He is eligible again and his representative will soon return to the DGE to collect his sponsorship forms,” adds Joseph Etienne Ndione, another lawyer, who specifies that the State must first execute and implement this court decision. .
Very quickly, the judge’s decision spread throughout Ziguinchor. Crowds of sympathizers came out into the city’s main streets until late at night and converged on the house of Ousmane Sonko, who has been imprisoned in Dakar since the end of July in another case in which he is charged, among other things, with “call for insurrection.” “It was a relief, we have the feeling that the right has been said,” explains Bassirou Coly, youth manager at Pastef in Ziguinchor. Thousands of people wanted to show their support. This is a good sign for the future, the people are behind him. »
However, on the government side, the interpretation of this court decision is more mixed. “For the moment, Ousmane Sonko cannot be reinstated in the electoral lists”, retorted, in a press release, the judicial agent of the State, who denounced a hearing which “was held in conditions unworthy of ‘a fair trial’.
The session, which lasted thirteen hours, took place in an electric atmosphere. The day began with tear gas being fired to disperse the sympathizers who came en masse to support Ousmane Sonko near the court. “We were denied access, there were a few scuffles,” says Seydou Mandiang, deputy coordinator of Pastef in the Casamance capital.
“Rush”
Inside the courtroom, Me Cissé laments the “painful conditions”. “The state judicial agent wanted to put a lot of pressure on the judge by saying that he had family ties with a deputy mayor of Ziguinchor, also a member of Pastef… As if families were politically uniform! He therefore filed a request for recusal in the evening while the lawyers were pleading,” says the lawyer, for whom these arguments are not grounds for recusal. He denounces the non-compliance with the procedure.
“The judge is the brother of the sixteenth deputy mayor, an activist of the ex-Pastef. He should have left the file to another magistrate, justifies Adama Fall, state lawyer. And after thirteen hours of hearing and the pleadings of 20 lawyers, we were surprised to see that the president gave his decision in a hurry, in five minutes. » State lawyers declared “not to be satisfied with the judgment” and announced an appeal to the Supreme Court. “For the moment, Ousmane Sonko cannot be reinstated in the electoral lists,” the state representative said in a statement at the hearing.