In Senegal, Macky Sall's party is looking for a future after the failure of the presidential election

Can the Alliance for the Republic (APR) survive in the absence of Macky Sall, its founder in 2008? While since the defeat of March 14, the ex-president has flown to Marrakech, Amadou Ba, the one who, according to plans, was to succeed him, has not spoken since the recognition of his failure at the presidential election in Senegal.

Mute, the unfortunate candidate has however increased the number of meetings since his return to the country on May 13, after stays in Mecca, Dubai and Paris. “He meets his allies but also members of the opposition and former presidential candidates like Khalifa Sall, Idrissa Seck or Aliou Mamadou Dia. He is in the negotiations,” said one of his close collaborators.

At the end of these, will the former prime minister be the one who takes up the torch of the APR or will he form his own party? “Amadou Ba is the leader of the opposition with nearly 36% of the votes in his favor during the presidential election,” considers one of his close friends. According to the latter, the condition for remaining within the APR can only be achieved by granting Amadou Ba strong responsibilities or by his designation as head of the legislative list, in the event that the National Assembly, still dominated by Benno Bokk Yakaar (BBY) with 81 deputies out of 165, would be dissolved by the new president Bassirou Diomaye Faye.

Remobilize activists

Weakened by its defeat, divided around the personality of Amadou Ba and his ability to represent a successor, the former ruling party must today learn to become an opposition group, a new situation that it approaches with the fear of suffering the fate of his predecessors.

In Senegal, the Socialist Party (PS) of presidents Léopold Sedar Senghor and Abdou Diouf, and the Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS) of Abdoulaye Wade never regained their influence after the loss of power. The first managed to return to the political scene by being absorbed by the BBY coalition wanted by Macky Sall. The second has not presented a candidate in a presidential election since 2012.

To avoid such a fate, the APR began a “national tour” to remobilize its activists. In Kaffrine, at the beginning of May, the meeting even saw the remote participation of Macky Sall, from Marrakech. The next steps will be taken in the coming weeks in Sédhiou, Kolda, Ziguinchor, Kaolack, Fatick and Diourbel. In a press release, the national executive secretariat of the party indicated “to continue this dynamic of listening and exchange in order to carry out an objective and uncompromising evaluation of the results of the presidential election”.

“We are now in a strategy of reconquering power, we have an equation around remobilization, unity to consolidate and the imperative to heal fractures and wounds,” continues Seydou Gueye, spokesperson for the ‘APR.

“Only master on board”

Others, on the other hand, are more pessimistic about the place that the party will be able to maintain on the Senegalese political scene. “The party lacks structure, everyone is a senior officer. It would surprise me if some would agree to fall in line behind others. Apart from Macky Sall, we do not have a central national leader, he is the only master on board,” said a party executive. Still, the former president’s distance from Morocco could become a handicap for his party. Managed from Qatar by Karim Wade, the PDS demonstrated this.

Within the APR, a few forty-year-olds are today trying to create a new dynamic to revive the party. “We need a reorganization, a change of name, of our profiles, our postures and our political speeches otherwise we will disappear,” estimates a young executive who wishes to remain anonymous but for whom “the laudatory results and the cult of personality of the president are no longer enough to convince voters.” “By keeping the same political apparatus with the aging personnel of the old regime, we will appear as a backward-looking party that is not adapted to the concerns of the moment,” he says.

Beyond the APR, the issue also concerns the future of the Benno Bokk Yaakar coalition, an electoral machine which, until the presidential election, had remained undefeated. For the moment, only the Union for Democratic Renewal (URD), a party resulting from a split from the PS, has left the ship. But, behind the scenes, several say they do not want to side with BBY in the event of the next legislative elections.