This is the first time since 1963 that a presidential election by direct universal suffrage has been postponed in Senegal. During a speech to the nation, the Senegalese head of state, Macky Sall, announced on Saturday February 3 the indefinite postponement of the presidential election on February 25. An announcement that comes just hours before the opening of the electoral campaign.
“I signed the decree […] repealing [the one] convoking the electoral body” on February 25, he announced, after the establishment of a parliamentary commission investigating two judges of the Constitutional Council whose The integrity of the electoral process is contested.
The Constitutional Council, which validated a list of twenty candidates for the presidential election, had on the other hand excluded dozens of contenders, including two opposition leaders, the anti-system candidate Ousmane Sonko and Karim Wade, minister and son of the former -president Abdoulaye Wade (2000-2012). The National Assembly approved on Wednesday, after tumultuous debates, the formation of a commission of inquiry into the process.
A large number of members of the presidential camp had voted for. This support had caused trouble, with opponents of the outgoing president fearing a plan to postpone the presidential election because the government feared losing it.
Macky Sall promises not to run again
The president, Macky Sall, elected in 2012 for seven years and re-elected in 2019 for five years, announced in July that he was not a candidate. He reaffirmed on Saturday that he would not run for president. “I will initiate an open national dialogue, in order to create the conditions for a free, transparent and inclusive election,” Mr. Sall said in his speech, without giving a date.
The former ruling party and its rejected candidate, Karim Wade, announced that they had submitted to the National Assembly on Friday “a bill relating to the postponement” of the presidential election on February 25. “Our parliamentary initiative is motivated by the numerous incidents and protests which distorted the electoral process, highlighting serious dysfunctions” and “even more so with the elimination of candidates,” the Senegalese Democratic Party (PDS) said in a statement. , who leads a parliamentary group made up of 27 deputies, out of the 165 in the National Assembly.
