The jubilation which surrounded Ousmane Sonko and Bassirou Diomaye Faye on Saturday March 16 in Ziguinchor (South) may have given some fright to their rivals for the presidential election in Senegal. Two days after their release thanks to the vote on an amnesty law, the two leaders of the African Patriots of Senegal for Work, Ethics and Fraternity (Pastef), a party dissolved in July 2023, were able to demonstrate their popularity during of the launch of their campaign for the March 24 vote in the capital of Casamance, where the main Senegalese opponent is the mayor. The name of Ousmane Sonko was on everyone’s lips. “Sonko we missed you! », “May God give victory to Sonko”, chanted their supporters as their procession passed.
However, it is not the number 1 of the ex-Pastef who will compete in the presidential election, but his second and prison comrade, Bassirou Diomaye Faye. Dressed in a white hooded sweater and a cap with the “Diomaye president” logo, he greeted the activists, perched on the roof of his vehicle, with the gestures of a candidate fully campaigning. An ambitious bet for this man who will celebrate his 44th birthday the day after the first round, barely released from 335 days of preventive detention, notably for “contempt of court” and “call to insurrection”, propelled into the spotlight by a political coup of destiny.
Co-founder of Pastef in 2014, the current secretary general of the party has always been the discreet right-hand man of Ousmane Sonko, excluded from the presidential race by the Constitutional Council after his conviction for defamation by the courts. The choice to make it “plan B” for the election was made official at the end of December. “I am a substitute candidate because it was our way of imposing our presence in this electoral contest,” admits the person concerned without false modesty.
Between the two forty-year-olds, both from the tax inspectorate, a rare intimacy has developed over the years. “Bassirou even nicknamed his son Ousmane in honor of their friendship. It’s a fraternal relationship,” confides Ousseynou Ly, member of the communications unit of the ex-Pastef. To “presidentialize” the image of this man in the shadows, the party executives play on the similarity of the paths of the two men and hammer home “Diomaye moy Sonko, Sonko moy Diomaye” (“Diomaye is Sonko, Sonko is is Diomaye”, in Wolof).
Discreet and calm
In 2014, at the age of 34, Bassirou Diomaye Faye, a former student of the National School of Administration (ENA), stood out during the meetings leading to the creation of Pastef, of which he would become one of the ideologists and designers of Ousmane Sonko’s program for his presidential candidacy in 2019. Masterstroke: for his first election, the leader of Pastef garners nearly 16% of the votes and ranks third.
But it was when the “Sweat Beauty” affair broke out in February 2021 that Bassirou Diomaye Faye gained momentum. After the arrest of Ousmane Sonko, accused of repeated rapes by a massage parlor employee, the ex-Pastef lost his charismatic leader. While several executives were arrested, Bassirou Diomaye Faye took over and became the party’s secretary general. “He infused his serenity and rigor into the party by channeling our rage. For him, you had to keep your cool to confront power. He is not a supporter of violent action,” maintains Ousseynou Ly.
In its strategy of conquest of power, the party is trying to unite the opposition for the local elections of 2022. “It is he who is at the heart of the negotiations with the allies, as at the time of the creation of the Yewwi Askan Wi coalition », Explains Amadou Ba (no connection with the former prime minister, candidate of power), his representative.
At the heart of the ex-Pastef machine, Mr. Diomaye Faye stands out in comparison to the party boss. If Ousmane Sonko appears verbose and eruptive, his second-in-command has made his discretion and calm his trademark. “It is both flexible when the argument presented follows a coherence, but it can be rigid if someone does not have solid arguments to support an idea. The debates are difficult,” testifies Makhtar Seck, member of the Pastef executive movement, led by Bassirou Diomaye Faye.
At the head of the tax agents’ union
Like Ousmane Sonko, his “double” became politicized during his time at the General Directorate of Taxes and Domains (DGID). This is where the two agents and other co-founders of the ex-Pastef like Birame Souleye Diop or Walyd Diouf Badian met.
They all went through the Union of Tax and Estate Agents (SAID) that Ousmane Sonko created in 2006 with Mame Boye Diao, whose real name is El Hadji Mamadou Diao. This former director of estates, close to President Macky Sall and candidate in the presidential election, does not hide his friendly relations with Ousmane Sonko. This is also where the ex-Pastef gang rubbed shoulders with Amadou Ba, current government candidate and former prime minister, then director of this administration.
During his time at the head of the union, Bassirou Diomaye Faye campaigned to facilitate access to property for tax and estate agents. “They had difficulty acquiring land because some people appropriated it and resold it to their detriment. The union worked to distribute them transparently to hundreds of agents and Bassirou Diomaye Faye had a lot of experience on this subject”, testifies Waly Diouf Badian, member of Ousmane Sonko’s cabinet and former hierarchical superior of Bassirou Diomaye Faye within the DGID. “He was respected and he followed up well, but he had no more impact on the union than his predecessors,” explains Mame Boye Diao.
As a symbol, it was at the exit of his tax and estates office, rue de Thiong in Dakar, that Bassirou Diomaye Faye was arrested on the evening of Friday April 14, 2023, then placed in police custody for “dissemination of false news, contempt of court and defamation of a body” after the publication of a post on social networks. He denounced the “trampling” of justice, then foreseeing a conviction generating the ineligibility of Ousmane Sonko in the case which pitted his leader against the Minister of Tourism Mame Mbaye Niang. To these charges were added along the way those of “call to insurrection” or “endangering state security” which prolonged his detention.
“Anti-system” and “pan-African”
Bassirou Diomaye Faye showed himself to be a perfect lieutenant, to the point of causing the same controversy as Ousmane Sonko. While Amadou Ba, the government candidate, described the tandem as a “danger” for Senegal, the two men are regularly described as “Salafists” by their detractors in a country shaped by Sufi brotherhood Islam. The subject is sensitive but their support kicks in.
“We do not want to get into religious, ethnic or identity issues. We refused to use the brotherhoods because, behind it, there is always a bargain to receive this or that support. We do not show proselytism to confirm the allegiance of this or that marabout,” explains Mr. Ba, the representative of Bassirou Diomaye Faye, who recalls that the Yewwi Askan Wi coalition won during the legislative elections of July 2022 in Touba and Tivaouane, strongholds of religious brotherhoods. The main person concerned promises not to touch “secularism which is enshrined in the Constitution”.
Criticized for his lack of experience as an elected official or his failure during the 2022 municipal elections in Ndiaganiao (Mbour region), his commune of origin, Bassirou Diomaye Faye, who presents himself as “anti-system” and “pan-African”, can However, count on the territorial network of the ex-Pastef and its allies, as well as a strong presence on social networks.
The party electrifies a significant part of the youth, waiting for prospects, but also mobilizes within the intellectual elite and civil servants. Bassirou Diomaye Faye relies on a program in continuity with that defended in 2019 by Ousmane Sonko. Prominent among them is the promise to fight against corruption and against, he says, French “economic influence” in Senegal. He thus proposes the exit of the CFA franc, the abolition of the post of prime minister and the establishment of a post of vice-president elected in tandem with the head of state, the reduction of the powers of the President of the Republic , the suspension of the fishing agreement with the European Union and the reassessment of oil and gas contracts which should begin to be exploited this year. An anthology of intentions which leaves unanswered the question of the role which will be granted to Ousmane Sonko in the event of victory for his “double”.
