Omar Diop, 20, did not take part in the protests that left nine people dead Thursday in Senegal after the conviction of Ousmane Sonko. But he says he understands the young protesters “angry at the difficult life and the unjust fate” done to the opponent.
“It’s hard what happened, the deaths and the destroyed property, but we could have avoided it if (President) Macky Sall had not imposed it on us by condemning Sonko”, he affirms, on his motorcycle near the new Cambérène bridge, in the suburbs of Dakar.
Many in Senegal believe Mr. Sonko, third in the presidential election in 2019 and candidate for that of 2024, when he says that the proceedings brought against him for rape against an employee of a beauty salon where he gets a massage are a power plot to eliminate him.
There are also many among the youth and in these popular districts of Dakar to place in him their hope for change in a difficult economic context.
Many felt comforted in their suspicion of a set-up against their champion by the conviction of Mr. Sonko on Thursday: for two years they had heard that he was a rape suspect and now the court reclassified the facts and sentenced him to two years firm for pushing a young woman to debauchery.
Omar Diop sympathizes with a man in the ordeal according to him: “We accused him of rape then we condemn him for something else. It’s unfair”.
“Young people are also suffering in Senegal. I am a motorcycle driver because I have nothing else to do,” he says. He stopped school in CM2.
Mr. Sonko’s conviction, if upheld, renders him ineligible. An injustice for many young people who decided to do battle on Thursday.
President Sall “wants to torpedo their hope for a better life in Senegal”, says Aliou Faye, 25.
He lives in Rufisque, near Dakar, where the roadway bears the scars of violence: traces of fire, stones, closed shops all around, near the station of the new fast train serving the capital and its suburbs.
The line, one of the major projects in the president’s plan to put Senegal on the path to development, has been suspended since Thursday.
“Young people are revolting because they want a change. Times are tough. There is no work, no money and life is expensive. ballot boxes to choose a candidate,” said another young man, Demba Faye, 25.
Half of Senegal’s population is under the age of 18, a young country of over 18 million people, according to official statistics.
“Even finding an internship at the end of your studies is difficult”, says Aida Camara, a young person trained in marketing, in search of work.
“There are 300,000 new job seekers every year in Senegal, young people, but the market only absorbs 26,000 of them and it is mainly in the private sector”, explains Tamba Danfakha, a project guide.
President Sall has launched several projects for the integration of young people. Thousands of them have found work in the public service or through state-funded private entrepreneurship, according to the authorities.
President Sall also dangles the promise of exploitation, announced from the end of 2023, of Senegal’s new oil and gas resources.
Mr. Sonko affirms that the State sold off the wealth of Senegal to foreign companies by signing the contracts.
Along the highway leading to Parcelles Assainies, another suburban area, young people light fires near the facilities of the future Bus Rapid Transit (BRT), a bus on its own lane supposed to help relieve congestion in the capital, another major construction site. the Sall presidency. BRT facilities have been ransacked in recent days without ever having been put into service.
In Les Parcelles, young people appoint a spokesperson to speak to the press and acquiesce with a murmur or a nod of the head when he says, on condition of anonymity: “Misfortune is going to fall on this country the day Sonko is put in prison. We are not going to accept it”.
06/03/2023 12:07:51 – Dakar (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
