(Dakar) Senegalese President Macky Sall on Saturday described as “terrorist acts which will not go unpunished” the deadly unrest that occurred in Senegal in early June after the conviction of opponent Ousmane Sonko in a morality case.
The president was speaking at a ceremony closing a national consultation that began before “the serious excesses of June 2 and 3, unprecedented events” which led to “serious attacks and damage” on “public and private property”, according to Mr Sall.
“It is established that these facts are comparable to terrorist acts which will not go unpunished”, he added when receiving the final report of the consultation opened on May 31 and boycotted by part of the opposition, including the Mr. Sonko’s camp.
PHOTO LEWIS JOLY, ASSOCIATED PRESS
Senegalese President Macky Sall
The participants in this consultation notably agreed on the principle of revising the trial of opponent Karim Wade excluded from the old ballot of 2019.
Karim Wade, son of ex-president Abdoulaye Wade in power from 2000 to 2012, was sentenced in 2015 to six years in prison for illicit enrichment. Former Minister of State of his father, Mr. Wade, 58, was pardoned in 2016 by Macky Sall, and has since been exiled to Qatar.
The consultation also proposed to modify texts to allow the former mayor of Dakar Khalifa Sall, prevented by a conviction in 2018 from running against Macky Sall (no relation) in 2019, to be a presidential candidate for 2024.
The case of Mr. Sonko, sentenced on 1er June to two years in prison, was not addressed by the consultation. His conviction makes him in the current state ineligible. It caused serious unrest in early June, killing 16 people according to the authorities, 24 according to Amnesty International and 30 according to the opposition.
President Sall has promised to speak on his possible presidential candidacy in 2024 after the Muslim Tabaski festival scheduled for Senegal on June 29.
“I will respond very soon. I will make a Nation speech. (It will be) a free, sovereign choice which will be explained to the country and assumed, ”he said.
Mr. Sall was elected in 2012, re-elected in 2019. He had the Constitution revised in 2016. It stipulates that “no one may serve more than two consecutive terms”. His supporters present him as their candidate in 2024, arguing that the revision has reset the counters to zero.