2023-06-01 20:56:34
Acts of violence erupted Thursday in Dakar and other places in Senegal following the sentencing of Senegalese opponent Ousmane Sonko to two years in prison for “corruption of youth”, a sentence that further compromises his candidacy for the presidential election of 2024.
Immediately following the verdict was announced, Cheikh Anta Diop UCAD University in Dakar recorded violent clashes between young Sonko supporters and law enforcement, media reports.
Groups of young people, some of whom were hooded, confronted the police in riot gear with stones, responding with tear gas.
Several buses from the medical school, history department and journalism school were set on fire and offices ransacked by protesters. Classes at this university have been suspended until further notice by the Rector.
Groups of young people also attacked public property at several points in the capital, burned tires and put obstacles in the streets of Dakar, according to media reports. The streets of Dakar were deserted following these clashes, and businesses closed for fear of acts of ransacking.
Disturbances also took place in the Casamance region (south), in Mbour and Kaolack (west) and Saint-Louis (north).
Local media report that the TER regional express train station in Rufisque, near Dakar, was set on fire by protesters. The same sources indicate demonstrators attacked a Total station in Kaolack, adding that the police arrested several young demonstrators at the level of the various main arteries of the city.
This violence follows the deliberation rendered Thursday by the criminal chamber of the Dakar tribunal de grande instance once morest Ousmane Sonko, accused of “rape” and “death threats”, by a former employee of a beauty salon.
The court sentenced Sonko for “corruption of youth”, which consists in favoring the “debauchery” of a young person under the age of 21. On the other hand, she acquitted him of the charges of rape and death threats. Mr. Sonko has continued to deny the accusations, shouting at a plot of power to dismiss him from the presidential election of 2024.
In a statement relayed by local media, the Minister of Justice, Ismaïla Madior Fall, indicated that Ousmane Sonko, can be arrested “at any time”. “The sentence must be carried out. We are in absentia and the measure can be executed at any time,” he said.
On Wednesday, opening the National Dialogue, President Macky Sall promised firmness in the face of violence. “There is a new situation in our country where certain actors have chosen to destroy the Republic. It is their choice. And faced with this choice, I am obliged to defend this Republic and whatever it may cost. We cannot accept in this country, people who on a daily basis threaten judges and seek their homes and set them on fire, ”warned President Macky Sall in a firm tone.
Sonko, declared presidential candidate of 2024 was already sentenced at the end of March to six months in prison suspended for defamation once morest the Minister of Tourism. This conviction alone, if it is upheld in cassation, threatens the eligibility of Ousmane Sonko for the presidential election of February 25, 2024.
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